Social and Organizational Analysis

Industrial SMEs in the regional system of innovation

Status:
Finished
Project leaders:
Manuel Ahedo
Members:
Manuel Ahedo; Francesc Valls; Rafael Böcker; Ángel Belzunegui
Proposed start date:
2009-01-05
Proposed end date:
2011-12-30
Description:

Funded by Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness, Goverment of Spain

The theory of national / regional innovation systems emerged strongly in the nineties. This theory points to the importance of social factors (organizational, institutional, cultural) in the process of creating and applying knowledge. At the same time, some doubts about the technology transfer policies based on 'supply model' developed from the 80 appeared. The objective of this project is to analyze the processes of innovation in Spanish  SMEs, with special attention to the relations with its environment or regional innovation system.

The obtject of analysis are three autonomous regions with a significant degree of industrial development and regional governments active in policy research, development and innovation: Euskadi, Navarre and Catalonia. The research aims to analyze differentially:

  1. The internal processes of companies
  2. External processes in the relations between companies (customers, suppliers)
  3. External processes between any company (manufacturer or customer) and other R & D agents

The part of the project leaded by the research group Social and Organizational Analysis is entitled "Industrial SMEs in the regional system of innovation. The case of Catalonia".

 
It will be analyzed as three autonomous regions with a significant degree of industrial development and regional governments active in policy research, development and innovation: Euskadi, Navarre and Catalonia. The research aims to analyze differentially:
The internal processes of companies
External processes embodied in the relations between companies (customers, suppliers)
External processes from any company (manufacturer or customer) and third party agents of R & D