Patras, 28/04/2018
Applied and marketable product research and development, preparing for ‘exit’ of the business implementation onto the international market, along with growing acquisition prospects. These keywords are now the main vocabulary of the domestic innovation system as expressed in the latest period of ‘Funds’ and other co-funded national and European tools to support innovative entrepreneurship. Among the benefits of the system are the willingness to approach and financially support new businesses and clusters, the sense of more open procedures in relation to the past, and the provision of advice and, in particular, to encouragement to young entrepreneurs, especially in the so-called technological space.
But the fundamentals have their own story to tell. The uneven growth has now been established, with the organized, especially tourist-regions of the country, Crete, the South Aegean and the Ionian Islands being in growth and expansion and the other regions such as Western Greece Region in stagnation if not in recession. This basic imbalance characterizes the current growth model and not the temporary extroversion of the takeover of a startup by foreign capital. At the heart of economic activity, the challenges remain. The industry remains in a survival struggle. The urban fabric in major cities hardly meets the needs of a population with ever-changing needs and the pressing demands of energy and resource saving, sustainable transport and basic functionality.
The exit strategy from investing in technology is still a wishful declaration that has little to do with the country’s spatial economic program. Factually, since technological entrepreneurship has been squeezed out due to fiscal adjustment, new entrants to entrepreneurship still have difficulty answering the basic question: technological entrepreneurship yes, but for whom, how and under what conditions? Hence beyond the easy goal of facilitating the international takeover of domestic intellectual property, ways of preserving value in the regional economy should also be sought. In other words, the creation and organic growth of local businesses, the strengthening of existing benefits and local investment in the sectors that have proven to have multiplier effects: tourism, environment, energy, manufacturing, transport – to which the governance factor is worth adding. The latter factor, or rather its deficit, is also the major reason why the country’s derailment occurred and when it is restructured, we will be able to talk about sustainable growth.
It is therefore crucial that the continued efforts to support innovation be made in an environment where the fundamental issues of the local economy are at least on the path of sustainable management. Technological development is a component in every economic system, but it requires the necessary social and economic orientation and securing the basic parameters of sustainability of the urban pole in energy, natural and human resource management, the accessibility so reduced by the lack of an airport and the quality-functionality of the urban environment, and its relation to the hinterland. These are necessary to deliver “innovation” on a wider social and economic scale.