Knowledge Economy and Technology Management

Knowledge - The Heart and Mind of Economic Development

- Overview

Knowledge economy is an economic system that relies on intellectual ability to produce goods and services. It is driven by innovation, research and technological advancement.

Technology management is the process of managing and evaluating an organization's information technology (IT) resources. This includes: hardware, software, data, people, procedures.

Technology management enables organizations to:

• Accurately assess IT costs and consumption
• Plan, organize, direct and control IT infrastructure and software applications

With technology advancing faster than ever before, the knowledge economy is becoming increasingly dynamic. Businesses need to work hard to keep up with this growing economic dynamism.

Some challenges of the knowledge economy and technology management include:

• Trust and quality
• ICT supports new channels for collaboration, information exchange and distance learning
• Traditional means of building trust are often bypassed or weakened

- The Knowledge Economy

The knowledge economy (or the knowledge-based economy) is an economic system in which the production of goods and services is based principally on knowledge-intensive activities that contribute to a rapid pace of advancement in technical and scientific innovation as well as accelerated obsolescence. 

The knowledge assessment approach based on four pillars: education, innovation, information and communication technology, and an enabling economic and institutional environment, and it asserts that continued investment in these pillars will lead to sustained economic growth.

The key element of value is the greater dependence on human capital and intellectual property for the source of the innovative ideas, information and practices. Organisations are required to capitalize this "knowledge" into their production to stimulate and deepen the business development process. There is less reliance on physical input and natural resources. A knowledge-based economy relies on the crucial role of intangible assets within the organisations' settings in facilitating modern economic growth. 

A knowledge economy features a highly skilled workforce within the microeconomic and macroeconomic environment; institutions and industries create jobs that demand specialized skills in order to meet the global market needs. Knowledge is viewed as an additional input to labour and capital. In principle, one's primary individual capital is knowledge together with the ability to perform so as to create economic value. 

- The Global Knowledge Economy

The emergence of a global knowledge economy means that globalization now extends beyond markets for goods and finance into markets for technology, knowledge workers, and innovation finance. The knowledge economy is the use of knowledge technologies (such as knowledge engineering and knowledge management) to produce economic benefits as well as job creation. 

The global economy is in transition to a "knowledge economy," as an extension of an "information society." The transition requires that the rules and practices that determined success in the industrial economy need rewriting in an interconnected, globalized economy where knowledge resources such as know-how and expertise are as critical as other economic resources. These rules need to be rewritten at the levels of firms and industries in terms of knowledge management and at the level of public policy as knowledge policy or knowledge-related policy. 

A system of consumption and production that is based on intellectual capital. the knowledge economy commonly makes up a large share of all economic activity in developed countries. In a knowledge economy, a significant part of a company's value may consist of intangible assets, such as the value of its workers' knowledge (intellectual capital). However, generally accepted accounting principles do not allow companies to include these assets on balance sheets.

Lesser-developed countries tend to have agriculture or agriculture and manufacturing-based economies, while developing countries tend to have manufacturing or manufacturing and service-based economies, and developed countries tend to have service-based economies.

Most countries' economies will consist of each of these three major categories of economic activity, but in differing proportions relative to the wealth of that country. Examples of knowledge economy activities include research, technical support and consulting.

[Budapest, Hungary - Civil Engineering Discoveries]

- Transdisciplinary Research and Interdisciplinary Research

[Harvard University]: The definitions below are meant to provide a greater understanding of collaborative team science.

• Transdisciplinary Research is defined as research efforts conducted by investigators from different disciplines working jointly to create new conceptual, theoretical, methodological, and translational innovations that integrate and move beyond discipline-specific approaches to address a common problem.
• Interdisciplinary Research is any study or group of studies undertaken by scholars from two or more distinct scientific disciplines. The research is based upon a conceptual model that links or integrates theoretical frameworks from those disciplines, uses study design and methodology that is not limited to any one field, and requires the use of perspectives and skills of the involved disciplines throughout multiple phases of the research process.

- The Four Pillars of the Knowledge Economy

[The World Bank]: The Knowledge - the heart and mind of economic development. The following pillars are four critical requisites for a country to be able to fully participate in the knowledge economy: 

• Education & Training: An educated and skilled population is needed to create, share and use knowledge.
• Information Infrastructure: A dynamic information infrastructure-ranging from radio to the internet-is required to facilitate the effective communication, dissemination and processing of information.
• Economic Incentive & Institutional Regime: A regulatory and economic environment that enables the free flow of knowledge, supports investment in Information and Communications Technology (ICT), and encourages entrepreneurship is central to the knowledge economy.
• Innovation Systems: A network of research centers, universities, think tanks, private enterprises and community groups is necessary to tap into the growing stock of global knowledge, assimilate and adapt it to local needs, and create new knowledge.

- Technology Management

Technology management can be described as a discipline - closely related or synonymous with IT management - in which businesses and/or companies utilize the different technologies available to them for strategic growth. To do this, businesses must understand the role technology plays in each department and as an entity as a whole. 

Additionally, businesses must invest in new technologies and improve existing ones. Technology management is a relatively new field that relies heavily on an understanding of business and technical skills.

Technology enables businesses to face competitors in almost any market. Technology can directly impact business growth in a number of ways.

- Major Technologies that Will Lead the World in the Next Hundred Years

In the next hundred years of mankind, four major technologies will lead the world:

• Quantum Computing: IBM quantum technology mastered by the Rockefeller camp leads the world: IBM quantum chips and quantum technology are commercially applied, and the world's traditional financial institutions are almost collapsing. Combining blockchain, digital currency, and quantum communication technology will change the world. Communication rules and financial order.
• Biological stem cells: The United States' leading global biotechnology has completely changed the way humans live. The vaccine disaster will approve the use of stem cells and change stem cell transplantation due to ethical issues.
• Graphene nanomaterials: Britain, Japan, the United States, and China: Nanomaterials change the natural inheritance of human sexual reproduction and egg laying, and combine technology with biological genetic modification to transform into asexually reproducing plant humans, completely reversing the way humans live.
• Artificial Intelligence: Stanford University: Human beings have mastered biotechnology genetic modification, stem cell technology combined with nanotechnology. Human beings do not need sexual reproduction and can create humanoid tools on demand. Human beliefs and religions will be completely subverted.

Whoever controls the future technology is the most important way to survive!