The current performance indexes, notably the Innovation Union Scoreboard and Regional Innovation Scoreboard) fail to capture regional data, in particular regarding innovation enablers. In consequence, this limits the scope of enablers to inform investments in capacity building that can help improve performance in modest and moderate innovator regions.
Therefore, DanuBalt focused on health innovation enablers in the participating regions that brought together available evidence with bottom-up stakeholder experiences capturing local context in a way that IUS and RIS cannot. Accordingly, it is expected that the catalogue of recommendations as well as the action plan underlying the pilot actions will contribute to evidence that there are still efforts to be undertaken to alleviate the innovation and research divide in moderate and less performing regions. However, there are already good practices that demonstrate the successful utilization of funds, resources and established networks to alleviate and counteract a suboptimal, if not averse, innovation eco-system.
DanuBalt has leveraged on these role models in its pilots in Period II of the project to unlock the potential of similar successful initiatives. DanuBalt aims also to provide an evidence based catalogue of recommendations for future policy design in innovations and research in health. A concept paper has been published and widely disseminated (Macro-regional Development within Health Economy: Solving Societal Challenges and Promoting Competitiveness ). The long term socio-economic impact and implications are manifold. DanuBalt offers visibility not only of what is wrong and should be rectified in health and innovation research but also showcases role models that could function as lighthouses that keep and attract new talents, leverage public and private investment and perform good research and innovation activities by effectively mobilizing resources and networks.
