The Diffusion of Technology

M2A1 Short Paper: The Diffusion of Technology

Businessmen and women speaking around a table. Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel, second from left, meets with corporate and non-profit veterans organization’s leadership at a round table hosted by J.P. Morgan Chase in New York City, N.Y., on Nov. 1, 2013.A technology is useless unless it is put to use. This is a crushingly obvious statement, but it does serve to remind us that a technology that never makes it out of a laboratory or an inventor’s basement might as well not exist. We have recently discussed the process by which technologies are introduced and then put into use. Here, we examine the method of diffusion, the process by which technologies make it into homes, factories, and so forth. In this assignment, you discuss how a CEO makes technological decisions and the rationale behind those thought processes. Scenario: You are a CEO of well-established and profitable software technology firm that has a choice to invest in one of two new software technologies; one that promises modest profit with very little risk and another that may yield a very high profit but at considerable risk. Keeping in mind cultural factors (social values/priorities, politics, economy, technology, regulation, etc.) answer the following: 1.What would your choice be? 2. Who in your company might support the first technology and who might support the second? Think about individuals from all levels of the company, from the CEO and board members down to R&D personnel. 3. What considerations of your decision need to be made from a societal perspective? Consider individuals outside of the company itself. 4. How might the type of industry affect this type of decision?