The low-value trap: Sustaining multi-actor collaboration across problem spaces in emerging technology commercialization

Despite the potential applications of bio-marine technologies, many promising innovations remain confined to the laboratory, missing potential high-value applications and damaging the overall perception of the emerging technology. Prior research has highlighted the positive impact of multi-actor collaborations on technology development, particularly to bridge the gap between the lab and the market. However, we know little about the mechanisms that sustain productive multi-actor collaboration in emerging technology commercialization and why they prove insufficient as actors move from low-to high-value applications. We study the case of an emerging technology – the utilization and application of fucoidan, a bio-marine extract – to explore how collaboration is sustained among actors as they face the increasing complexity of the technology commercialization for high-value applications. By building on patents and publications and analyzing in-depth interviews, we identify three key mechanisms that support effective collaboration: anchoring a shared vision, coordinating across knowledge boundaries, and structuring an operational framework. We show how these mechanisms need to be recalibrated, not simply scaled, when actors transition across problem spaces from low to high-value applications, and why the failure to do so produces a low-value trap for the emerging technology.