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on Technology and Industrial Dynamics |
| By: | Michele Cincera (The International Centre for Innovation, Technology and Education Studies (iCite), Solvay Brussels School of Economics and Management, University of Brussels, Belgium); Anabela Santos (The International Centre for Innovation, Technology and Education Studies (iCite), Solvay Brussels School of Economics and Management, University of Brussels, Belgium) |
| Abstract: | Promoting Research and Development (R&D) activities is the main goal of the EU 2020 Strategy in order to achieve an R&D spending at least 3% of GDP. The Innovation Union is one of the seven flagship initiatives of the EU 2020 Strategy, which has the aims: to improve access to finance for R&D; to get innovative ideas to market; to ensure growth and jobs (European Commission, 2014b). The aim of the present paper is to identify and explain the main mechanisms related to four commitments of Innovation Union: i) Commitment 10 (Put in place EU level financial instruments to attract private finance); ii) Commitment 11 (Ensure cross-border operation of venture capital funds); iii) Commitment 12 (Strengthen cross-border matching of innovative firms with Investors); iv) Commitment 13 (Review State Aid Framework for Research, Development and Innovation). To this purpose, a review of both theoretical and empirical literatures about ’Innovation, Access to Finance and SMEs’ based on more than 80 scientific and other articles and analyses is presented. The paper provides an analysis of the main alternative financial instruments to bank loans, namely Risk-Sharing Facility Financing, Venture Capital, Business Angels and public subsidies. We found some evidence in the literature that Venture Capital could have a limited impact in enhancing innovation in the long-term and that some public support schemes could be more effective than other, depending on the firm’s maturity state. |
| Keywords: | EU 2020 strategy, innovation, finance, Innovation Union |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crv:opaper:6&r=tid |
| By: | Akcigit, Ufuk; Hanley, Douglas; Stantcheva, Stefanie |
| Abstract: | We study the optimal design of R&D policies and corporate taxation when the outputs of innovation are not appropriable in the absence of intellectual property rights policies and there are non-internalized technology spillovers across firms. Firms are heterogeneous in their research productivity, i.e., in the efficiency with which they convert a given set of R&D inputs into successful innovations. There is asymmetric information about firm productivity and about its stochastic evolution over time that prevents the first best solution to the technology spillover. The problem is thus posed as one of dynamic mechanism design with externalities. We characterize the optimal constrained efficient allocations over firms' life cycles and for firms of different productivities. We show that the constrained efficient allocations can be implemented either by a patent system plus a price subsidy for the monopolists' products, together with a parsimonious R&D subsidy function or, equivalently, by a prize mechanism. We estimate our model using firm-level data matched to patent data and quantify the optimal policies. Simpler innovation policies, such as linear R&D subsidies and linear profit taxes, lead to large revenue losses relative to the optimal mechanism. |
| Keywords: | Corporate taxation; innovation; patents; R&D; Subsidies; Tax credits |
| JEL: | H21 H23 H25 H32 O31 O32 O33 O38 |
| Date: | 2016–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:11682&r=tid |
| By: | Liu, Rebecca; Rammer, Christian |
| Abstract: | This paper studies the effects of different public innovation funding programs on the innovation output and export performance of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). We evaluate the effectiveness of regional, national and European funding programs implemented in Germany for both product and process innovations. Our panel study shows that public financial support contributes to higher innovation outputs, which in turn translates into higher export success in later years. This relation however only holds for certain sources of public funding and certain types of innovation output. Innovation support from the European Union and national programs for cutting-edge technology that results in higher sales with new-to-market products shows a significant positive effect on SMEs' export performance. For funding programs run by regional authorities, we find similar though relatively smaller impacts on both innovation output and exporting. Bottom-up funding at the national level-which allows firms to freely define the design of the funded innovation projects in terms of content and cooperation-increases sales with innovations that are only new to the firm, but these innovations have limited impacts on export success. Our results suggest that public innovation programs should challenge SMEs to go for more ambitious innovations in order to strengthen their competitiveness. |
| Keywords: | Public Funding,SMEs,Innovation Outputs,Exporting,Panel Study,Matching |
| JEL: | O32 O38 F14 |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:zewdip:16078&r=tid |
| By: | Petros Gkotsis (European Commission – JRC); Antonio Vezzani (European Commission – JRC) |
| Abstract: | Advanced manufacturing technologies (AMTs) and other key enabling technologies (KETs) are expected to have a major impact on productivity, efficiency, profitability and employment in major industrial sectors worldwide. Thus, development of AMTs and KETs is considered essential if the European Union is to achieve the strategic goals set out in the European Commission’s Employment, Growth and Investment priorities. Indeed, AMTs and KETs are among the top priorities identified as necessary to support the competitiveness of European industries in the context of the European flagship on industrial modernisation. This study builds upon and extends results that were obtained in the context of the Advanced Manufacturing Technologies for Competitiveness AMTEC project, in which the technological profiles of the patent portfolios of the EU Industrial R&D Investment Scoreboard companies were constructed using patent-based analysis. In particular, their technological competences were investigated and it was found that European companies invest in KETs, and in particular in AMTs, as these technologies are considered to be vital for maintaining current competitiveness. However, other countries also invest heavily in AMTs and KETs. It is therefore very important for the EU to define a strategy that aims to find a suitable position in the global value and innovation chains and that selectively augments existing capabilities. To this end, a methodology based on patent analysis was applied to assess the capacity of the world’s top R&D investors in developing AMTs. Particular emphasis was placed on complex AMT patents that also pertain to at least one of the five KETs. These patents are considered important because they represent AMT applications used for the development of KETs in general or, conversely, they represent other KET applications that can be incorporated into AMT systems. The main questions addressed by this study were (1) In which countries are the most important inventors of AMTs and applicants for AMT-related patents located? (2) Is it possible to analyse internationalisation patterns and knowledge flows between world regions and countries? and (3) Are there any special patterns and clusters between AMT-related technological fields and the five core KETs and, if so, which companies are responsible for the development of these technological applications? Developing and patenting AMT-related technologies is particularly important for firms in the Aerospace & defence, Industrials, Automobiles & parts and Electronics & electrical equipment sectors. Moreover, the more specialised a sector is in developing AMT-related technologies, the less internationalised the AMT-related activities of the firms in the sector appear to be. In general AMT-related R&D activities of European- and US-based firms are more internationalised than the activities of Japanese- and Asian-based companies. It was found that many Scoreboard firms based in the USA, Japan, Germany, France and the UK own and develop a large number of AMT-related patents. However, there are also many inventors of AMT-related technologies based in other countries, such as China, India, Canada, Italy, Belgium and Spain. Finally, the ratio of complex AMT patents to the total number of AMT-related patents is close to 8%, the vast majority being patents that relate to micro- and nano-electronics, advanced materials or photonics. Companies that own these complex patents are often relatively small firms that are highly specialised in the development of AMT-related applications. |
| Keywords: | Advanced Manufacturing Technologies, Key Enabling Technologies, Patents, Industry |
| Date: | 2016–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ipt:iptwpa:jrc101970&r=tid |
| By: | Jérome VALETTE |
| Abstract: | This paper analyses whether international migrants contribute to foster innovation in developing countries by inducing a transfer of productive knowledge from destination to the migrants’ home countries. Using the Economic Complexity Index as a proxy for the amount of productive knowledge embedded in each countries, and bilateral migrant stocks to 20 OECD destination countries, we show that international emigration is a strong channel of technological transmission. Diasporas foster the local adoption of new technologies by connecting high technology countries with low ones, reducing the uncertainty surrounding their profitability. Our empirical results support the fact that technological transfers are more likely to occur out of more technologically advanced destinations and when emigration rates particularly high. |
| Keywords: | International migration, Technology transfer, Export sophistication, Diaspora externalities. |
| JEL: | F63 O33 F22 |
| Date: | 2016–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cdi:wpaper:1835&r=tid |
| By: | Sunil Kanwar (Department of Economics, Delhi School of Economics); Shailu Singh (Department of Economics, Delhi School of Economics) |
| Abstract: | While there is consensus that innovation is a prime motive force in the process of modern economic growth, there continues to be lack of clarity about how best to capture this process of innovation. Although it is relatively clear that research and development expenditure constitutes an important, perhaps even the most important, input into the innovation process, its relationship with the output of this process remains enigmatic. A sizeable literature considers this relationship in the developed country context, though primarily the US, and sheds light on a number of aspects. Evidence for developing countries, in contrast, is sparse. This study intends to fill this gap by exploring the innovation-R&D relationship as exemplified by the influence of knowledge capital on patents, in the context of the emerging economy of India. Using a relatively large sample of 380 manufacturing firms spanning 22 industries over the recent period 2001-2010, we find weak evidence at best for this relationship. A one unit (dollar or rupee) increase in the knowledge capital stock is likely to raise the expected patent count by only about 0.7%, which given the current average patent count per firm per year, is only a marginal change. In addition, we also find that patent experience and the firm’s access to resources are both strongly significant factors explaining changes in expected patent counts, although their magnitudes are equally small. Our semi-elasticity estimate w.r.t knowledge capital translates to an elasticity of about 0.02 at the means, which is in line with that for enterprises in Spanish manufacturing. However, it is an order of magnitude smaller than the 0.1 to 0.2 reported for the Dutch pharmaceuticals sector, and the 0.3 to 0.6 for firms in the US manufacturing sector. Given the many reasons why most firms appear not to patent even when they conduct some research, policy makers would have to address multiple issues to bring about a more effective conversion of research into formal intellectual property in the developing country context. |
| Keywords: | Patents, r&d, manufacturing, India |
| Date: | 2016–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cde:cdewps:265&r=tid |
| By: | Jin, Wei; Zhang, ZhongXiang |
| Abstract: | Whether China continues its business-as-usual investment-driven, environment-polluting growth pattern or adopts an investment and innovation-driven, environmentally sustainable development holds important implications for both national and global environmental governance. Building on a Ramsey-Cass-Koopmans growth model that features endogenous technological change induced by R&D and knowledge stock accumulation, this paper presents an exposition, both analytically and numerically, of the mechanism underlining China’s economic transition from an investment-driven, pollution-intensive to an investment and innovation-driven, environmentally sustainable growth path. We show that if R&D technological innovation is incorporated into China’s growth mechanism, then at some tipping point in time when marginal welfare gain of R&D for knowledge accumulation becomes equalized with that of investment for physical asset deployment, China’s economy will launch capital investment and R&D simultaneously and make a transition to a sustainable growth path along which consumption, capital investment, and R&D have a balanced share of 5: 4: 1, consumption, capital stock, and knowledge stock all grow at a rate of 4.9%, and environmental quality improves at a rate of 2.5%. In contrast, if R&D technological innovation is not harnessed as a new growth engine, then China’s economy will follow its business-as-usual investment-driven growth path along which standalone accumulation of dirty physical capital stock will lead to a more than 200-fold increase in environmental pollution. |
| Keywords: | Endogenous technological change, sustainable development, economic growth model, China’s economic transition, Research and Development/Tech Change/Emerging Technologies, Q55, Q58, Q43, Q48, O13, O31, O33, O44, F18, |
| Date: | 2016–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:ancewp:249520&r=tid |
| By: | Dang, Thang; Dung, Thai Tri; Phuong, Vu Thi; Vinh, Tran Dinh |
| Abstract: | Using a panel sample of manufacturing firms from small- and medium-sized enterprise surveys between 2009 and 2013, we estimate the causal effects on firm outcomes of human resource management practices at the firm level in Vietnam. Employing a fixed-effects framework for the estimation, we find that on average a firm that provides the training for new workers gains roughly 13.7%, 10% and 14.9% higher in output value per worker, value added per worker and gross profit per worker respectively than the counterpart. Moreover, an additional ten-day training duration for new employees on average leads to 4.1% increase in output value per worker, 3.0% rise in value added per worker and 3.0% growth in gross profit per worker. We also uncover that a marginal 10% of HRM spending results in about 2% and 1.6% rises in output value per worker and value added per worker, respectively. Nevertheless, we find no statistically significant impacts of incentive measure on firm outcomes. The estimated results are strongly robust to various specifications. |
| Keywords: | Human resource management; firm outcomes; Vietnam |
| JEL: | M5 |
| Date: | 2016–09–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:75359&r=tid |
| By: | Ciliberti, Stefano; Bröring, Stefanie; Martino, Gaetano |
| Abstract: | Innovation is a clear target of the Europe 2020 growth strategy. It has been widely postulated that cooperation is especially important for innovation in the food industry because it has traditionally been regarded as a “low tech” sector. This paper analyses how different forms of cooperation affect innovation activities in the EU’s food industry. In particular, the study addresses the question of how cooperation between companies and key chain agents influences innovative activity. To do so, we analysed data at the country level drawn from the Community Innovation Survey (CIS). The aggregated data allowed us to investigate national system-level processes that must be considered the outcomes of micro-level decisions and policies. A random effect linear model is formulated and estimated to analyse the panel data obtained from five CIS waves. The model indicates that cooperation with universities positively affects innovative activity and, surprisingly, that government financial support has not been an effective instrument to foster innovation by food companies. |
| Keywords: | Innovation, food industry, cooperation, supplier integration, Agribusiness, |
| Date: | 2015–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:eaa144:206249&r=tid |