Replication and translation of co-innovation: The influence of institutional context in large international participatory research projects

Stakeholder involvement in research processes is widely seen as essential to enhance the applicability of research. A common conclusion in the extensive body of literature on participatory and transdisciplinary research is the importance of the institutional context for understanding the dynamics and effectiveness of participatory projects. The role of institutional context has become increasingly important in view of large international research projects implementing shared participatory methodologies across countries (for example within Horizon 2020 and within CGIAR programmes), which each have different institutional contexts. Despite the generally accepted importance of the institutional context for understanding the unfolding of participatory and transdisciplinary research projects, surprisingly little research has actually looked into its role in greater detail. This paper aims to fill this gap in the literature by studying how a set of participatory principles and methods in a European project on integrated pest management (denoted as co-innovation in the project under study) was applied by researchers and advisers operating in a single international research project under the institutional conditions of four countries. The principal finding of this study is that, although constraints and enablers of participatory research at the personal level (e.g. researcher identity) were similar across the studied countries, research organisation- and community-based constraints and enablers differed, as well as those at the level of the overall innovation system. The institutions at different levels interact and create country-specific histories and path-dependencies, which lead to different degrees of propensity and preparedness, and hence different starting positions for participatory approaches. Consequently, when participatory research methods and approaches are applied in different contexts following a one-size-fits-all approach they may be less effective if not translated to institutional conditions at different levels. The study suggests that large international participatory research projects make provision in their design for careful selection of project team individuals, the composition of teams, and pay attention to the room for manoeuvre that the project, institute and national contexts provide for participatory research. To support the adjustment of participatory approaches to local institutional conditions, large international projects would benefit from fostering learning spaces that enable reflection on translation to local contexts and are capable of connecting to a wider network of decision makers and influencers that can facilitate institutional change in organisations and innovation systems.     

嵌入性创新网络与科技型小微企业创新绩效:网络能力中介效应研究

科技型小微企业嵌入于创新网络中,通过自主性发挥网络构建与管理能力,进一步分享创新网络资源,提高创新实力。基于中国软件谷(南京)及相关创业孵化园246家软件企业问卷调查结果,运用SPSS、LISREL软件进行统计分析,实证研究网络能力对嵌入性创新网络与科技型小微企业创新绩效的中介效应。结果表明:(1)嵌入性创新网络稳定性有利于科技型小微企业创新绩效的提升;(2)嵌入性创新网络强度越大,科技型小微企业网络能力越强;(3)科技型小微企业网络能力越强,创新绩效提升越明显;(4)科技型小微企网络能力有助于促进嵌入性创新网络对创新绩效的提升作用。     

Driving force from authorities: the evolution of innovation system for biomedical industry in China

Over the past 30 years, China has fully exploited its advantage to steadily foster an innovation system for the biomedical industry with Chinese characteristics, that is, ‘Government-guided, resource-integrated and long-term planning.’ The system originated from historically famous ‘863 program’ in the 1980s, evolved with a series of favourable policies in the different periods, and eventually has taken shape in the industrial clusters across the country. It features with a systematic and integrated R&D infrastructure (or public platform) at different levels. In this study, China’s biomedical innovation system will be examined and the leading role of Chinese authorities will be explored from the perspective of Triple Helix theory. As the ‘highland of innovation’, Shanghai case is highlighted with plentiful information gathered from primary sources in the involved agencies for the first time, including the Shanghai Biopharma Service Platform.     

创新驱动先前实践对建设目标的影响

基于各省出台的创新型省份建设方案，运用省级政府面板数据，实证研究了创新型省份建设对预期建设目标的影响。结果发现，创新型省份建设仅对可操控程度较高、完成难度较低的建设目标具有显著影响，而对可操控程度较低、完成难度较高的建设目标无显著影响；高强度激励对建设目标实现的影响作用较大。公开建设方案、科学设定建设目标、促进多部门参与、建立监督和评估机制是改进创新型省份建设和推进创新驱动发展战略实施的重要突破口。     

国家重点科技资源支撑区域创新经济产出的空间差异研究

根据2011-2014年科技部《国家重点科技基础条件资源调查表》以及国家统计年鉴数据,首先,使用赫芬达尔指数定量描述了利用国家重点科技资源进行创新活动的非均衡性。其次,使用网络DEA方法,实证分析了2012-2014年中国(内地)各省份国家重点科技资源对区域创新发展的支撑作用。研究表明,国家重点科技资源对区域创新发展的支撑作用不仅取决于资源创新生产阶段,而且受制于重点科技资源支持下的区域创新发展阶段。重点科技资源的支撑作用还有较大提升空间,70%的省份创新成果转化能力有待提高,且大部分省份的国家重点科技资源未实现优化配置。此外,全国及东部、中部和西部国家重点科技资源对区域创新发展的支撑效率不存在绝对收敛趋势。     

Taming wicked civic challenges with an innovative crowd

Civic challenges such as urban mobility and energy problems offer new corporate innovation opportunities. However, such challenges are wicked and difficult to tame. They require novel solutions that account for and integrate contradictory perspectives within the local innovation ecosystem of firms, governments, and citizens. This article presents a successful civic innovation crowdsourcing project case study, in which multinational firm Bombardier encouraged a global civic crowd to co-create visionary solutions to the challenge of future mobility in crowded cities around the world. Bombardier recruited a global crowd of 900 individuals and facilitated the citizen development of more than 215 solutions of unique firm value. We explore the process and outcome of this crowdsourcing project and derive actionable design principles for a three-phased civic innovation crowdsourcing process including: (1) crowd construction, (2) crowd knowledge acquisition, and (3) crowd knowledge assimilation. This process enables the crowd to integrate members’ diverse and contradictory knowledge proactively at both the team and individual levels. Additionally, the crowd is able to balance extension of existing local solutions and exploration of path-breaking technologies and solution concepts.     

Network,knowledge and relationship impacts on innovation in tourism destinations

We combine network structure and firm-level relationship measures to explore the association between innovative behavior, firm position within the network of a destination, and the knowledge and relational trust characteristics of a firm's innovation-oriented relationships. We find current collaboration, shared knowledge and trust are associated with innovative behavior with partner firms, but that betweenness centrality indicates which partners are the most prominent innovators in a population. That is, relationship-level characteristics facilitate innovation partnerships, but network structure characteristics identify the most successful innovative partners. To theory, our findings contribute to efforts in the tourism, innovation and network literature to evaluate the differential effects of knowledge stocks and flows on innovation. For practice, our results suggest that promoters of innovation within a destination should leverage brokerage positions to improve the in-flow of ideas while encouraging the firms that share knowledge and trust to collaborate to apply those ideas.     

Strategic framework for commercialisation of fly ash innovations

Numerous innovative applications have been developed to utilise large quantity of fly ash generated at coal fired thermal power plants (TPPs) worldwide. However, this requires power plants to undertake the role of third-party innovation intermediaries, that is, commercialising technological innovations developed by others. As commercialising an innovation requires considerable resources, a well-considered selection and promotion are desired. The paper presents a strategic framework for commercialisation of fly ash innovations. Explanation for step-by-step implementation and generic pointers for strategy formulation for typical problems are suggested. The proposed framework is expected to assist coal-fired TPPs in formulating strategies to commercialise innovative utilisation of fly ash. The study contributes to scarcely addressed aspects of an open innovation paradigm, that is, challenges faced by third-party intermediaries.     

融资渠道与中国区域技术创新

运用2011-2016年中国内地31个省份面板数据，通过固定效应模型检验不同融资渠道对全国以及东中西部地区技术创新的影响。结果表明：①债权融资在整体上对技术创新影响不显著，分地区看，其在东部地区发挥了促进作用，而在中西部地区则起到抑制作用；②从整体及中西部地区看，股权融资对技术创新的影响不显著，且抑制了东部地区技术创新；③对股市板块进行细分后，整体上股权融资中只有创业板股权融资显著促进了技术创新水平提升，主板和中小板的作用均不显著。     

地方政府人才引进政策促进了区域创新吗？——来自准自然实验的证据

高技能人力资本对于我国经济转型的重要性不言而喻。本文以2009—2012年间39个城市集中出台的地方人才引进政策为准自然实验,采用多期政策的双重差分法,结合机制分析和异质性分析,探究了人才政策出台前后区域创新能力的变化及其背后的机制和深层次原因,并分析政策效应在不同的地区营商环境、科教事业投入力度、知识产权保护程度下的差异。本文主要结论包括,地方人才引进政策总体上提高了当地的专利授权总量和专利价值总量;显著增加了研发投入的规模,但创新效率没有得到明显提升;在营商环境较差的地区,政策的效应侧重于提高专利数量,营商环境较好的地区则侧重于提升专利价值;在科教投入力度本身就很大的地区,政策效果较小,在科教投入弱的地区效果会更明显;在知识产权保护程度弱的地区,政策效果更多地表现为提高专利数量,保护程度强的地区,则侧重于提升专利价值。上述结论对地方政府优化人才激励政策、实施创新驱动发展战略具有一定的政策启示。