Transnational Innovation Research Articles

Varieties of corporate innovation systems and their interplay with global and national systems: Amazon, Facebook, Google and Microsoft’s strategies to produce and appropriate artificial intelligence

The widely accepted globalization of innovation entails two interrelated undertheorized aspects: (1) the capacity of certain firms to orchestrate transnational innovation systems appropriating successful results, which some have explained with the concept of corporate innovation systems (CIS), and (2) the co-existence of such globalization with those CIS and national innovation systems. I address these matters analysing US Big Tech artificial intelligence (AI) CIS showing that they combine multiple mechanisms to co-produce and appropriate AI. I propose ‘frenemy’ to describe Microsoft’s strategy because many Chinese organizations and even direct competitors integrate its CIS. ‘University’ symbolises Google’s strategy, given its focus on fundamental AI, its central place in the AI research field and appropriation mechanisms that are not translating into clear business advantages. ‘Secrecy’ defines Amazon’s strategy, maximizing knowledge inflows while minimizing outflows. Facebook, with the narrowest AI CIS, exhibits an ‘application-centred’ strategy. Ultimately, this paper contributes to understanding the multiple mechanisms used by leading corporations for controlling and shaping frontier transnational knowledge production and appropriation. By doing so, it advances our knowledge of the interplay between different innovation spheres (national, global and corporate) and highlights the dangers of CIS’s encroachment of national and global systems.

Transnational innovation systems for bioeconomy: insights from cassava value chains in East Africa

In this study, we analyze the purpose, challenges, and opportunities of transnational innovation systems using cassava as the case study crop in the East Africa region. Cassava scientifically referred to as Manihot esculenta Crantz, is an important food security crop for the poor and vulnerable and a potential building block for advancing the bioeconomy in Africa and the global South. Semi-structured interviews with researchers, government official, and small and medium enterprise representatives from the region were done to determine their level of collaborations with other partners across the region and the opportunities and challenges for transnational innovation systems along the cassava value chain. The selection of interviewees followed a purposive sampling technique according to their knowledge on transnational innovation in the cassava value chain. This was corroborated by a focused literature review on innovation systems concepts gathered from scholarly literature. The findings show that transnational collaborations and innovations in the East African region offer opportunities for expansion of biomass production, bioprocessing, and value addition to the rich bioresources available. Collaboration across borders and transnational innovation systems were found to play an important role for advancing and/or upscaling cassava breeding, growing, value-adding products and novel processing methods and contributing to a growing East African bioeconomy. Other than the regional policy challenges, organizational and cultural barriers were more prominent in venturing, participation, and involvement of parties and users in transnational innovations. These findings draw attention to the often unnoticed, but vital, role that institutional and policy frameworks play in initiating as well as supporting transnational innovation systems that address issues of current and future global concern. Therefore, appropriate policy environment and partnerships that offer opportunities for synergy and complementarity are vital for building effective transnational innovation systems that enhance the sustainability of production, value addition and end-uses of biobased cassava products.

The COVID-19 Crisis, National Innovation Systems, and World Development

In this think-piece, I reflect on what lessons innovation scholars and innovation policymakers in the developing world can draw from the COVID-19 crisis. While it has confirmed the fundamental importance of science and technology in coping with a major global challenge, it has also shown its limitations and the importance of institutions and organisational capabilities. While the crisis has demonstrated the necessity to build stronger national innovation systems (NSI) in the South, it has also simultaneously shown the need to go beyond national governance and move in the direction of a global innovation system. The COVID-19 crisis has reinforced new trends in technology and in global competition that challenge innovation system theory and innovation policy. The crisis stimulated the application and development of artificial intelligence and accelerated the concentration of intellectual capital in a handful of tech giants located in the US and China. While the volume of trade in digital services kept growing, there was a dramatic fall in the volume of global value chain trade in tangibles. These developments intensified the China-US rivalry and undermined transnational collaborations in science and technology. Countries in the South aiming at building stronger national innovation systems need to do so under new circumstances, where artificial intelligence is emerging as a strategic technology, where intellectual monopolies harvest data worldwide, where great powers are engaged in technological rivalry, and where linking up with global value chains for tangibles has become less of an option. One implication is that the issue of scale has become more critical than before; groupings of small and medium-sized countries need to integrate economically and politically in order to develop crucial digital capabilities and competitiveness. Such moves in the direction of forming transnational innovation systems are consonant with strategies to cope with global challenges.

Towards a new model of EU-China innovation cooperation: Bridging missing links between international university collaboration and international industry collaboration

This paper theoretically conceptualises and empirically explores the role of international university collaboration in building transnational university–industry co-innovation networks (TUICNs) in the EU–China context, and suggests a new model of international innovation cooperation. The theoretical framework was constructed by synthesising insights from social network theory and institutional theory. The empirical exploration was based on an analysis of interviews with 18 actors engaged in EU–China innovation cooperation. The findings suggest that international university collaboration could contribute to international industry collaboration and, therefore, to the development of TUICNs by 1) matching suitable industrial partners, 2) building trust between them, 3) giving industrial actors access to new resources, (4) enhancing the reputations of international companies in their cooperation countries, and (5) creating innovative business collaboration models. The study also addresses the following paradox in innovation studies: although the vital role of universities in national/regional innovation systems has been widely studied and the global interconnectedness of innovation networks is generally acknowledged, little attention has been given to universities’ engagement in transnational innovation (eco)systems. Based on the findings, recommendations for policymakers, universities and companies are provided in light of the shifting balance of challenges and opportunities presented by China to the EU.

Not all peripheries are the same: The importance of relative regional innovativeness in transnational innovation networks

AbstractThis paper aims to test the hypothesis according to which “relative” innovativeness (regions scoring higher than the national average in innovation rankings, such as the Regional Innovation Scoreboard) is more important than “absolute” innovativeness (regions scoring higher than the European Union [EU] average) in determining the centrality and key positioning of EU regions in highly selective and competitive international innovation networks. The combined adoption of various social network analysis techniques and econometric models in the specific arena of the EU nanotechnology network created within the Horizon 2020 program confirms this hypothesis. However, additional graph visualization and brokerage analysis highlight how such relative innovators, holding key positions in the targeted network, hardly act as gatekeepers in the respective national contexts. A major implication of this study is that although relatively innovative regions may play a key role in transnational innovation networks, their inadequate action as gatekeepers represents a negative aspect for peripheral regions in general and especially in marginally innovative countries. This finding raises doubts about the actual increasing and more effective knowledge circulation between the surveyed regions to which the EU explicitly aspires.

English-Language Periodicals in Parisian Reading Rooms and the Cross-Channel Transfer of Editorial Innovation (1800–65)

In the historical context of the development and modernization of the press, of an increasingly intense transnational circulation of ideas and of editorial styles, this essay sets out to analyze the reasons why reading rooms specialized in the foreign-language press, especially in English—for which the market was narrow—were successful in Paris during the first half of the nineteenth century. It examines the consequences of the circulation of the normally difficult to access British periodicals and newspapers, such as the Edinburgh Review, the Quarterly Review and the Westminster Review present in these reading rooms, on the transformation of the French media system. In the 1850s and 1860s, the wind started to change direction. By then, on the other side of the Channel, Alexander Macmillan and Mathew Arnold had become fervent admirers of the famous Revue des deux mondes. This turnabout testifies to the complexity of the mechanisms at work behind transnational cultural transfers and media innovation in France and in Britain at the time.

Entrepreneurial Opportunities of Refugees in Germany, France, and Ireland: Multiple Embeddedness Framework

Recently, the entrepreneurial potential of refugees has received growing attention from scholars and policymakers. However, the literature on refugee entrepreneurship suffers from the fragmentation of previous research findings, which has been mainly attributed to the fact that refugees have heterogeneous backgrounds. Tackling this challenge, this study conceptualized the framework for the multiple embeddedness of refugee entrepreneurs by applying and extending the concept of mixed embeddedness. Based on 50 semi-structured interviews with refugee entrepreneurs who relocated to Germany, France, and Ireland, we identified six patterns in which refugees’ multiple embeddedness and their actions as entrepreneurial agencies interacted to develop entrepreneurial opportunities: (i) value creation with homeland resources, (ii) acting as transnational middleman minorities, (iii) integration facilitation, (iv) qualification transfers, (v) homeland-problem solving, and (vi) creative innovation. This study contributes to the literature on refugee entrepreneurship by considering multiple contexts in which refugees can be embedded in and by elaborating on the interactions between opportunity structure emerging within the multiple embeddedness, actions, and capabilities of refugees as entrepreneurial agencies.

The stakes in decoupling discovery: China’s role in transnational innovation

Technological innovation has emerged as an important site of globalization in recent decades. Yet it is unclear what the future holds for this new form of collaboration, given the spectre of high-tech “decoupling” between the United States and China. This article explores the role that China has come to play in transnational innovation linkages, in an effort to ascertain what is at stake. We find that China has become a key player in some respects, while in others it remains relatively marginal. Moreover, we find that in the arenas where China is most prominent – as a player in brain circulation and as a partner in basic science – China’s participation has had important benefits for other countries, particularly the United States.

Transplanting institutional innovation: comparing the success of NGOs and missionary Protestantism in sub-Saharan Africa

Viewing missionary Protestantism and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) as carriers of transnational institutional innovation, this article compares their successes and failures at creating self-sustaining institutions in distant societies. Missionary Protestantism and NGOs are similar in that they attempt to establish formal organizations outside kinship, lineage, and ethnic forms of solidarity. Focusing on institutions as ways to create collective capacities that organize social life, we trace the route whereby Protestant missionaries established congregational religion in Africa and identify social practices that made this enterprise successful but are comparatively absent in current NGO attempts to transform organizational life. Largely ignored by sociologists interested in institutional transformation, the history of congregational religion offers valuable sociological lessons about the conditions for radical institutional innovation. Its success was rooted first, in colonial missionaries’ ability to enforce new ways of life on small exemplary communities; second, in local adaptations (African prophetic movements, Pentecostalism) that deepened and widened the social reach of congregational principles; and third in the incentives Protestantism created for propagating the congregational form.

Political History and the Socio-Economic-Cultural- Transnational Innovation in Bangladesh

Riverine country in South Asia Bangladesh has seen various incidents from the British Bengal to East Pakistan and after being an independent country in Bangladesh. Its social, economic, cultural changes affected its people from the beginning, people of East Bengal were an innocent, poor peasants Muslim Bengali majority. Because of its economic and educational disadvantage, the British have exploited through land reforms, feudal system. It was similar exploitation from West Pakistan. People of East Pakistan finally started a revolution for freedom from the exploiters and through a bloody war in 1971, East Pakistan became an independent country. Bangladesh after independence has seen poverty, unemployment, social classifications, communalism between majority Muslims and minority Hindus, it has seen a civilian and military government with impractical policies, which provided nothing but tensions and grief. However, Bangladesh finally manages its status in the world as a future economic power by the establishment of democracy, by the implementation of various policies, such as a vision of a developed country by 2030. Its academic exchanges through various institutions like the American Institute of Bangladesh Studies (AIBS) at the University of Wisconsin helps its acceptability worldwide and recognizes its linguistic features, such as literature of Tagore and Kaji Nazrul Islam. It is an ethnographic article, which will send a message to the rest of the about Bangladesh, its social, economic, political structure, people, and its ambition to be an economic powerhouse in the 21st century, it is a message from a Bengali nation who established Bengali language as an international language to the UN. This article has completed through the reading of various books, academic articles and journals, and the research will be continuing through discussions, publications and collaboration with academic institutes.

Building University-Industry Co-Innovation Networks in Transnational Innovation Ecosystems: Towards a Transdisciplinary Approach of Integrating Social Sciences and Artificial Intelligence

This paper presents a potential solution to fill a gap in both research and practice that there are few interactions between transnational industry cooperation (TIC) and transnational university cooperation (TUC) in transnational innovation ecosystems. To strengthen the synergies between TIC and TUC for innovation, the first step is to match suitable industrial firms from two countries for collaboration through their common connections to transnational university/academic partnerships. Our proposed matching solution is based on the integration of social science theories and specific artificial intelligence (AI) techniques. While the insights of social sciences, e.g., innovation studies and social network theory, have potential to answer the question of why TIC and TUC should be looked at as synergetic entities with elaborated conceptualization, the method of machine learning, as one specific technic off AI, can help answer the question of how to realize that synergy. On the way towards a transdisciplinary approach to TIC and TUC synergy building, or creating transnational university-industry co-innovation networks, the paper takes an initial step by examining what the supports and gaps of existing studies on the topic are, and using the context of EU–China science, technology and innovation cooperation as a testbed. This is followed by the introduction of our proposed approach and our suggestions for future research.

Simulation of the national innovation systems development: A transnational and coevolution approach

The current state of scientific and technological development of the world economy is quite specific, because advanced technologies already known are too complicated for simple mechanical copying and borrowing, and most of the technologies of Industry 4.0 are in the making. Thus, the development and further exploitation of all kinds of innovations today, more than ever, require an appropriate environment - an effective national innovation system (NIS), which determines the country's ability to generate innovation, which is the key to high competitiveness and world leadership. However, the formation of a full-fledged innovation system of the country is quite complicated, for at least two reasons: first, there exist purely national features of functioning and cooperation of the main agents of change, and secondly, in the modern globalized world many of the most important for innovation processes go beyond the borders of individual countries, creating a unique transnational "ecosystem" with its distinctive features, which, undoubtedly, must be considered. The article proposes the scientific approach of reliable identification of national and transnational (supranational, global) innovation systems (TNIS) and the corresponding toolkit for simulating their development in the context of the quadruple helix concept. Identification of innovative systems is based on the methods of cluster analysis, genetic algorithms and neural network training. As a result, there have been identified and qualitatively interpreted four basic types of TNIS, which have stable characteristics determining the behavioural parameters and capabilities of the NIS included. A neural network has been built to identify NIS, which simplifies the process of simulating their development within the characteristic features of basic TNIS. It is established that the NIS of Ukraine belongs to the basic type of TNIS – “developed and developing countries with mixed extractive-inclusive institutions with a strong informal component (including the post-Soviet type)”. The results of its functioning against the background of global and relevant cluster leaders are not satisfactory and necessitate the adjustment of the further development vector. In order to demonstrate the capabilities of the neural network built, four supranational associations have been identified and analysed. The proposed approaches and tools will facilitate variant analytics and forecasting studies in substantiating the optimal directions for the individual NIS further development in the context of global and cluster trends.

Asymmetric Power of the Core: Technological Cooperation and Technological Competition in the Transnational Innovation Networks of Big Pharma

This article theoretically and empirically analyzes leader corporations’ innovation processes in contemporary capitalism. We highlight three characteristics: their transnational scope, the primacy of power or asymmetric relations exercised by leaders over the participants of their innovation circuits or networks, and the relevance of what we called technological competition and technological cooperation between leaders. Focusing on the latter, our theoretical contribution integrates the concepts of innovation circuit, global innovation network and modularity of knowledge production in order to elaborate a preliminary model for synthesizing leader’s technological competition and collaboration behaviors. This model is the general framework used for studying three big pharma’s innovation networks (Roche, Novartis and Pfizer). In particular, we study those networks by considering two outputs: scientific publications and patents. Network maps are constructed based on institutions’ co-occurrences, thus looking at who is co-authoring their publications and co-owning these corporations’ patents. We find that big pharmaceuticals co-produce together mainly generic knowledge modules, thus develop a strong technological cooperation. Simultaneously, to succeed in their technological competition they outsource stages of their innovation networks to subordinate institutions that, even if they contribute to achieve the innovation, will not be co-owners of the resulting patents, while big pharmaceuticals enjoy associated innovation rents.

Political History and the Socio-Economic-Cultural- Transnational Innovation in Bangladesh

Riverine country in South Asia Bangladesh has seen various incidents from the British Bengal to East Pakistan and after being an independent country in Bangladesh. Its social, economic, cultural changes affected its people from the beginning, people of East Bengal were an innocent, poor peasants Muslim Bengali majority. Because of its economic and educational disadvantage, the British have exploited through land reforms, feudal system. It was similar exploitation from West Pakistan. People of East Pakistan finally started a revolution for freedom from the exploiters and through a bloody war in 1971, East Pakistan became an independent country. Bangladesh after independence has seen poverty, unemployment, social classifications, communalism between majority Muslims and minority Hindus, it has seen a civilian and military government with impractical policies, which provided nothing but tensions and grief. However, Bangladesh finally manages its status in the world as a future economic power by the establishment of democracy, by the implementation of various policies, such as a vision of a developed country by 2030. Its academic exchanges through various institutions like the American Institute of Bangladesh Studies (AIBS) at the University of Wisconsin helps its acceptability worldwide and recognizes its linguistic features, such as literature of Tagore and Kaji Nazrul Islam. It is an ethnographic article, which will send a message to the rest of the about Bangladesh, its social, economic, political structure, people, and its ambition to be an economic powerhouse in the 21st century, it is a message from a Bengali nation who established Bengali language as an international language to the UN. This article has completed through the reading of various books, academic articles and journals, and the research will be continuing through discussions, publications and collaboration with academic institutes.

EU-China Innovation Relations from Zero-Sum to Global Networks

It is in the long-term interests of both the EU and China to encourage innovation collaboration. Transnational innovation networks or ecosystems can boost innovation outcomes for both sides. European and Chinese leaders should encourage an open mindset among policymakers, businesses, researchers and the public at large. This requires moving beyond thinking about innovation as a national or regional project and seeing it as a way to enrich the engagement of European and Chinese researchers and enterprises in global networks. Targets, such as those for local content, which encourage nationalist or protectionist mindsets should be avoided. The EU and China are already cooperating in science, technology and innovation and there is much potential to cooperate further in basic research; food and agriculture; manufacturing and industrial technology, such as high-speed railways and aircraft; sustainable urbanization, such as water and health; and climate change mitigation measures, such as renewable energy and green finance. To boost innovation cooperation further, the governments of EU member states and China should facilitate the movement of researchers, through flexible and easy-to-navigate visa regimes, student exchanges, and by encouraging researchers to collaborate and to gain global experience. They should also facilitate the cross-border registration of patents by their nationals, so that the EU and China can become effectively the world’s largest single market for innovation. Growing industrial competition complicates potential close innovation relations. The encouragement of innovation networks needs to be balanced by risk management measures to maintain incentives for individual firms and institutions to invest in innovation, and by the further development and strengthening of intellectual property rights protection. Evaluating relative innovation capacity has become more complex with the rise of China, and shifts to a more diffuse and multipolar world. But developed economies are still at the forefront in innovation, and Europeans should have confidence in the strengths that mature research institutions and supportive regulatory frameworks can bring to global innovation. Innovative Chinese companies will also create new opportunities for Europe.

Motivações do P&D transnacional em Brasil e efeitos locais de absorção de conhecimento

Este trabalho tem como objetivo discutir as características do P&D transacional em países emergentes, a partir do ponto de vista das estratégias globais das grandes corporações transnacionais (GCTs) e das vantagens oferecidas pelos receptores, fazendo uma especial referência ao caso brasileiro. As tradicionais motivações para a internacionalização tecnológica baseadas na visão home-base tiveram que ser ampliadas para explicar a nova geografia da inovação voltada para países emergentes sob uma visão host-base. Os principais atrativos destes países são o tamanho de seus mercados, as especificidades de suas demandas e menores custos relativos de P&D compatíveis com níveis aceitáveis de qualidade de seus recursos tecnológicos. Indicadores recentes colocam o Brasil como receptor de investimentos líquidos em P&D, embora o direcionamento seja assimétrico entre setores e tecnologias. As potencialidades locais que o Brasil oferece poderiam representar uma fonte de criação de capacitação local, a partir da combinação de esforços internos e externos com políticas públicas de absorção de conhecimento.

The return of highlyskilled migrants to Serbia

Migration scholars argue that return migrants have the potential to become a developing force in their countries of origin, but that the realization of this 'diaspora solution to innovation capacity development' depends on different context factors. This paper contributes to capturing theoretically such context factors by making use of concepts of the Cultural-Historical Activity Theory. Based on an explorative empirical approach, a model of processes of return migration in a specific country (Serbia) is created. According to the findings of this paper, returnees offer potential for Serbian transnational innovation systems, which subsequently could strongly contribute to the social and economic development of Serbia. However, at present, the developmental potential of highly skilled returnees in Serbia has not bee realized yet. Returnees arrive with hopes to earn a living in Serbia and possibly to contribute to the development of the society. Still, there are many barriers for returnees, such as nepotism, as well as the existing power structures at potential workplaces and markets. At the same time, state institutions or independent organizations do not provide sufficient support to make a difference for the majority of returnees. Although there are some examples of returnees who are successful in developing innovative start-ups or becoming innovators in the existing organizations, their number remains limited. Nevertheless, it seems possible that returnees can become a developing force in Serbia and similar countries in transition. In order to realize this, the establishment of a sustainable support system for highly skilled returnees to Serbia and scientific diaspora members is needed.

Knowledge creation and diffusion of Taiwan's universities: Knowledge trajectory from patent data

The university sector, receiving government funding to perform basic research, is designated to produce and widely disseminate innovative knowledge to industry in many countries, particularly in latecomer countries such as Taiwan. Knowledge flows occurring in university research can be traced with patent data. This exploratory study aims to investigate knowledge creation and diffusion of Taiwan's universities by using university patents as the proxy. The empirical analysis finds a dramatic increase in the number of university patents after 2002. Some implications are derived based on this empirical analysis. Moreover, the cross-national citation behavior of university research would be worthwhile for conceptualizing transnational innovation networks in future studies.

Transnational innovation networks aren’t all created equal: towards a classification system

This paper examines the growth of transnational networks of innovation and proposes a preliminary classificatory system of four distinct kinds of forces which give rise to social networks that facilitate knowledge flows, relationship building, and collaborative activities important to accessing global markets. The networks may form around a technology sector, be identity based, emerge from a government-led initiative, or be stimulated by a civic or philanthropic organization. Each has a different mode of organizing, financing, and meeting its objectives, as shown by examples presented in the paper. The proposed classification of these characteristics is intended to open a conversation within the social sciences and among policy makers about how better to understand the ways in which transnational networks get formed, operate and produce desired results.

Higher education regionalization in Asia Pacific

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to outline some of the historic ways of reviewing patterns of regional engagement, with special attention to how the emergent concepts of higher education (HE) regionalization stand in relationship to regionalism. Additional implications are spelled out for governance, citizenship and university transformation.Design/methodology/approachThis conceptual essay is meant to appear in conjunction with more discrete, case‐oriented examinations of Asia Pacific HE regionalization.FindingsDiscussions of regionalism in Asian HE are being replaced by those focused on regionalization; the former is a nation‐state and geographic policy framework whereas the latter tends to refer to emergent empirical relationships. Regionalization itself can be further distinguished in terms of its “older” forms, focused on geographic proximities and exchanges defined and carried out within those proximities. New regionalization is increasingly linked to global circuits of exchange in which the currencies of such exchanges are closely linked to the emergent dynamics of the knowledge society and economy. These dynamics in turn are closely linked to patterns of migration and mobility in HE and the efforts of higher education institutions (HEIs) and regional governments to develop new governance structure structures appropriate for this style of regionalization. These regional dynamics reflect tensions that draw institutions and nations together (centripetal forces) and those that keep them apart (centrifugal forces). These processes are marked by governance dynamics, those of affinity and affiliation, transnational innovation, and redefinitions of the responsibilities and promises of citizenship.Originality/valueUse of these modal concepts can be used to promote and extend a region‐wide discussion and related research relevant to HE transformation within the region.