Britain drove the Industrial Revolution with a strategy of learning by experience. The age of science that followed was driven by formal education in abstract and theoretical knowledge that could be applied to many applications. The conditions and environment created by formal education produced the concept of competitive intelligence through the publication of scientific journals and the creation of the mass media.
Industrial espionage arises where the published data is non-existent or beyond the experience of those seeking to reproduce the success of others. They need somebody to show them how to put the pieces together. Sometimes, only people with hands-on experience can pass-on the knowledge.
For example, after 1916 France was desperate for field guns. They gave the USA blueprints for their 75mm gun, which was the best in the world at the time. It was so well designed that a glass of water placed on the carriage would go undisturbed as the gun fired. The Americans could not produce usable copies of the gun until French workers arrived to show them how to properly produce the gun.
After WWI, Germany’s lead in chemistry could not be exploited by the victorious allies, even with the confiscated patents and other documents. The Americans needed German chemists to show them how to make it all work. They got this expertise in the 20’s by hiring away the needed German chemists.
In earlier times, industrial espionage was the preferred method of gathering knowledge and building experience as published data was almost non-existent and experience was limited. Competitive intelligence works when you have the hands-on experience to do something constructive with collected and analysed data.
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