Understanding Research, Science and Technology Parks Global Best Practices: Report of a Symposium (2009) / Chapter Skim
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Panel II: North American and European S&T Parks
Panel II: North American and European S&T Parks
Pages 70-85
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From page 70... ...
The English Experience Jane Davies Manchester Science Park United Kingdom Ms. Davies said she has been CEO of Manchester Science Park Ltd.
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From page 71... ...
and in Europe with capital funding from regional development agencies which see science parks as tangible evidence of their region's developing knowledge economy. A Mix of Ownership Many of these parks, she said, are partnerships between government and local universities, which in the U.K.
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From page 72... ...
They examined some 900 companies altogether, comparing the economic and innovation performance of park tenants with similar firms located outside parks. The results showed that the single most important factor affecting the performance of science parks is the state of the sub-regional economy in which they operate.
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The next science parks to be built in the U.K. will represent a third generation, she said, and each is likely to be: • A global player with local roots.
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From page 74... ...
The city produces 11 percent of Mexico's manufacturing goods, equivalent to US$12.1 billion. The province of Nuevo Leon also has a good higher educational system to anchor park activities, including 93 colleges and universities.
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Main centers in the park include a variety of R&D groups, in operation or u nder construction. These include universities and public research centers in different fields, including electronics, biotechnology, mathematics, advanced materials, food industry, nanotech, water research, and others.
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Two business incubators have been designed, one for nanotechnology and one for biotechnology, at a cost of $20 million. The state's first seed and venture capital fund is being assembled by private partners, the government, and the national bank to a level of $30 million.
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Vass, vice president of the National Office for Research and Technology, began by saying that her country of Hungary is "a newcomer to this arena," having become a market economy only a decade and a half ago. She said that Hungary is still among the "catching-up countries in the European Union, with weaknesses outweighing the strengths." She noted the presence of a strong science base and a very weak industrial maquila or maquiladora is a factory that imports materials and equipment on a duty-free and A tariff-free basis for assembly or manufacturing and then re-exports the assembled product, usually back to the originating country.
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Among the country's strengths are a moderately developed business climate, a good science base, and strong R&D capacities. The opportunities have become more interesting since joining the European Union (EU)
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The government is trying to decide where to focus the country's nowfragmented R&D elements and which specialties to build up. It is also trying to encourage business-to-business cooperation, "which is not a tradition." More broadly, the strategy will attempt to better connect science to commercialization, move domestic firms up the value chain, and build critical mass "to be sure we are visible in the world." Hungary is betting on science and technology parks largely on the basis of experiences elsewhere.
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From page 80... ...
In 2006, it established a pre-seed/seed capital fund, which has accumulated about 5 million Euros, and a business angel network. The country has emulated the European Technology Platform initiative in trying to bring all stakeholders in certain sectors together to set up a strategic research agenda.
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Old structures are difficult to change, she said, quoting John Kenneth Galbraith: "The conventional view serves to protect us from the painful job of thinking." "The bottom line," she said, "is that Hungary is experimenting with a model that is highly centralized in strategy formulation but decentralized in implementation." Initiatives in France David Holden Minatec Dr. Holden spoke about the evolution and current status of Minatec, the first European campus for micro and nanotechnologies, located in Grenoble, France.10 Minatec is relatively new, an extension of the national laboratory system that has been redesigned to stimulate economic development.
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The population of Minatec will soon reach 4,000, including 1,100 students and 1,900 researchers. Of the annual research budget of 320 million Euros, two-thirds comes from outside contracts.
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in first-round investment in May 2006. A spin-off from Leti called Movea, which designs microsystems to capture and quantify human motion, received a first-round investment of 7.3 million Euros (US$11.2 million)
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"I think this agreement is good for Grenoble," said Dr. Holden, "because it's focused on technology that is much more diverse and that is better for start-up creation." A Response: Diversification The next stage for Minatec, which will be supported by annual inflow of about 320 million Euros, is to diversify into a research triad of micro-nanotech, biotech, and clean-tech (new technologies for energy)
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From page 85... ...
This investment, he said, has been more than paid back in the form of corporate taxes over the four-year period, and the local government is still benefiting from a net positive of 1,000 technical jobs and perhaps three times as many support jobs. A questioner agreed that local job creation is desirable, though not the best true measure of park success, and asked what other metrics Minatec used.
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