Technology Road Mapping (TRM) is a framework and technique to scope out future landscapes in science and technology, given objectives such as product or service development, strategic R&D management, and social or industrial policy development. TRM emerged as a set of diverse industry practices, which academics gathered, collated and systematized in the early 2000s, and continue to do so. This programme aimed to enhance the capacity in Scotland for undertaking TRM, in: academic research and knowledge exchange; business practice (with a particular focus on SMEs); and policy, both as a user and diffuser of TRM.
The programme’s objectives included, to:
• Capture state of the art knowledge about TRM among internationally recognised researchers in science, technology and innovation studies, and in strategy practices.
• Capture and contrast expert practices in TRM among large companies and SMEs, compared with other analytical practices in support of decision-making, and across different industry sectors important to the Scottish economy, assessing the extent to which practices can be made generic.
• Appraise the uses of TRM in policy, as practiced in decisions making, as libraries, and as practices to be diffused.