Issue #178
October 1, 2008
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This newsletter is published by ONRIS at the Centre for International Studies, University of Toronto, and sponsored by the Ministry of Research and Innovation. The views and ideas expressed in this newsletter do not necessarily reflect the views and policies of the Ontario Government.
ANNOUNCEMENTS [Table of Contents]
Trivaris -- a company that puts ideas and money together to create new companies and social ventures-- is moving to Hamilton from Burlington and taking over the entire top floor of the industrial space now under renovation on Longwood Road South. The innovation park is to take shape over 10 to 15 years on a 37-acre brownfield site once occupied by Camco's appliance factory. McMaster bought the property in 2005 and its plans include 14 low-rise buildings housing as many as 3,000 employees in an airy, campus style setting. The park's mission is to build university, government and private partnerships that turn research into commercial products and services. Chamberlain said that mission fits perfectly with his company's, as both work to help Hamilton shift to a knowledge economy.
University of Waterloo Opens Up 'Dorm-cubator' Residence to Student Entrepreneurs
Last week, the first group of 70 upper-year and graduate students began living in VeloCity, a combination residence hall and business incubator at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, designed for student entrepreneurs interested in mobile communications and digital media. The university has spent about $400,000 to convert a 40-year-old building into the residence, which will include a wireless device lab, wi-fi, videoconferencing space, increased bandwidth, student presentation space, a LCD wall screen, and common areas to encourage collaboration.
Turning Innovation Into Ontario Jobs
Recently the Ontario government introduced Ideas for the Future Act, 2008, that, if passed, would provide a 10-year corporate income tax exemption for new companies that turn home-grown ideas into Ontario jobs and products. The tax exemption – the first of its kind in Canada – would encourage Ontario’s entrepreneurs to commercialize public research in areas such as bio-economy/clean technologies, advanced health technologies, and telecommunications, computer and digital technologies. Qualifying corporations that commercialize an idea would be eligible for the tax exemption if developed at qualifying Canadian universities, colleges or research institutes.
EDITOR'S PICK [Table of Contents]
The Global Competition for Talent: Mobility of the Highly Skilled
OECD
This publication discusses the dimensions, significance, and policy implications of international flows of human resources in science and technology. The international mobility of highly skilled workers is increasing in scale and complexity as more economies participate in R&D and innovation activity. Mobile talent diffuses knowledge both directly and indirectly across borders. This can boost global innovation performance, with benefits accruing to both sending and receiving countries. It is clear that mobility is leading to an increasing level of labour-market internationalization and integration, and competition for talent is now influencing innovation policy initiatives across the globe.
INNOVATION & RELATED POLICY [Table of Contents]
Jan Fagerberg, David Mowery, and Bart Verspagen
This paper analyses the co-evolution of science, technology and innovation policy and industrial structure in a small, resource-based economy (Norway). The contributions of the paper are threefold. First, it develops an evolutionary and historically oriented approach to the study of the development of science, technology and innovation policy based that may have wide applicability. Second, if focuses on a particular type of innovation, innovation in resource-based activities, that differs in many respects from the more commonly studied “high-tech” case and which arguably be of relevance for may present day developing countries. Third, the paper advances our understanding of the roles played by institutions and politics in innovation. Previous work on national systems of innovation has often devoted little attention to these matters, possibly because much of it examines “snapshots” of various
innovation systems at a specific point in time and lacks historical depth.
Comparing the Candidate's Technology and Innovation Policies
Stephen J Ezell and Robert T Atkinson, ITIF
With aftershocks continuing to reverberate from last week on Wall Street, the presidential election is likely to be a referendum on which candidate is best suited to deal with a challenging economic situation. Effective technology and innovation policies must be and will be an important part of any solution, and this is an area where McCain and Obama offer quite different perspectives and prescriptions. A new Information Technology and Innovation Policy Foundation report compares the two candidates on innovation and technology policies. The study tracks the candidates’ position in eleven key areas, including tax, trade, education and workforce policies. The report is full of detailed proposals, but also notes that McCain and Obama bring different philosophies to the table.
Trade and Innovation Project: A Synthesis Paper
Osamu Onodera, OECD
This research paper examines the links between trade and innovation. It reviews the academic literature, and also assesses how trade has promoted innovation in five smaller countries: Finland, Korea, New Zealand, South Africa, and Sri Lanka. According to the study, trade’s impacts were in two primary ways. First, technologies and ideas get diffused across borders via trade and other interactions. Second, trade builds economies of scale. As firms gain market share, they can re-invest profits into innovative activities. Firms that are open to global competition tend to be more productive and more profitable, so it makes sense for national governments to open their economies and to update key rules for intellectual property protection and the like. These policy directions are especially important for small and medium-sized enterprises who are critical drivers of innovation in developing economies.
New Challenges for Germany in the Innovation Competition
Fraunhofer Institute for Systems and Innovation Research, the German Institute of Global and Area Studies, and Georgia Tech’s Program in Science, Technology and Innovation Policy
This report benchmarks Germany’s innovation performance against a number of other national systems, including China, France, India, Korea, and the US. Like the US, Germany faces many challenges in terms of coordinating policies across different parts of its Federal system. In terms of strategies, German innovation policies place great emphasis on support for small and medium-sized enterprises, what Germans call the Mittelstrand. These two patterns create special issues for German policymakers who must seek to promote technology transfer and commercialization in a fragmented environment characterized by numerous research organizations and numerous potential partners among German SMEs. Overall, Germany shows great strengths in areas related to international trade and key technology sectors. Information technology presents one exception where Germany’s international technology profile lags other economies. Germany is now making a big national push to spend at least three percent of GDP on R&D. The report applauds this ambition, but also cautions that policy makers must also focus attention on how best to optimize national framework conditions for innovation.
STATISTICS & INDICATORS [Table of Contents]
Saffron Consultants
This study ranks 72 of Europe’s largest cities based on a comparison of their assets and attractions against the strength of their brands. To support the analysis, Saffron commissioned a YouGov poll of 2,000 consumers to find out what people most want from a city. Paris and London emerged as the cities with the best assets and the strongest brands to match. Among old Europe’s other capitals, Berlin is the striking example of a city with a brand that is significantly stronger than its assets. On the other hand, Rome is more blessed with what people want than the German capital but it is not as effective at communicating this – hence its brand is considerably weaker than Berlin’s. Vienna, Austria, was the only city deemed to get precisely the reputation its assets deserve – its brand was judged to be fully consistent with what the city has to offer.
The most recent Urban Audit has revealed that there are large difference between cities in Europe when it comes to their quality of life. The audit included more than 300 indicators concerning a wide range of issues, such as crime, housing, health and climate. The indicators were measured in 321 European cities.
EVENTS [Table of Contents]
St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador, 16-18 October, 2008
The Leslie Harris Centre of Regional Policy and Development, Memorial University of Newfoundland is hosting an International Conference, with over 90 submissions received with themes ranging from:How to identify opportunities and challenges to knowledge sharing; How to work with the media in connecting research to the community; How to translate knowledge to influence policy and decision-making; How communities and non-governmental organizations can "reach in" to influence research and knowledge generation; How outreach centres can evaluate and maximize their impact; How institutions in other countries are doing it, from Iceland and Ireland, to the U.S. and the Philippines; How Canada's research funding councils are developing knowledge transfer and knowledge mobilization strategies.
Regional Comparative Advantage and Knowledge-Based Entrepreneurship
Amsterdam, Netherlands, 9-10 October, 2008
The organizers invite submissions for empirical and theoretical papers on the financing of knowledge-based entrepreneurial firms, on the influence of venture capital on firms’ ability to translate technological advances into successful products, and on the contribution of knowledge-based entrepreneurship to regional dynamics.
Seville, Spain, 16-17 October, 2008
Following the success of 2004 and 2006 events, the International Seville Conference on Future-Oriented Technology Analysis (FTA) has become a major occasion for FTA experts, practitioners and decision-makers to bring their ideas and knowledge together in a highly interactive environment. As with previous FTA events, the 2008 Conference places emphasis on diversity of views by attracting participants from a wide geographical base. Academics, practitioners as well as public and private sector decision makers from Europe, North America, Asia, Latin America, Africa and Australasia are invited to broaden the network and to increase understanding of advances in the field of FTA.
The 5th International Conference on Innovation and Management (ICIM2008)
Maastricht, Netherlands, 10-11 December, 2008
Organized by UNU-MERIT (The Netherlands) and supported by Wuhan University of Technology (China) and Yamaguchi University (Japan), This conference will bring together academics, practitioners and other professionals involved in the filed of innovation and management. The conference format includes plenary and parallel sessions with both academic and practitioner presentations and workshops. In addition, the conference will provide networking opportunities together with a taste of local culture.
Understanding and Shaping Regions: Spatial, Social and Economic Futures
Leuven, Belgium, 6-8 April, 2008
Many topics will be discussed such as regional policy and evaluation, regions as innovative hubs, economic restructuring and regional transformation, and local and regional economic development. Abstract submission deadline: Sunday, 4th January 2009.
Glasgow, Scotland, 17-19 June, 2008
Triple Helix VII offers a multi-disciplinary forum for experts from universities, industry and government. The Conference is designed to attract leading authorities from across the world who will share their knowledge and experience, drawing a link between research, policy, and practice in sustainable development. The Conference will bring together policy-makers, academics, researchers, postgraduate students, and key representatives from business and industry. The theme for Triple Helix VII - “The role of Triple Helix in the Global Agenda of Innovation, Competitiveness and Sustainability” - reflects the interaction between academia, the private and the public sector.
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