Conceptualizing the Role of Geographical Proximity in Project Based R&D Networks: A Literature Survey

Empirical evidence shows that research is being carried out more in cooperation or in collaboration with others, and the networks described by these collaborative research activities are becoming more and more complex. This phenomenon brings about new strands of research questions and opens up a different research context in the area of geography of innovation. The recent set of literature addressing these new issues shows a high degree of variation in terms of focus, approaches and methodology. Hence to elucidate the relationship between networks and geography it is crucial to have a review them. In this regard, this study focuses on a particular type of networks, namely, project based R&D networks and aims at describing the state-of-the-art in explaining the specificity of geography in formation and evolution of such networks. Towards this aim, we framed the discussion along four lenses: the specificity of geography in partner choice, in successful execution of the collaboration, in the resulting innovation performance both at the organizational and regional level, and the spatio-temporal evolution of networks. The overview provided by the survey is suggestive regarding the theorization of geography and network relationship, and informative regarding the issues demanding further research effort, and promising extensions.

Using Affiliation Networks to Study the Determinants of Multilateral Research Cooperation Some empirical evidence from EU Framework Programs in biotechnology

This paper studies multilateral cooperation networks among organizations and work on a two-mode representation to study the decision to participate in a consortium. Our objective is to explain the underlying processes that give rise to multilateral collaboration networks. Particularly, we are interested in how heterogeneity in organizations' attributes plays a part and in the geographical dimension of this formation process. We use the data on project proposals submitted to the 7th Framework Program (FP) in the area of Life sciences, Biotechnology and Biochemistry for Sustainable Non-Food. We employ exponential random graph models (p* models) (Frank and Strauss, 1986 ; Wasserman and Pattison, 1996) with node attributes (Agneessens et al., 2004), and we make use of extensions for affiliation networks (Wang et al., 2009). These models do not only enable handling variability in consortium sizes but also relax the assumption on tie/triad independence. We obtained some preliminary results indicating institutional types as a source of heterogeneity affecting participation decisions. Also, these initial results point out that organizations take their potential partners' participations in other projects into account in giving their decision ; organizations located in the core European countries tend to participate in the same project ; the tendency to preserve the composition of a consortium across projects and the tendency of organizations with the same institutional type to co-participate are not significant

Dynamiques spatiales des réseaux de connaissances

La littérature économique attribuant des rôles endogènes à l'évolution technologique et à lagéographie pour expliquer la croissance économique suggère que la compréhension des fluxde connaissances dans l'espace et de leurs conséquences sur les activités d'innovation est aucoeur de l'explication des disparités dans la croissance économique. À cet égard, cette thèsemet l'accent sur les réseaux de connaissances comme un mécanisme permettant la circulationdes connaissances dans l'espace et le temps. Parmi les différents types de réseaux deconnaissances, elle étudie les réseaux de collaboration de R&D et explore deux questionsprincipales.Tout d'abord, elle examine l'effet de la géographie sur la formation du réseau pour savoir si lesflux de connaissances par les réseaux de collaboration en R&D sont limités dans l'espace oupas. Elle s'enquiert de cette question à la fois pour le réseau multilatéral entre lesorganisations et le réseau inter-régional entre les régions européennes dans le domaine desbiotechnologies en utilisant les données sur les collaborations de R&D promues par lesProgrammes-Cadres Européens.Deuxièmement, elle explore comment un réseau évolutif de collaborations de R&D entre lesrégions affecte les performances des régions en matière d'innovation. Elle utilise l'économétriespatiale pour quantifier les effets statiques et dynamiques des flux de connaissances desvoisins spatiaux et d'un ensemble évolutif de partenaires de collaboration sur l'activitéinventive des régions dans le domaine des TIC au cours de la période 2003-2009.The economic literature attributing endogenous roles to technological change and geography inexplaining economie growth suggests that understanding knowledge flows in space and theirconsequences on innovative activities is central to explaining disparities in economie growth. Inthis regard, this PhD thesis focuses on knowledge networks as a mechanism that enablesknowledge flows in space and time. Among different types of knowledge networks, it studiesR&D collaboration networks and addresses two main issues.First, it investigates the effect of geography on network formation to figure out whetherknowledge flows through R&D collaboration networks are constrained in space or not. It inquiresthis question both for multilateral R&D collaboration network among organizations and theresulting inter-regional network among European regions in the field of biotechnology using dataon R&D collaborations promoted via European Framework Programmes.Second, it addresses how an evolving network of R&D collaborations among regions affectsregional innovation performances in time. It employs a spatial econometric approach to quantifythe static and dynamic effects of knowledge flows from spatial neighbors and an evolving set ofcollaboration partners on inventive activity of regions in the field of ICT durin 2003-2009

Determinants of cross-regional R&D collaboration: some empirical evidence from Europe in biotechnology

CNRS 2; AERES