Innovation Districts - an organization of actors across borders
In the spring of 2023, Future by Lund and partners together with Lund Municipality and Lund University commissioned to catalyze and co-create Lund's innovation district with the capacity to solve complex and shared challenges. But what exactly is an innovation district? An innovation district can be described as an urban area where there is a small geographical distance between actors and infrastructure that in different ways enrich the work with innovations. Actors can be a collection of different organizations, institutions and companies that are strong on research and development with in-depth knowledge in their fields along with entrepreneurs, start-ups and business incubators. Other important elements for an innovation district are physical assets in the form of buildings, sites, streets, laboratories, technical equipment, testing facilities, industry, computing power and broadband, which constitute the physical infrastructure; economic assets in the form of enterprises, institutions, organizations, investors and so on that carry out activities and innovation work in the district and assets in the form of social networks that contribute to and develop relationships and collaboration within an innovation district. Also important is the connection you have to your local area, but also how you connect nationally and internationally.
Wikipedia states that as of 2019, there are more than 100 Innovation Districts worldwide. The origin is said to be, among other things, that in some cities with Silicon Valley as a model, in the 1990s and 2000s, consciously began to bring together, for example, internet startups and creative companies - such as the El Poblenou area in Barcelona, the Mission District in San Francisco, Shoreditch in London and Silicon Sentier in Paris. Neighborhoods were able to offer central locations, urban amenities and low rents. Subsequently, other cities began to try to emulate these areas by variously giving way to entrepreneurs, start-ups, business accelerators and incubators in certain areas.
Global Institute Innovation District Framework (GIID) is an association that was one of the first and catch the phenomenon. GIID has created a framework for a review of innovation ecosystems, examining five key areas of each ecosystem: critical mass, entrepreneurship & innovation, quality of place, leadership and finally diversity to provide a holistic view of the innovation ecosystem. By analyzing the innovation district, it is possible to highlight strengths but also to find where there are gaps and untapped potential to create an even stronger innovation ecosystem.
In 2020, researchers Jasna Pocek and Christin Scheller from Stone K. Johnson Centre for Entrepreneurship (SKJCE) onto Lund University together with Future by Lund analyses on Lund's innovation ecosystem based on this framework. Data for the analysis is based on data collection from registers, reports and interviews with the public sector, academia and industry. Link: What about Lund's innovation ecosystem?
In the spring of 2023, work will start again on collecting data on Lunds as an innovation district in various ways. The aim is for Lund to become an internationally recognized innovation district, a place where unique development takes place, where international actors and individuals seek themselves, and where ideas and people are connected internationally.
Future by Lund's articles over the years about the innovation district in Lund
NIDD: Innovation districts to make talent thrive
Science City Lyngby's journey towards becoming an innovation district
Collaboration can improve Lund's innovation ecosystem
Density in Lund Innovation District
Petter Hartman: “We in Lund need to position ourselves together”
Barcelona connects technology and innovation with culture, creative industries and social innovation
Interview with James Wilson, Research Director at Orkestra in San Sebastian, in Spain:
“Cities have an interesting role to play as a testbed for many of the innovation activities”