Issue #215
June 15, 2010
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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]
Ontario Government Invests $1.86 Million in Green Energy Projects
Morgan Solar Inc. will receive a substantial financial contribution from the Ontario government to facilitate the launch of its commercial activities in the province. The young Toronto-based company has developed a unique photovoltaic (PV) panel characterized by its lightness, sturdiness, and unparalleled sunlight-concentrating capacity. With the $1.86 million in funding it received from the government, Morgan Solar will soon begin manufacturing its patented technology for market. Construction of a new production facility will undoubtedly create many temporary employment opportunities, but once operational, Morgan Solar's production line could create as many as twenty new long-term solar jobs. The provincial government’s investment reflects the considerable growth of the solar energy industry, even during one of the worst economic crises in the past several decades.
Governments of Canada and Manitoba Investing in Pulp and Paper Innovation
The pulp and paper industry received a boost today when the Governments of Canada and Manitoba delivered a $400,000 investment to support research and development of high quality, eco-friendly paper made from agricultural crop byproducts. To date, the provincial and federal governments have invested $575,000 in Prairie Pulp and Paper through programs including Manitoba Rural Adaptation Council (MRAC), Sustainable Development Innovations Fund (SDIF), Technology Commercialization Program, and Agri-Food Research and Development Initiative to support the original prefeasibility study to develop a lab-scale prototype paper product that meets industry specifications.
EDITOR'S PICK [Table of Contents]
Hubs of Transformation: Leveraging the Great Lakes Research Complex for Energy Innovation
The Brookings Institution
America needs to transform its energy system, and the Great Lakes region (including Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Michigan, Kentucky, West Virginia, western Pennsylvania and western New York) possesses many of the needed innovation assets. For that reason, the federal government should leverage this troubled region’s research and engineering strengths by launching a region-wide network of collaborative, high intensity energy research and innovation centers. Currently, U.S. energy innovation efforts remain insufficient to ensure the development and deployment of clean energy technologies and processes. Such deployment is impeded by multiple market problems that lead private firms to under-invest and to focus on short-term, low-risk research and product development. Federal energy efforts—let alone state and local ones—remain too small and too poorly organized to deliver the needed breakthroughs. A new approach is essential.
INNOVATION & RELATED POLICY [Table of Contents]
Institute for Competitiveness and Prosperity
While the impact of the recent recession has been devastating, the Institute, like all Canadians, is hopeful that the worst is over and that Canada is on the road to economic recovery. The challenge is to look beyond the recovery, whenever it occurs; ensuring that the recession’s damage is short lived while keeping our eye on a long-term Prosperity Agenda for Canada. The report argues that Canada needs to look beyond the current turbulence and beyond the recovery, avoiding the temptations and traps of poor economic policy. It must strive to stay on track to achieve prosperity potential through positive attitudes, wise investments, excellent tax policy, and structures that encourage innovation
Open Canada: A Global Positioning Strategy for a Networked Age
Canadian International Council
The pace of economic development in Asia and South America, and the new power that comes with it, offer Canada a chance to lead and prosper. The country is armed with natural and intellectual resources that can be galvanized to transform the nation into a leader on the world stage, to become "the new Canada" – if it acts now. Canada will never be the most powerful nation on Earth. But we live in a digital age, where might is measured in knowledge rather than muscularity. If Canada keep building on openness—attracting the best and the brightest citizens, generating and exchanging new ideas and new ways of doing things and welcoming investment in our economy—it can position itself at the centre of the networked world that is emerging in the 21st century.
Strengthening Clean Energy Competitiveness: Opportunities for America COMPETES Reauthorization
The Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF)
Reauthorizing the American COMPETES Act provides an opportunity for Congress to strengthen U.S. clean energy innovation and competitiveness policies. In a joint report, the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, the Breakthrough Institute, and the Metropolitan Policy Program at the Brookings Institution outline how the U.S. can regain leadership in the global clean energy market with major investments in clean energy technology and support of bold new paradigms in clean energy education, innovation, and production and manufacturing policy.
CITIES, CLUSTERS & REGIONS [Table of Contents]
Climate Change Adaptation in New York City: Building a Risk Management Response
New York City Panel on Climate Change
Climate change has the potential to affect everyday life in New York City. Environmental conditions as the city experiences them today will shift, exposing the city and its residents to new hazards and heightened risks; the city will be challenged by increasing temperatures, changes in precipitation patterns, rising sea levels, and more intense and frequent extreme events. While mitigation actions that reduce greenhouse gas emissions will help to decrease the magnitude and impact of future changes, they will not prevent climate change from occurring altogether. Funded through a grant from the Rockefeller Foundation and modeled on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the New York City Panel on Climate Change (NPCC) was convened by Mayor Michael Bloomberg in August 2008 as part of PlaNYC, the City's long-term sustainability plan. The NPCC consists of scientists who study climate change and its impact, as well as legal, insurance, and risk management experts. This Annals volume presents the NPCC report, including New York City–specific climate change projections, tools to help entities identify climate vulnerabilities and develop adaptation strategies, and recommendations on how to foster an effective climate resilience program.
Regional Innovation Governance
European Union Directorate-General for Regional Policy
This study presents different approaches towards the governance of innovation; examines complementarities between the ERDF and the national/regional funds for innovation; shows an obvious effort to involve partners in the design and in some cases in the implementation of the programme; and argues that there is still room to improve the effectiveness of ERDF support for innovation. Based on only 14 regional case studies, its findings should be understood as a partial picture of the EU regional governance of innovation.
STATISTICS & INDICATORS [Table of Contents]
Measuring Innovation: A New Perspective
OECD
This report presents new measures and new ways of looking at traditional indicators. It builds on 50 years of indicator development by OECD and goes beyond R&D to describe the broader context in which innovation occurs. It includes some experimental indicators that provide insight into new areas of policy interest. It highlights measurement gaps and proposes directions for advancing the measurement agenda.This publication begins by describing innovation today. It looks at what is driving innovation in firms, and how the scientific and research landscape is being reconfigured by convergence, interdisciplinarity and the new geography of innovation hot spots. It presents broader measures of innovation, for example using new indicators of investment in intangible assets and trademarks.Human capital is the basic input of innovation, and a series of indicators looks at how well education systems are contributing to the knowledge and research bases. Further series examine how firms transform skills and knowledge, and shed light on the different roles of public and private investment in fostering innovation and reaping its rewards, with concrete examples from major global challenges such as health and climate change. This report is a major step towards evidence-based innovation policy making. It complements traditional “positioning”-type indicators with ones that show how innovation is, or could be, linked to policy. It also recognizes that much more remains to be done, and points to the measurement challenges statisticians, researchers and policy makers alike need to address.
Eurobarometer Survey of Entrepreneurship
European Commission of Enterprise and Industry
The survey on entrepreneurship is about peoples' entrepreneurial mindset. It examines the motivation, choices, experiences and obstacles linked to self-employment. The results help EU policy makers to understand problems and develop future policy responses. The 2009 survey is based on data from interviews with over 26,000 persons in 36 states. The survey includes the EU27, the EEA/EFTA countries (Norway, Iceland, and Switzerland), Turkey and Croatia. As in the past the United States of America were also covered by the survey. For the first time countries from Asia (Japan, South Korea and China) were also included in the Eurobarometer
POLICY DIGEST [Table of Contents]
The OECD Innovation Strategy: Getting a Head Start on Tomorrow
OECD
The world today faces significant economic, environmental and social challenges. While no single policy instrument holds all the answers, innovation is the key ingredient of any effort to improve people’s quality of life. Today’s recovery from the global financial and economic crisis remains fragile. As countries seek to improve productivity performance and ensure sustained growth, they will need to boost their capacity to innovate. Innovation is also essential for addressing some of society’s most pressing issues, such as climate change, health and poverty.
But how can governments encourage more people to innovation more of the time? And how can government itself be more innovative?
To transform invention successfully into innovation requires a range of complementary activities, including organizational changes, firm-level training, testing, marketing and design. Science continues to be an essential ingredient of innovation, even though innovation now encompasses much more than R&D. Innovation also rarely occurs in isolation; it is a highly interactive and multidisciplinary process and increasingly involves collaboration by a growing and diverse network of stakeholders, institutions and users. Moreover, the emergence of new and important players has added to the complexity of the multifaceted international landscape of innovation.
The objective of the OECD’s Innovation Strategy is to support this process of policy development, recognizing that “one size does not fit all”. It is built around five priorities for government action, which together form a coherent and comprehensive approach to policies for innovation that can help underpin an innovation-led recovery and strengthen the role of innovation in the long run.
1. People should be empowered to innovate
Human capital is the essence of innovation. Empowering people to innovate relies on broad and relevant education as well as on the development of wide-ranging skills that complement formal education. Curricula and pedagogies need to be adapted to equip students with the capacity to learn and apply new skills throughout their lives. At the same time, education and skills development systems require reform to ensure they are efficient and meet the requirements of society today.
2. Innovation in firms must be unleashed
Firms are essential for translating good ideas into jobs and wealth. New and young firms are particularly important, as they often exploit technological or commercial opportunities that have been neglected by more established companies. Both market entry and exit are indispensable for the experimentation that leads to the development of new technologies and markets. Simplifying and reducing start-up regulations and administrative burdens can reduce barriers to entry. Bankruptcy laws should be less punitive for entrepreneurs and should offer more favourable conditions for the restructuring of ailing businesses, with due regard to risk management and the need to avoid moral hazard.
3. The creation, diffusion and application of knowledge is critical
Science continues to be at the heart of innovation and public research institutions in many OECD countries require reform in order to maintain excellence and improve collaboration with the business sector. Today, high-speed communication networks support innovation throughout the economy much as electricity and transport networks spurred innovation in the past. Governments should also foster ICTs, in particular broadband networks, as platforms for innovation by upholding the open, free, decentralized and dynamic nature of the Internet. In addition to hardware and software, ICT infrastructure includes information that is publicly generated or funded. Provision of this information at no or low cost can stimulate innovation and improve the transparency and efficiency of government. Obstacles that impede the commercial and non-commercial re-use of public-sector information should be addressed including restrictive or unclear rules governing access and conditions of reuse; unclear and inconsistent pricing of information when re-use is chargeable; and complex and lengthy licensing procedures. In general, public information should remain open so as to eliminate exclusive arrangements and allow innovative commercial and non-commercial re-use.
4. Innovation can be applied to address global and societal challenges
Global challenges need to be addressed collectively through global solutions and bilateral and multilateral international co-operation. However, current global challenges require more concerted approaches to accelerate technology development and diffusion and bring innovative products to the market. A new model for the governance of multilateral co-operation on international science, technology and innovation should be explored. It could focus on setting priorities, funding and institutional arrangements, procedures to ensure access to knowledge and transfer of technology, capacity building, and the delivery of new innovations into widespread use.
5. The governance and measurement of policies for innovation should be improved
Given the increasingly central role of innovation in delivering a wide range of economic and social objectives, a whole-of-government approach to policies for innovation is needed. This requires stable platforms for co-ordinating actions, a focus on policies with a medium- and long-term perspective, and leadership by policy makers at the highest level. Involving stakeholders in policy development can help develop a shared vision and make policies more effective in meeting social goals. This also involves coherence and complementarities between the local, regional, national and international levels. Evaluation is essential to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of policies to foster innovation and deliver social welfare. Improved means of evaluation are needed to capture the broadening of innovation, along with better feedback of evaluation into the policy-making process. This also calls for improved measurement of innovation, including its outcomes and
impacts.
The way forward - changing the emphasis in policies for innovation
The broad concept of innovation embraced by the OECD Innovation Strategy emphasises the need for a better match between supply-side inputs and the demand side, including the role of markets. Moreover, policy actions need to reflect the changing nature of innovation. This implies an emphasis on the following areas:
• A more strategic focus on the role of policies for innovation in delivering stronger, cleaner and fairer growth.
• Broadening policies to foster innovation beyond science and technology in recognition of the fact that innovation involves a wide range of investments in intangible assets and of actors.
• Education and training policies adapted to the needs of society today to empower people throughout society to be creative, engage in innovation and benefit from its outcomes.
• Greater policy attention to the creation and growth of new firms and their role in creating breakthrough innovations and new jobs.
• Sufficient attention for the fundamental role of scientific research in enabling radical innovation and providing the foundation for future innovation.
• Improved mechanisms to foster the diffusion and application of knowledge through well-functioning networks and markets.
• Attention for the role of government in creating new platforms for innovation, e.g. through the development of high-speed broadband networks.
• New approaches and governance mechanisms for international co-operation in science and technology to help address global challenges and share costs and risks.
• Frameworks for measuring the broader, more networked concept of innovation and its impacts to guide policy making.
The OECD stands ready to help governments and international instances to use the Innovation Strategy in designing their approaches to finding national and global solutions. Implementing the Innovation Strategy will be an ongoing and evolving process, which will benefit from monitoring, peer review and the exchange of experience and good policy practices.
EVENTS [Table of Contents]
Opening Up Innovation: Strategy, Organization and Innovation
London, 16-18 June, 2010
The DRUID Summer Conference 2010 intends to explore new theoretical, empirical and methodological advances in industrial dynamics, contributing novel insights and stimulating a lively debate about how economic systems and organizations evolve. The conference will include an exciting programme of plenary debates where internationally leading scholars take stands on contemporary issues within the overall conference theme. Both senior and junior scholars are invited to participate and contribute to the conference with a paper.
McMaster Innovation Showcase: Growing Innovation 
Hamilton, 17 June, 2010
From seed to sprout, from blossom to fruit each stage of the innovation lifecycle presents challenges. In 2010, the McMaster Innovation Showcase will give the growers of innovation the tools and knowledge they need to reach the harvest. This year’s showcase will focus on the many research centers at McMaster, which act as innovation hothouses. Tonya Surman, Executive Director of the Center for Social Innovation, is a leader in the movement to use social innovation, to resolve existing social, cultural, economic and environmental challenges for the benefit of people and planet. Her keynote speech will explore this growing movement.
Aalborg, Denmark, 21-24 June, 2010
Schumpeter 2010 serves as an opportunity for both established scholars and young researchers to present research that has a Schumpeterian perspective. The major topic of the conference is "Innovation, Organisation, Sustainability and Crises". But the conference more generally embraces micro-studies of the innovation, routine and selection as well as studies of the macro-problems of Schumpeterian growth and development as a process of "creative destruction". The broad range of issues implies that both economists, business economists, and other social scientists can contribute to the conference and that evidence may be provided by statistical and historical methods as well as other methods.
Experience the Creative Economy
Toronto, 22-24 June, 2010
This is a unique conference which allows scholars new in their careers to experience notions of the creative economy in a small and focused setting. This conference will bring together up to 25 individuals with similar research interests to share their work, receive feedback, foster the development of effective research methods and to establish an ongoing framework of collaborative learning and mutual exchange for years to come.
Resilient Places: The Future for Local Economic Development
Manchester, UK, 13-14 July, 2010
Local economic development is changing as the policy context and the on-the-ground challenges evolve and intensify. This CLES Summit is about unpacking and exploring what these changes will mean for your work, your organization and for the future of economic development. Many topics will be discussed such as the future for local economic development and regeneration, the green economy, and the changing relationship between the region and the local.
Partnerships in S&T Policy Research
Waterville Valley, NH, 8-13 August, 2010
The 2010 Gordon Conference on Science and Technology Policy will focus on a wide range of research at the intersection of science, technology, policy and society. The 2010 Conference will focus in particular on further developing partnerships between North American and European researchers. Invited speakers represent a variety of scientific disciplines in the policy sciences, social and natural sciences as well as the humanities. The Conference will bring together a collection of investigators who are at the forefront of their field, and will provide opportunities for junior scientists and graduate students to present their work in poster format and exchange ideas with leaders in the field. The collegial atmosphere of this Conference, with programmed discussion sessions as well as opportunities for informal gatherings in the afternoons and evenings, provides an avenue for scholars from different disciplines to brainstorm and promotes cross-disciplinary collaborations in the various research areas represented.
Toronto, 30 September, 2010
Toronto and the Greater Toronto Area ICT cluster, comes together for a celebration of technology as an engine of economic growth at the Allstream Centre at Exhibition Place in downtown Toronto. We live in a new world without borders. Two out of every three people in the world own a mobile communications device….and Toronto is leading the way to this borderless future. Technicity brings together technology leaders, entrepreneurs, investors and representatives of the region’s economic development agencies for a day of panel discussions, displays and an evening to remember, to celebrate, to brainstorm, network and create economic opportunity. It also serves as an opportunity to leverage our talent pool, infrastructure, and geographic location to broaden the base of our already powerful ICT cluster.Technicity will highlight breaking technologies such as wireless data connectivity that will make up in next-generation cars to predictive analytics that is the next-generation for business intelligence.
Triple Helix in the Development of Cities of Knowledge, Expanding Communities and Connecting Regions
Madrid, Spain, 20-22 Oct, 2010
Innovation is understood as a resultant of a complex and dynamic process related to interactions between University, Industry and Government, in a spiral of endless transitions. The Triple Helix approach, developed by Henry Etzkowitz and Loet Leydesdorff, is based on the perspective of University as a leader of the relationship with Industry and Government, to generate new knowledge, innovation and economic development. The main theme of our conference is “Triple Helix in the Development of Cities of Knowledge, Expanding Communities and Connecting Regions”.
Entrepreneurship and Community: 26th Annual CCSBE Conference
Calgary, 28-30 October, 2010
The theme this year is Entrepreneurship and Community. We are seeking to explore the multifaceted impact entrepreneurs and small businesses have on their communities through their new ventures, business and community outreach. There is growing recognition by policy makers, members of society, business leaders and youth, that creative approaches are needed to address environmental, economic, and societal issues. The conference program highlights the research, educational methods, and community practices pertaining to venture sustainability and social entrepreneurship. In support of the theme we have attracted an array of plenary and guest speakers, and developed workshops which will contribute to the dialogue.
Reshaping Europe: Addressing Societal Challenges Through Entrepreneurship and Innovation
Liege, Belgium, 27-29 October, 2010
Over the past couple of years, Europe, and the rest of the world, has faced an unprecedented crisis affecting all sectors of the economy. The crisis and the recovery that is now taking place in most Member States provide experiences that can be used to reshape Europe and to ensure that it is stronger and better prepared for the challenges of the 21st century. The Europe 2020 Strategy is designed to improve the business environment. It is vital that this environment offers the framework conditions to turn ideas into products and services more quickly and easily, whilst addressing environmental concerns and making efficient use of resources. At this important turning point, the Europe INNOVA conference will provide a timely opportunity to determine how innovation policy and innovation support can help Europe and its enterprises, both large and small, to best face these challenges.The conference will unite the Europe INNOVA Community with key innovation stakeholders from the worlds of politics, academia and business. Together they will discuss three approaches that are crucial if Europe is to respond to the societal challenges with which it is currently confronted.
Making Innovation Work for Society: Linking, Leveraging and Learning GLOBELICS 8th Annual Conference
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, 1-3 November, 2010
Global Network for Economics of Learning, Innovation, and Competence Building Systems (GLOBELICS) is an international network of scholars who apply the concept of "learning, innovation, and competence building system" (LICS) as their framework and are dedicated to the strengthening of LICS in developing countries, emerging economies and societies in transition. The research aims at locating unique systemic features as well as generic good practices to enlighten policy making relating to innovation, competence building, international competitiveness, regional development, labour market and human capital development. In an increasingly global and knowledge‐based competition, management strategies need to be based upon an understanding of these framework conditions and the public policies which seek to regulate the environment.
CALL FOR PAPERS: The Entrepreneurial University and thte Academic Enterprise
Washington, DC, 12-13 November, 2010
The theme of the 2010 conference is The Entrepreneurial University and the Academic Enterprise. Conference presentations should focus on the potential commonalities and/or conflicts of interests among government, university, and industry participants in technology transfer. The sessions will emphasize also the assessment of technology transfer activities, especially how to examine the objectives and processes of technology transfer activities (beyond the immediate needs of the participants), including both formal and informal transfer mechanisms (Link, Siegel & Bozeman, 2007; Abreu et al, 2008). Special focus will be placed on papers which evaluate the aspects of academicuniversity research relationships beyond their immediate outputs (Georghiou & Roessner, 2000; Vonortas & Spivack, 2005, Carayannis and Provance, 2007), including intellectual property issues (Feller & Feldman, 2009), modes of commercialization (Kenney & Patton, 2009), and economic impact (Roberts & Easley, 2009).
Knowledge Cities World Summit 2010
Melbourn, Australia, 16-19 November, 2010
‘Knowledge’ is a resource, which relies on the past for a better future. In the 21st century, more than ever before, cities around the world rely on the knowledge of their citizens, their institutions, their firms and enterprises. Knowledge assists in attracting investment, qualified labour, students and researchers. Knowledge also creates local life spaces and professional milieus, which offer quality of life to the citizens who are seeking to cope with the challenges of modern life in a competitive world. This conference will offer a range of innovative presentation formats aimed at facilitating interaction and accessibility for all members of the Knowledge Summit community. The Summit will attract a range of multidisciplinary participants including: practitioners, managers, decision and policy makers of non-government organisations, technology solution developers, innovators, urban planners, urban designers and developers, academics, researchers and postgraduate students.
Calgary, 25-26 November, 2010
The companies worst hit in western Canada during the recession tended to be those with undifferentiated products with many competitors, where price competition became severe. By contrast, the companies who did reasonably well tended to have unique products and fewer competitors. InnoWest 2010 tells the story of some of these companies, and how innovation helped them to live through the recession relatively unscathed, and position themselves for growth in the recovery. InnoWest 2010 will not focus on the very large companies [such as Suncor] or on very small companies [for example, a 10 employee company] but will focus on the large middle ground where the bulk of Canada’s GDP is generated. Keynote speakers include Sir Terry Matthews.
Managing the Art of Innovation: Turning Concepts into Reality
Quebec City, 12-15 December, 2010
Organized by ISPIM in collaboration with local partner INO, a leading non-profit R&D center in Optics/Photonics in Canada, this symposium will bring together academics, business leaders, consultants and other professionals involved in innovation management. The symposium format will include facilitated themed sessions for academic and practitioner presentations together with interactive workshops and discussion panels. Additionally, the symposium will provide excellent networking opportunities together with a taste of local French Canadian culture.
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