Version 20 January 2014 Regional Innovation Monitor Plus Regional Innovation Report Saxony-Anhalt To the European Commission Enterprise and Industry Directorate-General Directorate B – Sustainable Growth and EU 2020 www.technopolis-group.com Regional Innovation Monitor Plus Regional Innovation Report Saxony-Anhalt technopolis |group| in cooperation with Dr. Andrea Zenker Dr. Henning Kroll Fraunhofer ISI Table of Contents 1. Main Trends and Challenges in the Regional Innovation System 5 1.1 Recent trends in economic performance 5 1.2 Recent trends in regional innovation performance 8 1.3 Identified challenges 15 2. Innovation Policy Governance 16 3. Innovation Policy Instruments and Orientations 27 3.1 The Regional Innovation Policy Mix 27 3.2 Appraisal of Regional Innovation Policies 32 3.2.1 Knowledge production 32 3.2.2 Knowledge transfer 33 3.2.3 Innovation support 34 3.3 Good practice case: Industrial Initiative for Central Germany 39 3.4 Towards Smart Specialisation Policies 41 3.5 Possible Future Orientations and Opportunities 44 Appendix A Bibliography 47 Appendix B Stakeholders consulted 50 Appendix C Statistical Data 51 Table of Figures Figure 1: Economic performance indicators................................................................. 7 Figure 2: Innovation Performance Indicators..............................................................9 Figure 3: R&D expenditure per sector of performance.............................................. 13 Figure 4: Share of R&D expenditure per sector of performance ............................... 14 Figure 5: GERD and GDP trends ................................................................................ 14 Figure 6: Technological & non-technological innovators .......................................... 15 Tables Table 1: Innovation Policy Governance Saxony-Anhalt................................................. 19 Table 2: Innovation Policy Institutional Set-Up and Available Human Resources .26 Table 3: Existing regional innovation support measures.......................................... 31 Regional Innovation Monitor Plus i Table 4: Project approvals and allocated subsidies of innovation programmes in Saxony-Anhalt 2010-2012 ............................................................................................. 34 ii Regional Innovation Monitor Plus Commonly Used Abbreviations: BERD Business Expenditure on Research and Development EAFRD European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development EMFF European Maritime and Fisheries Fund ERDF European Regional Development Fund ESF European Social Fund FTE Full-Time Equivalent GDR German Democratic Republic GERD Gross Expenditure on Research and Development GOVERD Government Expenditure on Research and Development HERD Higher Education Expenditure on Research and Development RIM Regional Innovation Monitor Regional Innovation Monitor Plus iii PREFACE Launched in 2010, the Regional Innovation Monitor1 continues to be one of the flagship initiatives of DG Enterprise and Industry of the European Commission. From the outset, it aimed at supporting sharing of intelligence on innovation policies in some 200 regions across EU20 Member States. RIM Plus aims to help regions to improve their innovation policies based on better and harmonised policy intelligence. The new contract aims to contribute to the development of more effective regional innovation policies and promote policy learning. Building upon the experience gained and results obtained during the implementation of the RIM in the period 2010-2012, the RIM Plus service evolves towards providing practical guidance to regions on how to use the collected information, establishing a network of regional experts with thematic specialisation, and organising specialised workshops taking into account the relevance and potential interest among the regional innovation policy makers. RIM Plus covers EU-20 Member States: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden and the United Kingdom. This means that RIM will not concentrate on Member States where the Nomenclature of territorial units for statistics NUTS 1 and 2 levels are identical with the entire country (Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania), Malta which only has NUTS 3 regions, Slovenia which has a national innovation policy or Cyprus and Luxembourg which are countries without NUTS regions. The main aim of 30 regional reports is to provide a description and analysis of contemporary developments of regional innovation policy, taking into account the specific context of the region as well as general trends. All regional innovation reports are produced in a standardised way using a common methodological and conceptual framework, in order to allow for horizontal analysis, with a view to preparing the Annual EU Regional Innovation Monitor Plus report. European Commission official responsible for the project is Alberto Licciardello ([email protected]). The present report was prepared by Andrea Zenker and Henning Kroll. The contents and views expressed in this report do not necessarily reflect the opinions or policies of the Regions, Member States or the European Commission. The Regional Innovation Access Point and Knowledge Hub presenting further details of the regional innovation measures, policy documents and regional organisations in Severoiztochen is accessible through the RIM Plus online inventory of policy measures here: http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/policies/innovation/policy/regional- innovation/monitor/region/select Copyright of the document belongs to the European Commission. Neither the European Commission, nor any person acting on its behalf, may be held responsible for the use to which information contained in this document may be put, or for any errors which, despite careful preparation and checking, may appear. 1 http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/policies/innovation/policy/regional-innovation/monitor/ Regional Innovation Monitor Plus 1 Executive Summary 1. Main Trends and Challenges in the Regional Innovation System Saxony-Anhalt is one of the eastern German federal states. The region faced substantial political and economic transformation since the 1990s and is characterised by fragile economic structures and a comparatively high dependence on large industrial companies that – frequently not headquartered in the region – have their research facilities elsewhere. Further, the region characterised by intra-regional disparities: Economic activities are largely concentrated in a limited number of cities, while other parts are sparsely populated and dominated by agricultural activities. Economic activity in Saxony-Anhalt remains strongly characterised by the chemical industry, as well as mining, machine building, food industries, public services, transport, logistics and agriculture. Nonetheless, new fields were developed, mainly in automotive, biotechnology, medical technologies, information and communication technologies, and renewable energies (particularly wind energy, photovoltaic). Saxony-Anhalt steadily recovered from substantial structural challenges due to economic transformation since the beginning of the early 1990s, and was only to a moderate extent affected by the recent crisis. Accordingly, unemployment figures keep decreasing steadily – down to about half their end-1990s level – even though still above the national average, Challenge 1: Unbalanced Structure of the Regional Innovation System Besides some large industrial players that only to a moderate extent engage in research and development activities in the region, Saxony-Anhalt’s economic structure is mainly characterised by small and medium-sized enterprises from which only a modest share perform R&D and innovation activities. Given the region’s vulnerability in terms of unemployment, both types of businesses are needed to keep in check. While various efforts are addressing this problem and try to connect the regional economic base to the regional research sector’s generation of knowledge no complete, short-term alleviation of the problem can realistically be expected from them. While targeted engagements in new industries may help to transform the regional economy they must also be treated with care – as the equally quick rise and fall of the region’s photovoltaic industry has impressively demonstrated. Challenge 2: Demographic Change and Outmigration A further challenge of particular importance is the substantial outmigration of the region’s qualified labour force. As the outmigration of students and graduates reduces the region’s qualified human capital base and weakens the regional research and innovation system, Saxony-Anhalt becomes less and less attractive as an investment location for technology-oriented firms and/or research organisations – potentially prompting a vicious circle or downward spiral with a view to first innovative capacity and later socio-economic well-being. Summarised in poignant terms, Saxony-Anhalt seems caught in a self-fulfilling prophecy of losing its attractiveness and overall reputation as an attractive location to live and work in. Challenge 3: Budgetary Restraints Jeopardising Research and Education In the past, Saxony-Anhalt’s regional economy was strongly supported by European Structural Funds and national cross-subsidies, while the regional tax base remains rather limited. In the future, however, it will face significant decreases of financial 2 Regional Innovation