ECTS: 6

Year: 2

Semester: I

Instructor: Mauro Lombardi

The digital age we are living in: the second economy (Arthur), ubicomp (ubiquitous computing), "calm technology" (Weiser, 1991, 1993). The age of the spiritual machine (Kurzweil): what technology is. The starting point: the invention of invention (Landes, 1998). Technology and the Economy: some stylized facts. Taxonomy of innovations: radical, incremental, modular, architectural. Technological paradigms, technological trajectories, techno-economic landscapes. Different approaches to the analysis of production processes. Innovation processes between path dependence and path creation. Decision making processes: 1) standard mainstream paradigm, 2) evolutionary approach, the agents of techno-economic dynamics: individuals, firms, socio-technical systems. Basic concepts for the current Century (I): systems and complex systems. Basic concepts for the current Century (II): disruptive technologies, big data and data analytics, augmented reality, cloud computing and their consequences for business models.