The moment of technology centers
Technology centers need to be integrated into the Spanish science and technology ecosystem with a more strategic vision. They are the key to ensuring that the funds of the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan, at least that part of the funds earmarked for R&D activities, give prominence to SMEs, identified by the Spanish Strategy for Science, Technology and Innovation 2021-2027 as the critical point of action for changing the production model.
Apart from some specific aspects related to management that can be improved, for which universities and public research organizations cannot be exonerated (let's see who dares to throw the first stone), we have a map of centers with regional implementation and international action, with high levels of research efficiency and undoubted impact on the business fabric... but without a vision of the whole from the central administration.
There are many manifestations of this problem, which the group has been trying to put an end to for years. From the difficulties for companies from other autonomous communities to access regional aid where technology centers are located, and vice versa, to the fact that it is easier to obtain financing for collaborative projects with European funds than with state funds. Business as usual.
Not to mention the farce staged by the political parties on account of the reform of the Public Sector Contracts Law introduced in the last Budget Law, so that the companies that form part of the governing bodies can work with their own technology center! and to solve the problem of orders of less than 15,000 euros.
The text of the amendment promoted by the PNV in the three-way budget agreement with PSOE and ERC arrived mutilated and disoriented. An attempt was made to remedy it in the Senate through the Compromís group, which played no part in the alliance of parties, and it was finally diluted in the text of the law without any shame or glory. And there it is. All because there is no one in the Government or in any parliamentary group in Congress with criteria to know that what was being put in the bill was an outrage.
That the time has come for technology centers, because there is a need to be covered, is so obvious that the technology sector employers' association Ametic has dubbed its Ricardo Valle Innovation Network initiative as the 'Spanish Fraunhofer'. The German benchmark manages an annual budget of 2,800 million euros, these are big words, but the key is to know where we have to go.
After a few months of lack of communication, with no bad intentions on either side, it seems that Ametic has already built bridges with the technology centers, which have existed for decades, most of them integrated in the Fedit network, with powerful research infrastructures, in many cases at the forefront of the world. Together they are considering turning the project into a PERTE (Strategic Project for Economic Recovery and Transformation). Perhaps this is the way to achieve the articulation of the model that Spain needs.
Not just because I say so. The report "Open Innovation Models: an autonomous approach", by the Cotec Foundation, analyzes the cases of the Community of Madrid, the Basque Country and Catalonia, and its conclusion is very powerful: "Unlike Catalonia or Madrid, in the design of policies in the Basque Country, open innovation in companies has been boosted to a greater extent by encouraging the activity of technology centers, which promote the participation of many companies in innovation projects due to the download that means for them the possibility of outsourcing part of the activities, including such complex issues (particularly for SMEs) as the identification of technological opportunities and project planning".
The result of this commitment to technology centers is that "the open innovation strategy is comparatively more profitable, from the point of view of innovative performance, for companies in the Basque Country. Not only do they reach higher levels in terms of sales of new products (as a percentage of their turnover), but these higher levels are achieved with a greater degree of openness. In other words, at the point where the open innovation strategy begins to show diminishing returns in companies in Catalonia and Madrid, the performance of Basque Country companies takes off towards higher levels," continues the Cotec report, the most explicit on the subject of those published to date.
"The role of technology centers in the Basque Country is of the utmost transcendence in explaining the figures for this region, both with respect to its levels of business R&D and in terms of its networking behavior for innovation (i.e. in terms of its open innovation strategy)," he stresses again. And he argues that the role of technology centers "in the knowledge value chain should be reconsidered as a practical solution in building a more productive and innovative business fabric. In addition to the European cases that have relied on this strategy (such as Germany with the Fraunhofer Institutes, Holland with the TNO, or Finland with the VTT, among others), the case of the innovation policy of the Basque Country can illuminate our vision of the future on the role of knowledge intermediaries, and on the opportunities and challenges that such a strategy poses".
The distant attitude towards the model of technology centers on the part of the central government is not new, it is part of the erratic industrial policy that has been carried out in our country for decades, at the behest of both the PSOE and the PP. But the time has come to think big.
Perhaps one of the ways to achieve this would be to replicate at national level the model of industrial promotion institutes that emerged in the autonomous communities during the 80s of the last century, responsible in many cases for the flourishing of the technology center formula. There is no equivalent at the national level, only a General Directorate that does not even come close to fulfilling this role.
Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)
