Project 8: Linking SME Data to the Science Base – An Exploratory

Study of Growth and Productivity Effects

Bettina Becker

How does access to the Science Base influence firm performance?

Central Research Question

• What types of firms engage with the science base?

• Network aspect:– Are there specific types of collaborative projects that yield more

significant firm performance effects?

• Timing of impacts:

– How long does it take for the benefits of science contacts to feed through to firm growth or productivity?

• Sector aspect:– E.g, are performance benefits more concentrated in engineering than in

pure science?

• Spatial aspect:– Are performance benefits more concentrated in certain regions?– Does the distance between project collaborators moderate the firm

performance effects?

How does Access to the Science BaseInfluence Firm Performance?

• Dr Karen Bonner, Aston University

– Extensive experience in matching longitudinal firm data to other CRM type data from business support and innovation measures

• Dr Enrico Vanino, Aston University

– Extensive experience in micro-data analysis

• Professor Stephen Roper, Warwick University

• Dr Bettina Becker, Aston University

– Extensive experience in R&D and micro-data analysis

– ‘Public R&D policies and private R&D investment: a survey of the empirical evidence’ ERC 2015, ESRC Evidence Briefing 2015, JES 2015

ERC Project Team

• The project will bring together information from Gateway to Research (GtR) with business performance data for the first time

• GtR has been developed by the Research Councils UK (RCUK) and provides information about publicly funded research since 2006

• ERC will use information about firms’ grant histories and match this to longitudinal data on business growth and performance (from the Business Structure Database)

• Hence we can analyse grant histories alongside growth histories of all firms in the UK, i.e. potential to create a panel dataset, which may be updated over time

Overview of the project

• Available information that we intend to use includes:– Value of grant– Collaboration (e.g. organisation; department / faculty /

school / ministry)– Type of grant– Further funding (e.g. organisation; sector; amount)

• GtR data has not previously been used for any analysis of this kind

• (InnovateUK data on GtR is incomplete in terms of collaborators but this is available in the Innovate UK transparency data)

Gateway to Research Database

• We can identify least two interactions with the science base:

– Collaborative projects for basic research– Collaborative projects for applied research

• Funding organisations covered by GtR:

– Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC)– Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC)– Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)– Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC)– Medical Research Council (MRC)– Natural Environment Research Council (NERC)– Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC)– Innovate UK– National Centre for the Replacement, Refinement and Reduction of

Animals in Research (NC3Rs)

The Science Base

• Growth (BSD):– Turnover growth

– Job growth

– Link to project 3: High-growth firms?

• Productivity (BSD):– Labour productivity

• Innovation as a key driver of growth & productivity (UKIS):– Incidence of innovation

– Novelty of innovation

– Innovation sales (‘Innovation productivity’)

Firm Performance Measures

Project Milestone Completion

1. Establish firms’ grant histories

2. ONS provide firm identifier Mid / End January

3. ONS load GtR data into Secure Data Lab

4. ERC match GtR data to Business Beginning / Mid March Structures Database (BSD) and UK Innovation Survey (UKIS)

5. Exploratory Analysis April / May

Estimated Project Timeline

• What types of firms engage with the science base?

• Network aspect:– Are there specific types of collaborative projects that yield more

significant firm performance effects?

• Timing of impacts:

– How long does it take for the benefits of science contacts to feed through to firm growth or productivity?

• Sector aspect:– E.g, are performance benefits more concentrated in engineering than in

pure science?

• Spatial aspect:– Are performance benefits more concentrated in certain regions?– Does the distance between project collaborators moderate the firm

performance effects?

Which questions are of most interest?

Another interesting thing …..

• ERC Research Paper No. 52 – published this week!

• UK – Spain comparison interesting: – Public intervention in innovation more intensive in Spain than in

the UK

– Support is more regional in Spain and more national in the UK

– Regulation facing firms is more intensive in Spain than in the UK

• UK Innovation Survey and Spanish PITEC, panel data 2004-2012

• Over 35,000 company returns in the UK and over 52,000 in Spain

The Effectiveness of Regional, Nationaland EU Support for Innovation in the UK

and Spain

• Key findings:– Regional support most influential for the probability

of process and organisational innovations

– National innovation support is associated with a higher probability of product or service innovation and the novelty of that innovation

– In the UK only regional support is associated with increased innovative sales. In Spain, innovative sales are influenced by regional, national and EU support measures

The Effectiveness of Regional, Nationaland EU Support for Innovation in the UK

and Spain