Challenges for Nanomanufacturing Businesses

The identification of managerial challenges offered by an emerging nanotechnology innovation has been examined in a recent academic study. The study concerned the future of European manufacturing, based on interviewing technology experts and business leaders associated with the NanoManufacturing Institute (NMi) at Leeds University.

Nanomanufacturing has seen rapid development in the past ten years. Using bottom-up structural arrangements at the atomic and molecular level, scientists and engineers are for the first time engineering materials and devices with dimensions of the order of a billionth of a meter. Emerging from a convergence of quantum physics, molecular biology, computer science, chemistry and engineering, nanotechnology has been directed towards applications which have spread through different industries with varying magnitudes of impact on firms and their competitive position. Despite the enormous potential benefits of this technology, there are barriers to overcome for organisations interested in its commercial exploitation.

The nanotechnology innovation system contains organisations defined with reference to their technological problem-solving activities as well as their endeavour in creating capabilities in technology use. To map such a system the study used results from a Delphi analysis* of European manufacturing experts. The Delphi analysis showed a field that is both excited by the potential for innovation using nanotechnology and yet deeply ambiguous and even sceptical. Results suggest that randomly chosen manufacturing experts feel uncertain about engaging in nanomanufacturing, with a broad range of opinion concerning its relative future importance for European competitiveness. It is indicative that 35% of participants in the Delphi analysis attached a rank of ‘low’ or ‘very low’ to the prospects of using nanotechnology in manufacturing.

This is in stark contrast with a recently introduced European Union 7 Framework Programme, in which nanomanufacturing is considered a major priority. It, however, resonates well with the recently published report by Marks and Clerk (Kinsler, 2006), that sees Europe lagging behind Asia and the USA in the annual rate of filing nanotechnology patents. The majority of respondents thought the innovative potential of nanomanufacturing would be realised, but only in a 15 year timeframe.

Significantly, the contested nature of nanotechnology knowledge is suggested by that significant minority of experts for whom the commercialisation of nanotechnology will never be realised. Equally suggestive is the dispersed and asymmetric nature of the knowledge, revealed in the relatively high proportion who, despite their manufacturing expertise, felt unable to offer an opinion.

The self-assessed expertise of the participants with respect to their responses to questions on the time frame of realisation and the importance for manufacturing competitiveness also showed wide variation. Participants who declared themselves as having high or very high expertise in the area of nanotechnology were more inclined to view nanotechnology as being more important for manufacturing competitiveness and believed it would realise benefits sooner than participants who declared themselves as having low or very low expertise. It is, however, interesting that a minority of self-assessed experts in the field of nanotechnology still believed nanotechnology to be of little importance to manufacturing.

Figure 1 offers an interesting comparison between nanotechnology and other emerging technologies in manufacturing that were considered in the Delphi survey. Nanomanufacturing is considered as the technology for which the foreseen time of realisation is the longest. It has also the highest ‘never’ and ‘I don’t know’ rate.

Fig. 1. Importance and time of realisation for selected statements



Figure 2 shows how, from the six identified sources of obstruction, there was an overriding concern with the technical feasibility of the technology, followed by a lack of research investment. Commercial viability and a deficiency of qualified exponents were also recognised as of potential concern, yet the wider social impacts (and any associated legislation) were considered less of a barrier, something potentially anomalous given mounting concerns about the toxicity and invasiveness of nanomaterials. The data obtained from the Delphi study shows knowledge to be dispersed amongst manufacturers in Europe and the considered views about its range and potential suggests a wide variation in awareness of possible applications.

Fig. 2. Main barriers to the realisation of nanomanufacturing.



* Delphi has been defined as a method for structuring group communication processes using expert consultation to deal with a complex problem. Here the Delphi method acts as a formal intervention to integrate knowledge through structured communications that enable an analysis of a shifting and uncertain social reality. As such, the Delphi analysis helps to inform the development of research models.


References:
The Nanomanufacturing Institute http://www.leeds.ac.uk/nmi
K. Pandza, R. Holt, Absorptive and transformative capacities in nanotechnology innovation systems, 2007, J. Eng. Technol. Manage. 24 (2007) 347–365
Kinsler, M. (2006) http://www.marks-clerk.com/attorneys/Nanotech.htm.
H. Linston and M. Turoff, 1975. The Delphi Method, Techniques and Applications. Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA


Dr Simon Wilkins, University of Leeds May (2008)