Technology transfer was critical, and it lowers the barrier to constant capital heavy industries, but doesn’t remove it completely. You still have to get the physical machines. Also not all technology serves capital heavy industry. A lot of it is also needed for labor intensive industries just to keep up with the overall development of technology and demand. It’s hard to quantify how much of the technology transfer served to break out of the trap and how much just kept it going.
Technology transfer was critical, and it lowers the barrier to constant capital heavy industries, but doesn’t remove it completely. You still have to get the physical machines. Also not all technology serves capital heavy industry. A lot of it is also needed for labor intensive industries just to keep up with the overall development of technology and demand. It’s hard to quantify how much of the technology transfer served to break out of the trap and how much just kept it going.