The first work stream of INNOVA Measure 2 examined Community Innovation Survey (CIS) data to gain new insights on high-growth, innovative enterprises (HGIE) in Europe. Such firms are a key source of business dynamics, but little is known about their actual share in the enterprise population. This is due to an inherent uncertainty in how to distinguish high-growth firms from non-high-growth ones. Our study showed that the share of HGIEs in Europe ranged between 0.1 to 10% depending on the adopted definition. We observed a trade-off between high-growth and innovation performance at the country-level (differently than at the sectoral level), highlighting the importance of structural differences across EU Member States in terms of firms’ innovation profile, size and associated high-growth performance.
In a subsequent study, we analyzed the complex relationship between strategies, obstacles and firm performance. We found that firms pursuing adaptability strategies and perceiving the lack of qualified personnel as an important obstacle grew faster, those with explicit product innovation strategies were more innovative, and those pursuing cost reduction strategies and perceiving the lack of demand and of adequate finance as important obstacles experienced the worse performance. High-growth enterprises, in comparison with other firms, were less sensitive about financial constraints, more interested in the availability of skilled labor and benefited more from cooperative strategies.
The second work stream provided a conceptual and empirical study of the return mobility of scientific researchers in Europe. Researcher mobility is typically conceptualized under the assumptions that human capital is efficiently used by the productive system. Our study identified two other approaches in the literature that may be more aligned with how scientific research is carried out. Using data collected in the context of the MORE2 survey, we distinguished and analyzed return mobility patterns and motivations. We found that family ties and academic reasons are important determinants of mobility. The study also examined potential alternative data sources and highlighted the vast potential in novel “big” or administrative data.
The third work stream studied location determinants of foreign direct investments (FDI) in R&D in European regions, which are important catalysts of economic development. Our study investigated the factors that affect the degree of attractiveness of European regions from the perspective of a company investing abroad based on evidence gathered from all the FDI in R&D realized between 2003 and 2014. The fiscal regime and the size of destination regions as well as the sharing of a common language in the sending and receiving regions were the most important determinants. Labor costs, technological strength and R&D expenditure, especially performed by the higher education sector, deemed also important.
The fourth work stream focused on refining composite indicators and frameworks of research ad innovation. The Innovation Output Indicator (IOI) 2016 methodology report presented the 2016 update of the IOI and discussed in details how changes in the statistical definition of some of the underlying component indicators affect the methodology and results. The IOI complements the R&D intensity indicator by focusing on innovation output. The 2016 edition offered a number of novelties. It expanded international coverage to 38 countries over a 4-year window, and implemented changes in statistical definitions, improved timeliness and updated scaling coefficients fitting the larger, updated dataset. Sensitivity analysis highlighted that the revision of the knowledge-intensive service export component has the largest impact on outcomes.
Upon request of the European Research Area Committee, we conducted a feasibility study to assess the robustness of a modified research excellence index aimed at benchmarking effective national research systems using a single index. Building on past editions of the European Commission’s research excellence index, our tests showed that a robust index can be built by replacing the world class universities and research institutes component with one measuring Marie Skłodowska-Curie grants. This increased variance in country scores and better captured capacity building and attractiveness, two desirable features of effective national research systems. From the various potential specifications of the MSC indicator, we identified the version that best fit conceptually and statistically in the framework.
The fifth work stream assessed the feasibility of conducting a counterfactual impact evaluation of FP7 research grants on measures of performance of private firms. Preliminary estimations on Austrian, Estonian and Dutch data suggested that (i) the most reliable results were obtained for productivity; (ii) small granted amounts had no significant impact; (iii) the maximum impact is reached below the largest amount of awarded grant; (iv) similar, although less precisely estimated effects were obtained for sales growth; and (v) there is no indication of possible employment effect. The full project would include a larger set of countries and refined measures.
