Driving Place based Innovation

As the end of 2024 approaches, we are witnessing the installation of a new EC governance with new commissioners and a lively discussion on how to implement the main findings of the Draghi Report to enhance European competitiveness.

At the same time various voices are sharing their vision on the future scope of FP10 and how Europe’s research and innovation priorities could be better served by enhancing the role of place based innovation notably by developing true synergies between FP10 and cohesion policy. 

A recent Opinion published by the Committee of Regions sets out a series of recommendations and their vision on how such synergies can be achieved: for instance, by creating a multiannual, multi-fund programme in the future Multiannual Financial Framework and by stressing “the need to recast and step up territorial cooperation programmes, in particular their interregional component, which are best placed to make the link between the FP and cohesion policy and to connect regional industrial value chains, in particular between the players in the most developed regions and those still in convergence”.

Within Interreg Europe, a range of projects demonstrate the benefits that come from a strong regional innovation and research ecosystem, and how by connecting different policies, funding programmes and ecosystem actors it is possible to deliver more impact and competitiveness. 

Our recent policy brief on Interregional Complementarities on Innovation gives concrete examples of policy implementation in this thematic area.

Lessons from the past also illustrate the dangers of pursuing an “excellence” only approach to supporting research and innovation. They show the risk of encouraging and reinforcing growth disparities, leading to a number of consequences on related territorial development policies: attracting and retaining talent becomes more and more challenging, while larger metropolitan areas suffer from locational cost increases and congestion and mobility challenges, ultimately impacting on quality of life and accentuating carbon production impacts.

A new approach incorporating enhanced place based innovation in FP10 will enable Europe to:

• Tackle global challenges regarding RDI cooperation, securing greater sovereignty points towards the need for ensuring that Europe harnesses all the potential of its diverse regional RDI ecosystems and does not simply rely on a limited number of centres of excellence based on a few capital city/regional powerhouses;
• Enhance cooperation in cross border RDI ecosystems such as the Basque Country (FR/ES), Alsace/Baden Württemberg  (FR/DE). These examples illustrate how sharing knowledge, talent pools and technology competences can drive place based innovation;
• Respond to major societal challenges, achieve SDG’s, deliver EU Mission priorities and various climate adaptation objectives which cannot be tackled without a strong place based dimension that includes territorial pilot and demonstration projects;
• Exploit the results of Regional Smart Specialisation strategies, by concentrating regional resources in value chains where there are competitive advantages, empowering regional innovation stakeholders such as clusters and universities and by helping these same actors to cooperation across borders.

More concretely, we could in particular imagine the further boosting of the Pillar 3 (Innovative Europe) set of actions with greater support to the deployment of European Innovation Ecosystems engaging with a diversity of regional innovation intermediaries such as clusters and technology hubs that could enhance the impact upon SMEs.

The further development of financial instruments such as cascade funding models can accelerate small scale innovation projects and provide many SMEs with their first taste of EU funded projects.

The recent Regional Innovation Valley initiative supported by DG RTD and DG REGIO – combining financial resources with a strong territorial dimension- is a good example of how place based innovation can help Europe become more competitive and create dynamic value chains that exploit the RDI resources from both regional innovation leaders and more moderate innovators. 

Further experimentation with the I3 initiative could help harness the work with these same actors.  Equally, ambitions for the deployment of “Seal of Excellence” type approaches requires closer cooperation between Cohesion funding and the current Horizon Europe programme.

Furthermore members of the Interreg Europe community have shown how policy capitalisation actions and capacity building can help enhance participation in Horizon Europe funding programmes – as illustrated in various Peer Review reports such as the one delivered for the Pomorskie Voivodeship, Poland.

So if FP10 wants to remain a flagship EU RDI programme, it is important to learn from past experiences and pursue an approach that encourages and finances greater place based innovation. 

In this way Europe can exploit the full potential of its rich and diverse regional research and innovation stakeholders and create strong synergies between its different funding programmes and innovation ecosystem stakeholders thus spreading economic development across all regions.