We analyze the frequency and nature by which new firms are acquired by established businesses. Acquisitions are often considered to reflect a technology transfer process and to also constitute one way in which a “symbiosis” between new technology-based firms (NTBFs) and established...

It is often claimed that there are locally embedded values and attitudes towards entrepreneurship, exerting a strong influence on the rate and level of entrepreneurial activity in regions. The concept of regional entrepreneurship culture aims to capture such phenomena, and refers in a general...

Regional innovation strategies rank on the top of public policy agendas today. There is a widespread consensus in both academic and policy circles that standardised “best practice” innovation policy models suffer from severe limitations and major shortcomings. The recent literature is...

This paper seeks to enhance our understanding of critical preconditions and factors that facilitate the rise and development of new industrial paths in peripheral regional economies. Current conceptualizations of regional path creation are largely based on experiences from core regions and fail...

The aim of this working paper is to contribute to the debate on how to identify regions with less developed research and innovation systems. We look at both conceptual and empirical approaches that figure prominently in scholarly work on regional innovation systems. Based on a critical review...

This paper argues that obstruction of agency, intention and interest is a weakness in institutional studies in geography. There is a need to systematically anchor a role for agency in institutionally oriented combinatorial knowledge dynamics studies, and thus to reach beyond snapshots of...

According to the Innovation Union Scoreboard, published by the European Commission every year, Sweden has been, and still is, an innovation leader within the EU and one of the most innovative countries in Europe. In the Innovation Union Scoreboard 2014 (European Union, 2014: 5), Sweden has the...

Grand challenges such as climate change, ageing societies and food security feature prominently on the agenda of policymakers at all scales, from the EU down to local and regional authorities. These are challenges that require the input and collaboration of a diverse set of societal stakeholders...

The notion of path dependent regional industrial development has recently received increasing attention in economic geography, innovation studies and related fields. A core idea is that pre-existing industrial and institutional structures constitute the regional environment in which current...

This paper aims at shedding some light on the challenges of designing and implementing STI policies in developing countries. In particular, we discuss the problems of alignment of STI policies with the national economic development agenda, the alignment of innovation system policy with ST...