Public research in regional networks of innovators: a comparative study of four East-German regions

Abstract

Universities and public research organizations are said to be integrative and essential elements of a functioning innovation system. We analyze four East German regional networks of innovators and investigate the characteristic role of public research within these networks by applying methods of social network analysis using patent data. Our results show that universities and non-university institutions of public research are key actors in all regional networks. Differences between regional innovative performance seem to be related to differences in the structural properties of the networks.