An Evolutionary Approach to Technology Standard Competition: Focusing on 4th wireless telecommunication technology

Abstract

Technology standard competition is a fierce competition between tech- nologies to become a de facto standard. This is because a company or a group that develops and secures a de facto standard technology can gain an edge in the market and industry. This study applies the evolutionary perspective of natural selection to interpret the competition between technologies. By genetically interpret- ing the process of natural selection, the traits suitable for the environment spread to the group through generations through a mechanism called differential reproduction. By culturally interpreting the process of natural selection, the strategies to get higher payoffs spread to the group through generations by diffusion. In order to compare the payoffs between WiMAX technology and LTE technology, the measurement indicators were extracted from the patent data and defined. As a result, it was confirmed that LTE technology standard was technologically superior to the WiMAX technology standard. The main academic contribution of this study Is to compare the technol- ogy-related indicators such as diffusion, scope and profitability to figure out strategies to get higher payoffs between the WiMAX technology standard and LTE technology standard based on the evolutionary perspective.