Designing Science Indicators that relate to Output and have Impact

1. Designing Science Indicators that relate to Output and have Impact Scott Tiffin Director, Research & International Affairs School of Business, Universidad Adolfo Ibanez, Santiago, Chile scott.tiffin@uai.cl

2. Problems with Science Indicators in Latin America • General public and industry are not interested in this topic, so there is very limited and erratic support to creating and diffusing them. • Until this changes, there will be very few consistent, complete, accurate, detailed and useful data and indicators in the region. • There are only limited signs of this changing

3. Solution • Design simple science indicators focussing explicitly on outputs of competitive interest to political and commercial stakeholders

4. Measure Cities • Research, innovation and knowledge-based employment occur almost exclusively in cities, and the the clusters based in cities • Cities in LA are starting to compete against each other • It is possible that some cities can be attracted to this area as a new vision more fully than states

5. Cities, Ranking and Business are Big News

6. 2. Use ISI and US Patents • Standardized data exist for all cities of the region over many years, measuring high quality scientific and technological activities in all domains, at the city level • Recently measured 50 cities over 17 years, using Web resources, for as an introductory exercise, for possible publication in Scientometrics,

7. > 1,000/year > 100/year and < 1,000/year < 100/year Where Research is Found # ISI publications

8. > 100 > 25 and < 100 < 25 Where Innovation is Found Total # US patents 1986-2002

9. Trends of Research in Leading Cities

10. Innovation Leaders

11. Small Innovation Performers

12. Correlations and Testing Florida’s Hypothesis High-tech clustering is more likely in cities with diversity, tolerance and creative arts. Key proxy measures are concentration of artists and homosexuals R2 hard science only = .679 R2 all research = .670 Removing major outliers increases R2 & puts results slightly in favour of Florida

13. 3. Create Rankings • Ranking indices create regional marketplace and stimulate competition • All ranking schemes are seriously flawed approximations, but the data behind them can be strong and support serious analysis • Institutions invest significant free time to input their data to well known ranking systems and even compete to pay for entry into them

14. Change in Regional Research Market Share

15. Composite Ranking

16. 4. Measure Entrepreneurship • Stakeholders are only interested in output measures that relate to jobs, enterprise creation and competitive advantage • Entrepreneurship is a hot topic across LA

17. Growth of Incubators (Brazil)

18. Babson’s Global Entrepreneurship Monitor • Started in 1999 • Annual • Has grown to 41 countries • Self-financing • Entry cost is about 35$K US • Results are headline news in major national newsmedia and commented on by presidential offices

19. The Task Ahead • There is no urban data source for entrepreneurship comparable to ISI and US Patents • I am promoting a proposal to build an Observatory for Urban Innovation and Entrepreneurship to generate and diffuse such information, and to gather research funding