The Geography of Innovation:
What have we learned so far?
Meric S. Gertler
University of Toronto
Presented to the AIM Conference on ‘Social Science and
Innovation’, 11 February 2009, Royal Society of Arts, London
The Geography of Innovation
• Recent evidence:
– innovation-generating activity highly clustered in a
relatively small number of places
– Esp. evident in more knowledge-intensive
industries
– Becoming more pronounced over time, not less
– Examples: life sciences, financial services
• Question: what forces responsible?
ISRN Canada: Core Questions
• To what extent – and in what ways – do local
extra-firm relationships and interaction enable
firms to become more innovative and
successful?
• Relative importance/role of local vs non-local
(national, continental, global) knowledge
flows in spurring development of local
clusters?
Case Studies
• ICT/photonics/wireless (Vancouver, Calgary,
Waterloo, Ottawa, Quebec City, Moncton)
• Life science (Montreal, Toronto, Vancouver,
London, Saskatoon, Halifax)
• Mechanical engineering Aerospace (Montreal);
Steel, Auto parts (Southern Ontario)
• Digital media (Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver)
• Food & wine Specialty foods (Toronto); Wine
(Niagara, Okanagan)
• Resource industries Wood products (BC); Mining
(Sudbury)
Leading innovators
• ICT/wireless Research in Motion (BlackBerry)
• Life science QLT (Visudyne)
• Mechanical engineering CAE, Bombardier,
Magna
• Digital media Soft Image, Alias, EA, IBM
• Food & wine Vincor
• Resources Inco
1. Markets and Competition
• Literature:
– Importance of strong local market (‘sophisticated
and demanding customers’) and strong local
competition
• Our findings:
– Neither is universally true
– In many cases, the most important customers are
continental or global, not local (ICT, bio, aero, auto)
– Nor are local competitors more important than nonlocal competition (often less important)
2. Knowledge-producing organizations
• Literature:
– Stresses key role of local universities, PROs,
private research labs; local flows of knowledge
between economic actors
• Our findings:
– Non-local sources, flows complement local ones
– ‘buzz/pipeline’ geographies: local learning
dynamics important, but most productive when
economic actors, organizations are linked to other
non-local nodes of knowledge-generating activity
3. Role of local universities
• Literature:
– IP from local research-intensive universities drives
cluster formation, development
• Our findings:
– (with a few notable exceptions) universities play
more of a supporting role than a leading one
– (even in case of exceptions) role considerably more
complex, multidimensional than first thought
– Beyond tech transfer, ‘commercialization’, spin-outs
– Highly educated grads, co-op, consulting (2-way)
4. Role of business leaders
• Literature:
– Emphasizes role of business leaders, lead firms in
stimulating emergence of successful clusters
• Our findings:
– Support this, but also point to importance of strongly
aligned social networks at city-region scale
– New institutions of civic governance
– broadly based, multi-stakeholder organizations
– identify problems, align interests, resources, support for
strategies
– Size matters, but in surprising ways (mid-size advantages)
Implications for innovation policy
• ‘Payoff’ from universities: have realistic
expectations, objectives
– Not standalone, self-sufficient generators of
knowledge for local industry (more like portals to
globally extensive networks)
– Equally important to develop ‘absorptive capacity’
of local firms
– Need for independent intermediaries to broker
industry-university relationships
Implications for innovation policy
• Well-educated labour force:
– Single most important attractor to employers in
knowledge-intensive, creative industries
– Transcends individual clusters
• Importance of quality of place in attracting
and retaining well-educated workers
– Urban policy, sustainability closely complementary
to ‘innovation’ policy
Thank you
• meric.gertler@utoronto.ca
• www.utoronto.ca/isrn