This paper analyzes a rarely addressed issue: the long time lag between scientific advances and the commercialization of them. It does this by reinterpreting the time lag in terms of technological discontinuities: the new time lag is from when the concepts or architectures that form the basis of a discontinuity are first identified (advances in science) to when the discontinuities are successfully commercialized. Using the history of computers, it shows how the long time lag for them was primarily due to inadequate components. Second, it shows how one can define a minimum threshold of performance in each technological discontinuity for both computers and the electronic components that made these discontinuities in computers possible. Third, it shows how improvements in these components have changed the tradeoffs that users and designers make when they consider computers and how this led to the emergence of discontinuities.