ABSTRACT
Increasingly, innovation is viewed as an economic imperative. The act of introducing
something new, whether as a commodity or process, has become a central tenet of achiev-
ing economic growth, and also for improving quality of life in the face of new global chal-
lenges. Businesses, policy-makers and civic authorities look to innovation models to
develop new ideas and new technology, improve services and to accelerate this bringing
of new knowledge to the market as part of a knowledge-based economic strategy. In a
knowledge-driven economy, the focus for many areas is to move up the value chain
into more specialized high value-added goods and services and in resourcing research
and knowledge transfer to accelerate this. For this reason, the main emphasis of innovation
has been one of scientific push, with low levels of R&D cited as reasons for low innovation
and low growth-e.g. the low competitiveness and growth of Europe comparative to other
global regions (SAPIR et al., 2003). In this environment, the strategy of many urban
areas has been to reposition themselves in the global hierarchy, as places rich in skills
and technology, and as places where research, innovation and economic growth are
self-reinforcing.
