Impactful innovation and entrepreneurship
By discussing research which is both excellent and relevant to society, the fields of innovation and entrepreneurship can impact society. One of the most important impacts of research is through influencing understanding – such as through new questions, new data, new answers, and new interpretations.
The Spring 2025 Gothenburg U-GOT KIES workshop about Impactful Innovation and Entrepreneurship brought together leading scholars affiliated with the centre, as well as post-doctoral scholars and doctoral students. To promote scientific discussion of this type, this workshop was primarily focused upon early-stage research by scholars and PhD students, as well as a seminar by Professor Giovanni Dosi.
Discussing early-stage research
The people presenting their research, and acting as chairpersons, included professors, scholars, and PhD students from Chalmers University of Technology, the University 91̽, Halmstad University, University of Grenoble, and University of Iceland. Four presentations addressed dynamics of innovation as crossing research and industry, within the fields of bio medical research – medical technology – pharmaceuticals – health care. These presentations explored research questions related to development of cross-disciplinary interactions, the reasons for the retractions of research, how to organize data sharing platforms, and where radical innovations occur. Four presentations addressed the inter-relationships between the knowledge-intensive entrepreneur with their innovation ecosystems, during periods of high uncertainty and rapidly moving innovations.
These presentations – and extensive discussion of – early-stage research has becoming increasingly scarce in our field, and hence highly appreciated. Many presentations at conferences and workshops are “finished” papers. At this workshop, the excellent discussions of early-stage research provided many insights into ways of further improving the dissertations and articles arising from on-going research projects. Revision of the manuscript is very common within our field and helps sharpen the meaning and main points.
Professor Emeritus, Giovanni Dosi: Rethinking Intellectual Property Rights in Pharmaceuticals & Life 91̽
One of the main speakers at the workshop was Giovanni Dosi, Professor Emeritus at the Institute of Economics at the Scuola Superiore Sant'Anna, Italy, and Broman scholar affiliated with the Gothenburg U-GOT KIES centre. We thankfully acknowledge the support of the Broman Foundation.
Professor Dosi presented his arguments, based on his recent paper about intellectual property rights and the impact of innovation in the pharmaceutical industry, in a hybrid seminar, with about 100 participants including both at the workshop and online. Professor Dosi is very critical about the usefulness of intellectual property rights for pharmaceuticals, sparking a debate about the relative incentives, and outcomes, of alternative ways of rewarding innovation.
The presentation was based: Dosi, G., Marengo, L., Staccioli, J., & Virgillito, M. E. (2023). Big pharma and monopoly capitalism: a long-term view. Structural change and economic dynamics, 65, 15-35.
Recording of lecure
The lecture was recorded, and you can watch it here
