The Fit and Misfit of Technological Capability: Responses to Vehicle Emission Regulation in the United States

Regulatory moves towards reducing vehicle emissions have not proceeded with uniform success. Some regulations have been readily fulfilled whilst others receive much criticism and resistance from the automotive industry. The reasons for this lie in matching the process of innovation with the technological capabilities of the auto industry. Low emission vehicles represent an incremental development of established technologies and so are readily accepted by manufacturers, whilst the transition to zero emission vehicles demands technologies outside the boundaries of traditional automotive firms and has met more resistance. For such innovation and technology development processes to be fully understood demands the extension of existing, increasingly contingency focused, frameworks. The models we use need to be developed to reflect advances elsewhere in management research with the inclusion of capability based models. This allows the developmentof a greater sensitivity for how networks of firms and regulations interact