He bowed, and in a moment leaped among the lions wild:
The leap was quick, return was quick, he has regained his place
This week I spent some time with old and new colleagues at the Institute for Manufacturing in their impressive new building on West Cambridge site.
Elizabeth Garnsey presented some data from her group, who have been studying employment growth in the High Technology cluster of 1,500 companies, refining data collected by Cambridgeshire County Council over a 20 year period. The seminar had standing-room only, with a mixture of academics and local business leaders keen to understand more about what they have learned (if you are curious, many of their working papers are available on their website).
Elizabeth steadfastly denied that Cambridge presents a blueprint for the future growth of new jobs in new industries across the UK. I have to say that I agreed, having spent time earlier that afternoon with a visitor from Karlsruhe who was keen to see what good practice we had in encouraging entrepreneurs to start businesses and retaining them in the region. It is hard to extrapolate from a region formed around a large research-intensive university to a post-industrial grouping of many research institutes.
She did however present three local working models for funding R&D and creating employment. She identified these as "smart" ways to fund R&D because the companies concerned didn't need to start out with huge resources, but were still able to control their own destinies and create employment :
- Technical consultancies such as Cambridge Consultants and TTP which have not generated huge margins, but are responsible for many local patents and spin-offs such as Domino Printing Sciences and Xaar;
- IP licensing operations such as ARM, which has become a major local employer as well as dominant in designs for most microchips outside of the Personal Computer;
- Software companies like Red Gate, where short lead times to market and quick customer adoption via internet download have enabled them to build out a product bundle and enter new markets.
She contrasted this with the poorer control gained by inventors and uncertain local employment outcomes of the "spin out, spin up, sell off" model, where investors put in money and look for a quick exit. Obviously, this is just my understanding of her points - you should go directly to her papers at the link above.
What do you think? Do you agree that early exits have less impact? In your own region, what working models are delivering high margin new products and new jobs? What other ways are there to do smart R&D?
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