The actions are aimed at the implementation of the Podkarpackie Center for Innovation (PCI) developed in the first stage of the project. In the period between July 2016 and June 2017, the team from the World Bank in co-operation with the European Commission and representatives of the Podkarpackie Region, and the Higher IT and Management School developed the concept for the development of the regional technology transfer office. The concept of the project is based on the best solutions applied in European technology support and transfer ecosystems (France, Belgium, and Finland). The second part of the project (between July 2017 and June 2018) has been designed to support the Podkarpackie Region and to establish Podkarpackie Center for Innovation in reaching full operability.
PCI will be a professional liaison between business and science directed at strengthening the R&D potential of the Podkarpackie Region. The Center will support higher education schools and entrepreneurs within the framework of three platforms:
Platform 1 Valorisation of R&D projects
It is the key area of the PCI activities under which the promising R&D projects implemented by research teams of Podkarpackie scientific bodies will be selected. Next, resources (capital and competencies) will be allocated to increase their level of technological readiness. The undertaken projects are aimed at increasing the commercialization level of R&D work in the industry.
Platform 2 Structured contract research
The activity of this platform will focus on combining science and business. On one side, the activities will be directed at strengthening R&B instruments of universities by marketing of a specific type of contracted research. On the other side, the Podkarpackie Center for Innovation will help enterprises to find scientific partners for the implementation of joint research and development work.
Platform 3 ProtoLab
The leading idea of this platform is to stimulate the entrepreneurship culture by the creation of opportunities for learning and experimenting with various production technologies by students and young scientists. It will be a physical space equipped with basic tools and machines enabling constructing prototypes.
Strengths of the Podkarpackie Region
The Podkarpackie Region achieves relatively good results in terms of the key innovation indicators. In 2014, the share of R&D expenditures in relation to GDP was 1.38% (the average figure for Poland was 0.94%), and it is the second position in Poland, ranked equally with the Małopolskie Region after the Mazowieckie Region. However, in 2014, the share of expenditures for R&D of the enterprise in relation to GDP was 1.06% (the average figure for Poland: 0.44%), ranking first in Poland.
The employment in R&D sector per 1000 professionally active people in 2015 was 6.0 (the average figure for Poland was 6.3). The achieved results and its condition naturally direct the Podkarpackie Region towards enhancing the competitive advantage based on its strengths, i.e. competencies in cooperation between business and science.
Despite good indicators, there are also areas in which the Podkarpackie Region can improve the use of its potential, e.g. in creating technological start-ups, especially based on local universities or by increasing the revenue of the universities from licenses based on their R&D results.
Additionally, due to the challenges that are faced by the universities, the activities aimed at increasing the revenue of universities and scientific units from contracted research have a key significance. Development of local innovation ecosystems by the engagement of local companies in close cooperation with science is also essential. The activities of the Podkarpackie Center for Innovation will respond to these challenges.
The establishment of the PCI company,The team from the World Bank supports the Marshal Office within the framework of current work in the following areas:
- The creation of criteria for the team managing the Center (which will be selected in open competitive recruitment, in accordance with indications of the Steering Committee of the “Catching-up Regions Initiative”),
- Undertaking an active dialogue with possible candidates for managing PCI to attract the best applicants,
- The development of the management system and corporate governance for PCI and mechanisms of cooperation between local universities and entrepreneurs,
- The identification of interesting R&D projects in universities in the Podkarpackie Region that can be developed within the framework of PCI,
- The development of selected model business offers for R&D services that could be provided by universities to entrepreneurs.
Additionally, the World Bank's team supports regional shareholders in promoting existing solutions and the development of the optimal model for commercial use of R&D resources acquired by universities using the support from EU resources. It is indispensable to fostering development of more active R&D cooperation between business and universities.