This paper deals with the diversity of patterns of innovation
across industrial sectors and the definition of technological
regimes. Technological regimes are important because they identify
common properties of innovative processes in distinct sets
of production activities. Such properties contribute to interpreting
asymmetries in the dynamics of industrial competition.
This paper revises the prevailing definition of technological
regimes and provides a systematic summary of the evidence by
developing a new typology of regimes. The analysis suggests
that the concept of technological entry barriers might be a
more useful concept than that of appropriability.
The distinction between technologies and products is also revealed
important to assess features of regimes that are independent
on the characteristics of particular technologies, such as the
complexity of knowledge bases and the diversity of search trajectories.
Last, the importance of inter-firm diversity in innovative
environments is revised; in areas of high technological opportunities,
technological regimes impose stronger imperative on the rates
and directions of firms’ search.