Guide to Research and Innovation Strategies for Smart Specialisation

However, despite the major benefits brought by these structured and strategic approaches to
promote innovation in regions, there are shortcomings identified in these methodologies: they
reflect a too linear view of innovation, run the risk of autarky, and take a narrow view on the role
of policy in the exercise. Within the perspective of a RIS3, it can also argued that too few
emphasis is placed on the identification of 'niches' or specific domains for (present and future)
competitive advantages, from an international perspective. Hence the work for this analytical
step of a RIS3 strategy should combine the above types of analyses with other analyses aiming at
shedding light on potential for knowledge-based transformation of the economy, based on
information on the positioning of the regional economy in international value-chains and on
identification of key specific assets.
Several methods can be used to support the identification of potential niches for smart
specialisation.
An integrated method that delivers a unique solution to this question does not exist: it is the
combination of an array of evidence that is most likely to provide a suitable basis for this
identification process. The main relevant methods are listed below, including purely quantitative
to more qualitative ones. The last two – in depth cluster case studies and peer reviews, and
foresight - provide the opportunity to integrate the field knowledge held by, and concrete
experimentation done by regional actors, in the spirit of an 'entrepreneurial discovery process'.
1. Analysis of (matching) Scientific and Technological specialisation: analyses of
specialisation of R&D investments, publications and citations and patent applications and
citations by 'fields'. A region has a comparative advantage in a certain field if it shows an
above-average concentration of these indicators compared to the value taken in the country
or a group of countries 18 . The advantage of this method is that such data are available in a
comparative way (with some restrictions) but its disadvantage is that it reflects S&T
potential rather than commercial value or innovation prospects. A main problem is to relate
scientific disciplines with technological domains and with production sectors, since many
disciplines and technologies are generic and find applications in a multiplicity of sectors 19 .
The sector classification is also an important restriction as it is a based on rather outdated
product definition which do not match with current product mixes (e.g. the difficulty to
define environmental products or services 'sectors'). It is more interesting to calculate
changes of indexes along time, indicating specialisation trends which give a perspective on
the evolution of a region’s S&T specialisation.
2. Analysis of regional economic specialisation: quantitative analyses calculate degrees of
specialisation of regional economies on the basis of employment (or value added) data.
Location quotients measure whether some sectors are over-represented in a regional
economy compared to other regions or countries: this is sometimes equated with 'cluster
presence' even if these indicators only capture agglomeration effects, and not interactions,
which is an essential feature of a cluster. Specialisation indices thus indicate the presence
of critical masses of activities, but not innovation-driven linkages. They can point to
18
This is done notably, at national level, in Europe Innova (2010), National Specialisation report, Sectoral
Innovation Watch.
19
Conversion tables exist, which try to address this problem.
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