Tsinghua-ZEW Workshop "From Europe to China – Exploring New Frontiers in Economics of Innovation and Entrepreneurship"

The Centre for European Economic Research (ZEW) and the Research Center for Technological Innovation (RCTI) of Tsinghua University jointly organised the first workshop entitled "From Europe to China – Exploring New Frontiers in Economics of Innovation and Entrepreneurship" on June 30 and July 1, 2016, at ZEW. Within the framework of the 2-day workshop, ZEW and RCTI researchers presented their latest findings concerning, among other things, the quality of patents in cross-country comparison and women's entrepreneurship. The workshop aimed to strengthen the research cooperation between Germany and China in the fields of economics of innovation and entrepreneurship.

Following the introductory notes by Georg Licht  (Head of ZEW Research Department for Economics of Innovation and Industrial Dynamics) and Jin Chen (Vice Director RCTI), Pierre Mohnen (UNU-MERIT and Maastricht University) gave the first keynote speech on “R&D, innovation and survival in Chinese manufacturing firms”. After having been appointed as a research fellow of the RCTI, Philipp Boeing, as well as his colleagues from ZEW’s Research Department “Economics of Innovation and Industrial Dynamics” and scholars from Tsinghua University, presented novel research on global patenting and diverse challenges for entrepreneurship. The first two presentations addressed patent quality and the knowledge flow in firms, followed by a session on the influence of founders and owners on enterprise performance. In the last session of the first workshop day, the researchers dealt with topics such as the influence of fraudulent scientists on former co-authors, university-run enterprises in China, and the efficiency of insolvencies as compared to restructuring in Germany.

Diverse presentations on innovation, entrepreneurship, and science

The second day began with a discussion about different goal settings by female entrepreneurs, followed by an analysis of translational research in oncology. The last papers dealt with knowledge spillovers and appropriability in research collaboration as well as relationship banking and its impact on the dissemination of risks. A second keynote lecture presented by Paul Unschuld (Director of Horst-Goertz-Institute, Charité-Medical University Berlin) concluded the workshop. His talk on “Innovation from ancient knowledge: Historical Chinese recipes revisited” offered interesting insights into the use of traditional Chinese medical recipes for the identification of novel treatments for epilepsy.

During the two days, the participants were able to listen to a total of eleven presentations (six by ZEW affiliated researchers, five by Tsinghua University scholars) and two keynote speeches. To prepare the event and strengthen the cooperation between ZEW and Tsinghua University, ZEW researchers Georg Licht and Philipp Boeing had visited Tsinghua University in 2015. A key purpose of the event was to intensify the dialogue between European and Chinese researchers in economics of innovation, which is of major importance for both economic regions. High-profile speakers from economics and management presented various perspectives on the topics under discussion and considered a variety of approaches to meeting the challenges. The second Tsinghua-ZEW Workshop is scheduled to take place at Tsinghua University in Beijing in 2017.