Higher Education and Smart Specialisation in Lower Austria Reichert, Sybille Edwards, John March 2021 EUR 30634 EN This publication is a Technical report by the Joint Research Centre (JRC), the European Commission’s science and knowledge service. It aims to provide evidence-based scientific support to the European policymaking process. The scientific output expressed does not imply a policy position of the European Commission. Neither the European Commission nor any person acting on behalf of the Commission is responsible for the use that might be made of this publication. For information on the methodology and quality underlying the data used in this publication for which the source is neither Eurostat nor other Commission services, users should contact the referenced source. The designations employed and the presentation of material on the maps do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of the European Union concerning the legal status of any country, territory, city or area or of its authorities, or concerning the delimitation of its frontiers or boundaries. EU Science Hub https://ec.europa.eu/jrc JRC124126 EUR 30634 EN PDF ISBN 978-92-76-32165-1 ISSN 1831-9424 doi:10.2760/512886 Luxembourg: Publications Office of the European Union, 2021 © European Union, 2021 The reuse policy of the European Commission is implemented by the Commission Decision 2011/833/EU of 12 December 2011 on the reuse of Commission documents (OJ L 330, 14.12.2011, p. 39). Except otherwise noted, the reuse of this document is authorised under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) licence (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). This means that reuse is allowed provided appropriate credit is given and any changes are indicated. For any use or reproduction of photos or other material that is not owned by the EU, permission must be sought directly from the copyright holders. All content © European Union, 2021 How to cite this report: Reichert, S. and Edwards, J., Higher Education for Smart Specialisation in Lower Austria, EUR 30634 EN, Publications Office of the European Union, Luxembourg, 2021, ISBN 978-92-76-32165-1, doi:10.2760/512886, JRC124126 Table of Contents Acknowledgements............................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 4 Executive Summary........................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 5 1. Introduction............................................................................................................................................................ 7 2. Background analysis............................................................................................................................................ 8 2.1 Economic and Knowledge Base of the Region.............................................................................................................................................8 2.2 Financial Resources for Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Regional Development .........................9 2.3 The Higher Education and Public Research Sector................................................................................................................................ 11 3. Strategy development.......................................................................................................................................15 3.1 Regional Innovation and Smart Specialisation Strategy.................................................................................................................. 15 3.2 The Higher Education Strategy as part of a RTI Strategy Framework.................................................................................... 22 4. The Importance of Intermediary Agents and Services for Connecting Universities with Industry and for Facilitating Regional Innovation ...........................................................................................................25 4.1 The Technopoles as Connective Tissue between University Research Groups and Companies ...................... 25 4.2 University-Industry Collaboration in COMET Centres.......................................................................................................................... 27 4.3 Research and Technology Transfer Agency FOTEC...............................................................................................................................28 4.4 Accent and Tecnet: The regional start-up support services ......................................................................................................... 30 5. Governance and Implementation of Regional Innovation Strategy.....................................................32 5.1 Governance within the region ..................................................................................................................................................................................32 5.2 Coordination and interaction between national and regional strategy development...............................................34 5.3 Monitoring and Evaluation ..........................................................................................................................................................................................35 6. Conclusions and Recommendations ............................................................................................................. 39 References.............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 41 List of Figures and Tables ........................................................................................................................................................................................................ 42 Annex 1: Research Questions and Interview Questions for Lower Austria HESS-Case Study.....................................43 Annex 2: List of Interviewees ................................................................................................................................................................................................46 3 Acknowledgements We are very grateful for the openness, flexibility and competence of our Lower Austrian interviewees who took even more time than was scheduled to answer all questions and comment on the development of their ecosystem. Thanks to their generosity, we were able to gather an in-depth insight into Lower Austrian innovation institutions and networks despite difficult conditions and online interviews because of the Covid-19 pandemic. Authors Sybille Reichert, Reichert Consulting: Policy and Strategy Development for Higher Education John Edwards, Joint Research Centre, European Commission (until August 2020), CICS.NOVA and Policy Experimentation and Evaluation Platform (from October 2020) 4 Executive Summary Lower Austria as a unique case Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) can be key players in regional innovation ecosystems and for the design and implementation of Smart Specialisation Strategies (S3). However, regions in Europe are diverse, in terms of their economic and institutional structures, higher education systems, and competences and capabilities for S3 management. The project on Higher Education for Smart Specialisation (HESS) has included several case studies where historic and internationally renowned universities have not played a significant role in S3. This can be explained by a variety of factors, from weak strategies and regional institutions, problems with multi- level governance, to a lack of local engagement by the universities concerned. On the other hand, this case study of Lower Austria shows that even in a region with a small higher education sector, an absence of traditional research-intensive universities and an economy in transition from agriculture, that HEIs both within and outside the region can be important partners for S3 managers. The HESS project and action research The HESS project is managed by the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre on the initiative of the Directorate General for Education, Youth, Culture and Sport. Since 2016 a series of case studies have aimed to find out how HEIs are involved in smart specialisation and how stronger partnerships can be built with regional authorities. One of the features of the HESS case studies is that they are designed and carried out closely with the regional authority, HEIs and other innovation actors. This is because the one of the objectives of the HESS project is to help build stronger regional partnerships. In the case of Lower Austria, unfortunately the action research was handicapped to a large extent by the Covid pandemic, which broke out shortly after work had begun. Nevertheless, a wide range of innovation actors, regional and national policy makers were interviewed, and online methods were used as far as possible. Economic development and higher education in Lower Austria Lower Austria is a region defined by its proximity to Vienna, the country’s capital city with high levels of research and innovation, and many leading HEIs. However, compared to