Bridging Science to Economy: The Role of Science and Technologic Parks in Innovation Strategies in “Follower” Regions

Alexandre Almeida (), Cristina Santos () and Mário Silva
Additional contact information
Alexandre Almeida: Faculdade de Economia, Universidade do Porto
Cristina Santos: Faculdade de Economia, Universidade do Porto

FEP Working Papers from Universidade do Porto, Faculdade de Economia do Porto

Abstract: The concept of Regional Innovation System (RIS) builds upon an integrated perspective of innovation, acknowledging the contribution of knowledge production subsystem, regulatory context and enterprises to a region’s innovative performance. Science and Technology parks can act as a platform to the production of knowledge and its transfer to the economy in the form of spin-offs or simple knowledge spillovers, enhanced by the co-location of R&D university centers and high technology enterprises on site. Although reflecting mainly a science push perspective, they may constitute central nodes in an infrastructural system of competitiveness that articulates other entrepreneurial location sites and bridges Universities to the economy in a more efficient and effective way, being crucial to increasing technology transfer and interchange speed, promoting the technological upgrading of the regional economy. In this paper we discuss the importance of Science and Technology Parks in the building up of a Regional Innovation System, promoting the technological intensification of the economy, a more effective knowledge transfer and sharing and the construction of competitive advantages, with particular importance in follower regions facing structural deficiencies. We oppose to the predominant closed paradigm, which understands science parks’ role in a narrow and “enclavist”, arguing in favor of an open and “integrative” paradigm where the interconnection to other infrastructures and agents boosts the park’s performance and upgrades the regional economies competitiveness infra-structures and innovation capability. We further stress the importance of science parks in signaling capabilities and hence attracting R&D external initiatives, namely, R&D FDI.

Keywords: Science Parks; New technology-based firms; Innovation; Regional Policy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O31 O33 O38 R58 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 18 pages
Date: 2008-11
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cse, nep-edu, nep-geo, nep-ino, nep-ipr, nep-pr~ and nep-knm
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.fep.up.pt/investigacao/workingpapers/08.11.05_wp302.pdf (application/pdf)
Our link check indicates that this URL is bad, the error code is: 404 Not Found (http://www.fep.up.pt/investigacao/workingpapers/08.11.05_wp302.pdf [302 Found]--> https://fep.up.pt/investigacao/workingpapers/08.11.05_wp302.pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:por:fepwps:302

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in FEP Working Papers from Universidade do Porto, Faculdade de Economia do Porto Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().