ABSTRACT
Industrial innovation is supposed to save mature industries, to create new ones, new companies and jobs, which will be paying taxes, which will finance public services, social policies and, in the end, research and innovation policies. Innovation is foremost a question of practices developed through institutional arrangements associating companies, universities and government. The concentration of research and training institutions, of expertise, of financial institutions and legal firms required for sustaining or establishing “innovation ecosystems” creates deserts of competence, unequal employment and training opportunities. Diversity is a requirement for progress in science and technology as important as standardization. Standardization is a communication requirement while diversity is a requirement for productive and creative investigation. When the level of convergence generates standardization of research fields, institutions and policies, beyond quantitative indexes of scientific progress, leadership becomes sheer hegemony. Increasing standardization reduces research diversity and, in the end, science and technology’s productivity.
