Peripherality and university collaboration: Evidence from rural SMEs in the UK

Universities and innovation strategies in rural regions: The case of the Greater Lincolnshire Innovation Programme (UK)

“…Most of these rural businesses are SMEs and have little or no previous engagement with universities or with innovation support. This is in line with Johnston’s and Prokop’s (2021) findings, according to which rural SMEs are often innovative, but may have limited university connections. The challenge for innovation policy is not only to anchor knowledge in the region (James et al, 2016), but also to introduce firms to the idea of asking for support for innovation, and to identify some kind of collective growth opportunity as the focus of a smart specialisation strategy.…”

“…In a rural region there are typically established networks among traditional land-based industries but overlain by layers of community-oriented businesses and a more fragmented set of often externally-oriented firms that are located in the region but that have limited connections. Thus, the development of effective tacit knowledge exchange mechanisms facilitated by geographical proximity (Storper and Venables, 2004; Tödtling and Trippl, 2005) can be more complicated in rural regions, and should be addressed in rural innovation policies encouraging university–business linkages (Johnston and Prokop, 2021). Most of these rural businesses are SMEs and have little or no previous engagement with universities or with innovation support.…”

“…A key element in innovation policies at the local level is the university as knowledge provider, source of training and development agency. Universities can be important sources of intra- and inter-regional flows of knowledge, especially in rural regions lacking other knowledge institutions (Charles, 2016), but there is some evidence that rural SMEs are less likely to connect with higher education institutions (Johnston and Prokop, 2021). Overall, the university’s regional role has become more emphasised in international, national and regional policies in the past decades (e.g.…”

The Limits of Change Agency: Establishing a Peripheral University Campus in East Tyrol

“…However, while the need for public investments towards knowledge-based regional development might be especially high in peripheral or lagging regions, there are difficulties in translating these inputs into innovative activities. One reason is a lack in qualifications and capacity by local businesses (Johnston and Prokop, 2021). Despite this danger of a mismatch between what a university can offer and what a peripheral region can absorb, policy makers often lobby for tertiary education to decentralize the education system, to strengthen the regional economy and to prevent young people from leaving the region (Charles, 2016).…”

“…Another crucial issue is to ensure that firms and actors from the region have the actual abilities to benefit from research, that is, by absorbing the knowledge to develop new products and services. Especially among small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and in the public sector, absorptive capacity is often low and building this capacity is a challenge in institutionally and organizationally thin environments (Johnston and Prokop, 2021; Kempton, 2015; Pinto et al, 2015). Consequently, a careful alignment between university and periphery is necessary (Pinheiro, 2018), which can be based more around analytical or synthetic knowledge (Isaksen and Trippl, 2017).…”