Imperial HEFCE-BEIS-Innovate seminar: ‘Creating Opportunities in a World-Class Ecosystem’

Dr. Christopher Corbishley Imperial Enterprise Lab

June 2017

Mauveine: Sir William Henry Perkin, FRS (12 March 1838 – 14 July 1907)

White Paper on Ecosystems

Key themes and questions from research on ecosystems:

• What is an ecosystem and why is it important?

• What drives innovation in cluster ecosystems?

• How do entrepreneurial ecosystems grow and develop?

• How do you assess the performance of cluster ecosystems?

How are ecosystems different from clusters?Both are concentrations of scientific, entrepreneurial and corporate activities whereby proximity promotes knowledge sharing.

Clusters are concentrations of related activities that bear a sector-specific signature and bring together actors working in the same domain.

Ecosystems are an eclectic spatial concentration of activities that may appear unrelated. They provide a breeding ground for cross-fertilization of ideas and a space for serendipitous discoveries.

Innovation as creative recombination

Creativity and innovation originate not from within single disciplines or domain areas but the spaces between them…

Innovation as creative recombination:“Innovation consists to a substantial extent of a recombination of conceptual and physical materials that were previously in existence” (Schumpeter)

Multidisciplinary science fosters the cross-fertilization of ideas from different knowledge domains.

Cross-Faculty and Cross-Departmental publications as % of total publications (2014)

Building blocks of cluster ecosystemsCo-location of entrepreneurs and small businesses, large corporations, academia, and government provides a catalyst for scientific development and business growth as core building blocks of ecosystems

Connection: Ecosystems offer opportunities for spontaneous conversations between people of different backgrounds, which grow based on the interdependencies between them.

Community: Clusters may originate from an entrepreneurial, corporate, or academic basis, but ultimately they will only rise as ecosystems when broadened to include a variety of players, forming a community through shared space and shared goals.

Inputs and interdependencies

Global research universities play a central role in making discoveries, educating leaders and developing innovations.

Access to talent pools of entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial students is a prime incentive for others to seek a presence in an ecosystem.

Corporations have a leading role to play in providing the financial and operational infrastructure for fostering ecosystems where complementarities between corporate and academic scientists and entrepreneurs form the breeding ground for major innovations to take shape.

Government has a leading role to play in spatial planning that allows sufficient flexibility for ecosystem parties to grow without needing to relocate outside the area.

How do ecosystems grow and develop? Ecosystems have diverse origins that influence their sense of community, culture and purpose. Origins can lie with start-ups, universities, large corporations or government.

Case studies of cluster trajectories:

Start-up led: Bottom-upThe role of start-ups is considered a keystone in the emergence and development of an ecosystem. An existing concentration of small and medium-sized businesses characterized by agility, forward thinking and growth ambitions is a powerful beacon to attract further entrepreneurial talent from across the world

Industry-led: Science Park 2.0Developments led by larger corporations seeking to create ‘innovation districts’ attached to corporate R&D facilities. Intended to attract SMEs and universities or research institutes to their proximity

GSK BioCatalyst, Stevenage

• £38m joint venture between WellcomeTrust, UK government and GSK to build a biotech ‘campus’.

• Beyond corporate venturing, it is intended to attract start-ups to learn from them via small-scale accelerator-incubator programmes.

• Presence of UCL, Cambridge, and Oxford university researchers and biotech spinouts.

Government-led: Top-down Primary concerns of government-led efforts is the role of the built environment, specifically how to design-in serendipity through open planning, national (and global) connectedness and fluid transport.

Singapore A*STAR

• Government investment in science and innovation and spatial planning

• Development of ‘fringe’ public space that promotes interaction and integrates ecosystem into wider environment

• 14 biomedical, physical and engineering science institutes i.e. Biopolis with notable breakthroughs

• Attracted corporates with government grants and R&D facilities and deep science start-ups.

Academia-led: Research & TranslationUniversities have begun to take a central role in cluster emergence and development combatting laissez faire attitudes due to lack of central coordination of university-industry relations.

Cambridge University Cluster

• College led development of Science Parks using their own financial resources to invest in land and cultivate companies.

• Growing mandate to improve translation of scientific commercial output

• Access to the talent pool of entrepreneurial students is a driver for others to seek presence.

• 1990s onwards cluster received more systemsicforms of PE/VC funding led by boundary spanners such as Cambridge Consultants.

KPIs: How to measure performance?

Key Takeaways

• Ecosystems are spatial concentrations of scientific, entrepreneurial and corporate activities across a variety of sectors whereby spatial proximity between those parties promotes networks of knowledge sharing and joint idea development.

• Businesses can tap into the potential of such ecosystems to bid to gain competitive advantage at a time when innovation is fast-paced and collaborative.

• Creativity and innovation originate not from within single disciplines or domain areas but from the spaces between them.

• Clusters form ecosystems by connecting a variety of players and building communities through shared space and shared goals.

• Serendipity needs to be designed-in.