Abstract: An understanding of the growth of surgical robotic technology is not only a contribution to the academic literature on the proliferation of new technology, but also it is a precursor to effective U.S. public policies toward this burgeoning new technology and the ecosystem that it will create.  Using patent application information from filings with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, we characterize the growth of this technology in terms of a traditional S-curve model.  We also hypothesize a theory of the distribution of surgical robotic technology, and we test our theory empirically.  Our findings are anticipatory of the future promulgation of public sector performancestandards for the use of this technology in open surgery situations.

 

 

About Albert Link

De Albert N. Link is Professor Emeritus, Department of Economics, at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro (UNCG) and Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for Development Strategies at Indiana University.  Prior to retirement, Link was the Virginia Batte Phillips Distinguished Professor at UNCG. Link received the B.S. degree in mathematics from the University of Richmond (Phi Beta Kappa) and the Ph.D. degree in economics from Tulane University.  After receiving the Ph.D., he joined the economics faculty at Auburn University, was later Scholar-in-Residence at Syracuse University, and then he joined the economics faculty at UNCG in 1982.  

Link’s research focuses on innovation and entrepreneurship policy, the economics of R&D, and policy/program evaluation. He served as the Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Technology Transfer from 1996 through 2025.  He is currently co-editor of Foundations and Trends in Entrepreneurship and founder and editor of Annals of Science and Technology Policy.  He was the 2026 Recipient of the Global Award for Entrepreneurship Research.

Link is the author/co-author or editor/co-editor of more than 70 academic books, and author/co-author of more than 250 peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters. 

Link’s public service includes testifying before the U.S. Congress in April 2011 on the economic benefits associated with the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program.  He also served from 2007 to 2012 as a U.S. Representative to the United Nations (in Geneva, Switzerland) on the Team of Specialists on Innovation and Competitiveness Policies Initiative for the Economic Commission for Europe.  And, in October 2018, he delivered the European Commission Distinguished Scholar Lecture at the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre (in Seville, Spain).