1. JRC – Territorial Development Unit
Revitalising Regional Economies through Smart Specialisation and Industry October Brussels

2. The policy context Digital Single Market Strategy for Europe (2015)
Digitalisation is considered a major leverage for the EU in order to maintain its leading role in a number of industries
A renewed EU Industrial Policy Strategy (2017)
Importance of a holistic approach favouring the shift of EU industries toward digital technologies while empowering regions to address challenges and cater for their specific transformation needs

3. Methodology Patents at EPO (from Regpat 2018a)
Assess the capabilities of EU regions in developing digital technologies especially those more closely related to the digital transformation
We identify ICT patents by considering those containing digital codes (Inaba and Squicciarini, OECD-2017)
The penetration of digital technologies in the development of innovative products is captured by the co-occurrence of digital and non-digital codes within patent documents (ICT-combining patents)
Unfortunately…maybe this is not Industry 4.0!

4. What we mean by information and communication technologies?
ICT in Europe
What we mean by information and communication technologies?
The share of ICT patents in the EU between 2006 and 2015 is stable (17.5%-19%)

5. What do we mean by "co-occurrence of digital and non-digital codes within patent documents"?

6. Patenting activity of EU regions
Leadership in technological development is concentrated (well known fact)
Eastern and Southern regions tend to show lower levels of patenting activity

7. Patenting activity of EU regions
Leadership in technological development is concentrated (well known fact)
Eastern and Southern regions tend to show lower levels of patenting activity
Can we learn something looking at the capacity of developing specific technologies?

8. ICT in EU Regions
Regions with a specialisation in ICT development are not necessarily those with the highest patenting activity (no correlation)
Few regions with high ICT shares are also among those with intensive patenting activities

9. ICT-combining in EU Regions
Regions with a specialization in ICT-combining patents tend to have a high patenting activity (and a low ICT specialisation)
Spearman correlation coefficients
Pat = 0.295
ICT =
The share of
ICT-combining over ICT patents increased during the last decade
(pervasiveness?)

10. Takeaways
ICT development in EU has been relatively stable over the last 10 years
Meanwhile the share of ICT-combining over total ICT patents increased
Regions with a specialisation in ICT development are not necessarily those with the highest patenting activity
Regions with a specialization in ICT-combining patents tend to have a high patenting activity
The development of ICT and ICT-combining technologies and products may involve different regional capabilities and open different windows of opportunity

11. …and take a copy of the (short) report!
Thank you
…and take a copy of the (short) report!