DOI 10.1007/s11233-005-0983-4
Springer 2005
Introduction
Innovation is generally dened as a process through which value such
as new economic and social benets is extracted from skills and
knowledge by generating, developing, and implementing ideas to
produce new or improved products, processes, and services (Conference Board 2003a, b). Holbrook and Clayman (2003) believe that
tertiary education plays an important role in generating innovative
skills and research that feed enterprises in the particular region.
Examples such as the core contribution of Stanford University and
MIT to the success of the Silicon Valley and route 128, respectively,
have often been cited. Knowledge created at universities is a basis for
providing needed skills and expertise, and also allows companies to
access state of the art labs and capable graduates. Downstream
activities such as testing and prototype development are congenial to
community colleges. This type of interaction between public research
infrastructure and the private sector helps attract new investments by
allowing companies to access the level of expertise to test and to
improve new ideas, processes, and products. Therefore, public
338
research may play dual roles in these regions but the main attraction
is the potential economic and intellectual spillover of these areas.
Wolfe (2004a, b) states that
universities are now expected to generate more applied knowledge of greater relevance to industry, to diuse knowledge, and to provide technical support to
industry... reinforced by the political expectation that research funding be tied to
broader public policy objectives about promoting national innovative capacity,
greater competitiveness and, increasingly, local and regional economic development.
339
International Context
There has been a global trend to progressively increase innovation
levels in many economies. Innovation is multifaceted, drawing upon
stakeholders in the public, the private, and the non-prot sector.
Strong positive eects have been seen where close links exist between
tertiary education research and SMEs, and such collaboration has
been successfully fostered in many countries for the advancement of
regional innovation systems. Many industrial countries have one or
more levels of government using and/or creating policies to initiate
and further develop their innovation systems. At the regional level
these innovation systems, when linked with many stakeholders and
stable government funding, may expand into an industry cluster.
Porter (1998) denes clusters as a geographically proximate group
of interconnected companies and associated institutions in a particular eld, linked by commodities and complementarities. Wolfe
(2004a, b) believes that strong research intensive universities feed the
growth of clusters by expanding the local knowledge base and providing a steady stream of talent to support the growth of rms in the
clusters. There has been a strong belief in recent literature that
public research, which includes university research, is a prerequisite
for accumulating the skills and capacities required to further develop
innovation (Holbrook & Clayman 2003). Figure 1 depicts the
European context and demonstrates the network of stakeholders
required for innovation where no dominant player exists. This set of
interactions could be extrapolated and/or adapted to any industrial
country (Kuhlman 2001).
The United Kingdom, Israel, Australia, and Japan, as well as
Sweden, Upper Austria, Italy and other European countries have all
been attempting to strengthen their innovation network with government programmes. These strategies are typically based on
emphasising research collaboration between industry and the public
research sector, for the most part of universities. Where the research
340
Figure 1.
341
342
Exhibit 1.
343
mainly located in large metropolitan areas, and to encourage commercialisation wherever possible.
There are many dierent types of collaborations being used. For
example, the Japanese government instituted a plan to transfer some
of the innovation capacity away from its metropolitan areas by creating Technopoles in more remote, less auent areas. The desired
outcome has been dogged, however, by the diculty of maintaining
the long-term commitment of large anchor corporations and also by
branch plant status relative to Tokyo (Conference Board 2004;
Kitagawa 2004). In Canada it has been noted that plants belonging to
Canadian rms place a higher degree of importance on building the
local economy and give distinct preference to locally conducted
research. Foreign owned companies, of which there are many, normally tend to conduct research within their own geographical home
base (Wolfe 2000a, b).
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playing the role of an economic trigger (Carson 1999; Rae 1996) for
the national economy.
In Canada, the innovation agenda has put substantial onus on the
universities and colleges to provide three important factors: new
ideas, expertise and skilled graduates for the market (Government of
Canada 2002). These are needed to support the level of technological
change required to maintain, if not grow, regional economies. Canadas Innovation Agenda focuses on three areas: knowledge performance, skills and the environment for innovation. There is evidence
that the Highly Qualied Personnel (HQP) ratio is very important to
establishing prolonged innovation leading to economic growth
(Holbrook and Clayman 2003). Clearly the youth migration of skilled
labour must be stemmed for any innovation policy to be eective.
Canadian universities may have some communication issues with
the private sector outside their research centres, while the community
colleges typically have strong linkages with suitable industry partners.
The colleges concentrate on contract research designed to nd
applied solutions to industrial issues that a company may be facing.
In this regard, the Association of Community Colleges of Canada,
their national association, has articulated their role as being to assist
in product and process development; provide industry access to
equipment and pilot plants; build awareness of new and best practice
technologies; provide access to resource centres; assist with market
and product feasibility assessments; and supply input to business
planning (ACCC 2002). At the same time the universities participate
in contract research, engage in joint R&D projects, and often provide
testing and consulting skills (Fritsch & Schwirten 1999), all of which
also lead to commercialisation, technology transfer, etc. In this
regard the line of demarcation between the two types of educational
institution is conspicuously fuzzy.
Canadas national innovation strategy, while quite broad, has not
emphasised strengthening non-metropolitan regions to any notable
degree despite its vast land mass. However, in order to counter a
strong metropolitan representation at all levels of government, the
federal government has created FedNor and other agencies to provide
stronger nancial support for more remote regions. Most provinces
and territorial governments have established similar entities to
develop local economies. Recently, regions such as Northern Ontario
have begun looking at industrial clusters to re-stimulate their economies. Most of these regions have certain environmental rehabilitation
skill sets and knowledge that may be readily used to further strengthen
Exhibit 2.
345
the sector. Two decades ago, many of these same regions or communities strove to bolster their economic life through diversication.
However, there is currently a feeling that diversication strategies
alone have proved disappointing and that they should be strengthened
by the cluster approach (Robinson 2002). This new strategy would
aim at building and capitalising on regional assets, essentially through
vertical and horizontal integration. The evolution of a viable cluster
normally entails recognizable phases (Conference Board 2004).
Some uncertainty exists as to whether these non-metropolitan
locales would have the capacity within their regional universities and
colleges, industry, and government to handle the evolution of the
cluster.
Methodology of the Study
In line with the objectives of this exploratory study, a one-page
questionnaire was prepared and emailed and/or faxed to a selective
number of stakeholders perceived as representative experts, with the
overarching view of stimulating the policy debate. Such experts were
the deans of science at local universities, college presidents, Chamber
of Commerce presidents or managing directors, and executive
directors of regional economic development agencies in the targeted
regions. The questionnaire dealt with the main items identied in the
international literature as being critical for the development of
industry groupings/clusters, Many of the bigger non-metropolitan
regions have at least a community college and/or a university to help
stimulate their knowledge and research capacity. The questionnaire
346
347
Reasons for:
Academic collaboration
with industry
Firms collaborating
with academics
Exhibit 3.
348
TABLE I
Tertiary education institutions
Questions
Now occurring
(%)
Desirable
(%)
Dierence
(%)
30
94
64
35
50
94
100
59
50
44
94
50
44
94
50
52
100
48
Now occurring
(%)
Desirable
(%)
Dierence
(%)
Joint university/college
partnerships to push R&D
through to commercialization
Non-proprietary R&D done
for industry/business groupings
Willingness of universities/colleges
to participate in R&D
Local business/industry interest
in out-sourcing research
Extent to which business/industry
is ready, and able, to act upon R&D
Backing ($) from a federal or
provincial governmental body
11
100
89
13
100
87
25
100
75
33
100
67
33
100
67
37
100
63
349
Figure 2.
350
Figure 3.
man 2003). It is unknown whether the laboratory funding has provided transferable knowledge for industry.
Some believe that a major corporate player is integral for the
beginning of a cluster, and specically that there must be a leader to
champion the cause and unite all stakeholders. Others contend that
clusters have evolved over time. Looking at international literature
and past successes, one can conclude that a cluster has some very
striking dynamics that may have evolved naturally. It is prudent to
gather experts in specic knowledge areas to further the research
agenda. In most cases, it has been proven that universities play an
important role, perhaps or perhaps not a founding role. If the cluster
is properly managed through the dierent stages, there is a good
chance that regional economic growth may be realised by the
endeavor. This growth can be attributed to (Conference Board
2004):
(1) the ability of companies to introduce new products, services or
processes;
(2) the quality of new products and services;
(3) the speed at which companies can take new products and services to market;
(4) the ability to keep up with competitors; and
(5) the protability or productivity of companies.
351
352
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Charles Belanger,
Laurentian University,
80 Juliana Rd,
Ottawa, Ontario, K1M 1K3,
Canada
E-mail: cbelanger@bmvglobal.ca
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