Publication Code: S35

Effective Mechanisms for Supporting Private Sector Technology Development and Needs for Establishing Technology Development Financing Corporation

List of Contents

The extent to which industrial firms can successfully undertake technological endeavours depends very much on their technological and managerial experience and expertise. without deliberate investment in acquiring and accumulating a wide range of resources and capabilities, they are unlikely to progress nor to maintain progress through all phases of their evolution. There are also reasons to believe that unless firms have built up significant in-house capabilities they cannot effectively draw on the R&D results of the public sector, thus limiting the effectiveness of the public-sector investment in R&D. Indeed, there are empirical studies in some advanced countries suggesting that the emergence of their internationally competitive "high-tech" industries owed largely to the acquisition and accumulation of capabilities in industry.

Recognising the importance of private-sector technology development, the National Science and Technology Development Agency (NSTDA) supported this project to explore effective mechanisms for encouraging private-sector technology development, with particular emphasis on R&D financing in conjunction with the application of R&D tax incentives. Specifically, the project has the following objectives:

  1. To analyse the prevailing pattern of science and technology development in Thailand in relation to her industrialisation.
  2. To review existing incentives for promoting R&D in the private sector, and explore possible improvements and alternatives.
  3. To examine the nature of and constraints to industrial technology development in the private sector.
  4. To gather information on the problems faced by private enterprises regarding acquisition of funds and technical supports to meet their present and probable future demands for investment in technology development.
  5. To review the experience in industrialisation and technology development of some selected advanced and newly industrialised countries, and compare with that of Thailand.
  6. To explore the operation of some relevant organisations in some selected advanced and newly industrialised countries, as well as the application of important measures for promoting private-sector technology development, in order to learn about their problems and successes.
    In achieving the objectives, it is expected that the project can also draw on various analyses to examine whether there is a need to set up as a new institution to provide financial and technical supports to private-sector investment in technological development. If the rationale and feasibility of establishing this new institution --- presumably called "Technology Development Financing Corporation" --- is acceptable, the project is expected to propose preliminary plans for its establishment and operation. In other words, the project also has the following objectives:
  7. To identify missions and activities of the proposed institution, and to propose desirable characteristics of its overall organisation and management, and recommend the role NSTDA can play as well as broad strategies and policies that may be needed in supporting its establishment and inducing greater involvement of the private sector in technology development.

 

 

March 1998