Innovation, competition and public procurement in the pre-commercial phase

Should the supply or the demand side bear the risk connected to innovation? The two polar cases identified in the literature are the supply push and the demand pull. The former is the typical one, with the supplier bearing the costs and obtaining the benefits from innovating. The latter is technology procurement, where the buyer takes the risk, by procuring the innovative good or service. With respect to this, pre-commercial procurement is a peculiar solution that can explain the debate found in the literature relative to its configuration either as a supply-side or a demand-side instrument. The separation from the commercial phase allows the procurer to take only (part of) the risks connected to R&D services. Also, competition among suppliers gives the opportunity of evaluating different solutions and to obtain, in the commercial phase, a lower price for the innovative good. The counterpart of all this is a large portion of risk being left to the supplier. As a consequence, suppliers need to obtain a larger share of the benefits of the innovation process. This economic reason, besides the legal restrictions on State aid, explains the need for a shared risks-shared benefits approach, centred on the agreements on the assignment of IPRs

Unintended Consequences and Intended Non-Consequences

The idea that government policies have unintended consequences has become a fixture of political argument, indeed a cliché. One can hardly get through a day’s newspaper editorials without encountering it with respect to something in the news—the TARP bailouts, the North Korea bailouts, executive pay caps, local issues such as the drinking age and the driving age.

Trusts of To-day

Facts Relating to Their Promotion, Financial Management And the Attempts at State Control

What are the prospects for privatizing infrastructure? Lessons from U. S. roads and solid waste

Infrastructure (Economics) ; Roads

Reinventing Central Office

This report presents a provocative description of a school system where resources, authority, and accountability reside primarily at the school level

Liberalisation of European energy markets: challenges and policy options

The European electricity and gas markets have been going through a process of liberalisation since the early 1990s. This process has changed the sector from a regulated structure of, predominantly, publicly owned monopolists controlling the entire supply chain, into a market where private and public generators and retailers compete on a regulated and unbundled system of transport infrastructure. This report assesses the evidence of the effects of liberalisation on efficiency, security of energy supply and environmental sustainability.

World Bank, China -- Long term development issues and options, a World Bank Country Economic Report (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1985).

Report and book review on China's economic growth and development and the implications thereof

IBM: Building a Smarter Planet (Interview with Sandy Dochan and Jeff Tieszen)

A candid discussion is presented with two IBM corporate managers regarding IBM‘s history and current involvement in sustainable global development. This frank interview travels from the roots of the organization through the changing leadership of today, explores dilemmas experienced and lessons learned, and identifies the challenges and successes of one of the largest multi-national corporate entities in the world marketplace