Services Innovation in Ireland - Options for ... - Europe INNOVA

activities. In this respect a policy that merely re-brands or repackages existing innovation policies
and programmes will not be enough. A visible policy favouring innovation in services is required to
deliver a strong message to business, education and government that services innovation is as vital as
technological innovation.
If policymakers want service companies to understand the importance of services innovation, as
distinct from RTD, they will need to ensure a consistent message throughout the entire policy process.
Raising awareness of services innovation in Ireland will require a single coherent message that is
capable of reaching those service companies that have not expressed an interest in innovation to
date. Irish policymakers have a unique opportunity to demonstrate the value of services innovation
by developing a new service offering through more integrated and focused support for non-
technological innovation in client companies.
Services innovation requires a substantive policy development that is based upon a thorough
understanding of the different types and processes of innovation that are distinctive to services
companies. The adoption of a specific services innovation policy will encourage a sharper focus on
the barriers that prevent services companies from innovating as well as alerting policymakers to the
importance of specific drivers of services innovation. Ireland therefore needs to encourage services
firms to realise the importance of non-technological innovation through the development of new
business models, customer-interfaces and service-products, as an invaluable source of competitiveness
in the global market.
The Study reveals that Ireland’s leading companies in the Internationally Traded Services sector are
already exploiting services innovation to increase their competitive advantage. These companies need
to be showcased to business in Ireland in order to convince less innovative services companies of the
value of services innovation to company performance.
A services innovation policy development in Ireland is also a valuable opportunity to raise the profile
of Ireland’s offering to international services companies by focusing on services innovation within the
ITS sector as an important component of that offer. This in turn will make a significant contribution
towards the embedding of FDI in Ireland. The emerging services innovation support framework could
itself also form an important part of IDA Ireland’s offering to FDI companies.
As the Study findings indicate, service activities have an increasingly important role to play in value
chains of all types. Services innovations are therefore important for a wide range of industries,
including manufacturing industries. Although ITS companies have inevitably been a focus for
this Study, other services activities involved in the service value chain will be equally affected and
targeted. Likewise, the public services sector has not been specifically examined in this Study,
however it is clear that the important conclusions from this Study will have relevance across public
services also notably in respect of the potential influence that public procurement may play in
driving services innovation 93 .
Finally, although the Study clearly indicates that many of the Enterprise Ireland and IDA Ireland
supports in general have the "potential" to be re-oriented and expanded with the service sector in
mind, it is arguable whether they would, as a result, be as effective as they would need to be given
the changed focus.
93 However, the conclusions outlined below do not relate explicitly to the public services sector.
66