National and regional policies for design,

creativity and user-driven innovation

Thematic Report

Paul Cunningham
Manchester Institute of Innovation Research
University of Manchester
 National and regional policies for design, creativity
and user-driven innovation

Table of contents

Executive Summary.................................................................................................................1
1 Introduction.......................................................................................................................3
1.1 Background..............................................................................................................3
1.2 Methodology.............................................................................................................3
2 Policies and initiatives for the support of design..............................................................5
2.1 Activities in the EU member States..........................................................................5
2.2 Other ‘European’ countries.....................................................................................22
2.3 Developments outside Europe...............................................................................24
3 Policies and initiatives supporting creativity and user-driven innovation........................29
3.1 Activities in the EU Member States........................................................................29
3.2 Developments in other ‘European’ countries..........................................................41
3.3 Developments outside Europe...............................................................................43
4 Evidence for success and failure....................................................................................46
4.1 Evidence from Member States...............................................................................46
4.2 Other ‘European’ countries.....................................................................................49
4.3 Evidence from outside Europe...............................................................................50
5 Rationale and opportunities for European-level support for design...............................52
5.1 Suggestions for EU support for design...................................................................52
5.1.1 External support to Member States’ activities................................................52
5.1.2 Internal opportunities......................................................................................54
5.2 Rationale for EU support for design.......................................................................55
6 Conclusions and recommendations...............................................................................57
6.1 Overall conclusions................................................................................................57
6.2 Recommendations..................................................................................................59
 National and regional policies for design, creativity
and user-driven innovation: Thematic Report

Executive Summary
The European Commission is currently looking into the possibilities to encourage the use of design as
a tool for innovation. Design in this context is seen as the link between technology, creativity and the
user, as an important tool to increase the scope of innovation for European companies - in particular
SMEs - and as a necessary response to the challenges of globalisation. Thus, design, creativity and
user-driven innovation are all seen as potential contributors to an enhanced level of European
competitiveness.

In an effort to develop a better picture of the extent of policy attention accorded to this topic, a
questionnaire-based survey was conducted in 2008 using the network of Country Correspondents of
the INNO-Policy Trend Chart initiative of DG Enterprise and Industry.

Specifically, the questionnaire sought information on the following issues:

1. The existence of policies and initiatives (at national, regional and local level) to support
design as an activity or as a sector.
2. The presence of national and regional policies and initiatives in support of creativity
specifically as a source of innovation, and in support of user-driven innovation.
3. Evidence for the success or failure of any existing measures addressing the issues specified.
4. The rationale for, and opportunities, at the European level, for the support of design as a tool
for innovation.

It is clear from the responses elicited in this study that design, creativity and user-driven innovation
represent potentially strong issues in support of innovation and have already generated significant
policy debate on how they might be effectively harnessed in support of competitiveness at the
national, regional and local (particularly the municipal) levels. Thus, it follows that they may also have
major implications for competitiveness at the European level, implications that clearly necessitate a
range of policy responses from the European Commission.

The results of the questionnaire clearly indicated that the concepts of design and creativity tend to be
used interchangeably or in close association; several initiatives that address the issue of design also
touch upon the stimulation of or reward for creativity. Similarly, design is seen as a particularly
important element within certain sectors such as the creative industries. Likewise, creativity is also
viewed as an extension, or prerequisite, of the process of innovation.

Several countries have a long-established presence and activity in policies and initiatives that support
design as an activity or as a sector, although this has not always been explicitly connected to
innovation issues. Notable actors in this regard include the UK, Italy Denmark and Finland. Relatively
high levels of activity were also reported from a number of other EU Member States, many of which
have nascent developments. Outside the EU Member States, notable activity was reported in a
number of countries, in particular Norway, while Brazil and India are rapidly developing their activities
in the area and Japan has a longer tradition of design-oriented policies. Activity is also strong in the
United States, but is focused more at the state and municipal levels. A large number of policy

1
documents also focus on the issue of design, while a diverse range of design-specific policy activities
were reported.

Creativity is generally regarded as an inherent factor in the processes of both research and
development and of innovation. It therefore receives attention in many innovation policy documents
due to its perceived potential role in enhancing competiveness. A significant amount of the discussion
on creativity is devoted to the role of the creative industries, within which the concept of design is,
obviously, also important, while user-driven innovation also receives significant policy attention.
Broadly speaking, there are three main areas of policy debate and support: broader innovation
support, in which creativity is linked to innovation in a broad sense, support specifically for the creative
industries and support for the promotion or harnessing of innovation from a user, customer or
employee perspective.

The stimulation of creativity is, in some countries, a central part of the mission of those departments,
agencies and other bodies that are responsible for innovation. The notion is often also linked to the
issue of entrepreneurship and the creation of start-ups. As in the case of design, IPR regulation and
frameworks are also an important issue, alongside complementary initiatives targeting copyright and
design piracy, etc. Awareness promotion is a commonly encountered activity in this area and many of
the measures in place tend to operate at the regional or municipal level. There is also a particular
focus on the creative industries and the cultural sector, with a number of support measures being
cited. Countries that have a strong presence in this area include those already noted above. While
there was limited evidence regarding the success or failure of existing policies and initiatives in
support of design, creativity and user-driven innovation, some interesting positive examples were
reported.

Finally, a large number of suggestions were generated for potential action at the European level for
the support of design as a tool for innovation.

Broadly, these included:

 Awareness promotion
 Facilitation of policy learning
 Good practice dissemination
 Establishment of a European centre of excellence for design or a pan-European network of
design centres;
 The formulation of targeted support measures
 A ‘Made in Europe’ brand
 Promotion of training initiatives
 Improved R&D and innovation metrics that include design;
 Research studies into design, design policy, the impact of design on innovation and firm
performance
 A better-coordinated EU strategy for design, and a clearly defined locus for design issues
within the Commission.

There was strong support for the rationale and added-value for European level intervention in this
area, although the close links between culture and creativity also had to be considered in the context
of the principle of subsidiarity.

Finally, a number of broad recommendations for Commission action were proposed:

 Given the evident rapid development of policy interest in these issues in countries outside of
the EU, there is an urgent need to explore more extensively design, creativity and user-driven

2
 innovation within the EU context. One objective would be to better categorise types of policy
support in place and to undertake impact/benchmarking exercises to support policy learning.
 Undertake efforts to define and identify good practice, and based on these, promote
awareness both among users (as all the topics have a strong bottom-up relevance) and also
among policy makers regarding the potential of design, creativity and user-driven awareness
to competitiveness.
 Investigate further avenues to stimulate design and creativity at the EU level and to spread
these practices, at a range of levels, by showcasing leading initiatives from across Europe.

3
 National and regional policies for design,
creativity and user-driven innovation

1 Introduction

1.1 Background
In the Communication “Putting knowledge into practice: A broad-based innovation strategy for
Europe” of September 2006, the Commission outlined its innovation strategy for the years to come. It
is a first response to requests by Member States and stakeholders to broaden the scope of EU
innovation policy. Indeed, the focus of the general innovation policy debate speaks in favour of
continuing the progressive shift in emphasis from technology push to demand- and user-centred
innovation. As a concrete step in this direction, the Commission is currently looking into the
possibilities to encourage the use of design as a tool for innovation.

Design in this context is seen as the link between technology, creativity and the user, as an important
tool to increase the scope of innovation for European companies - in particular SMEs - and as a
necessary response to the challenges of globalisation. For many mature consumer markets where
technical developments bring only marginal improvements to the end-user, aesthetic and functional
innovations in product, service and package design are often key elements of commercial success
and longer lasting profits.

In addition to the more concrete aspects of design such as aesthetics, functionality and packaging, it
helps, together with marketing, to incorporate into products and services a wider array of
considerations of an intangible nature – related to, for example, needs, image and culture - thus
contributing to creating a unique competitive advantage. In this way, design helps European
companies to avoid competing on price, and to better face the competition from low cost emerging
economies.

As the innovation debate moves away from “technology push” towards a user-centred approach,
design is often referred to not only as a source of competitiveness, but also as a solution to societal
challenges such as the aging population (ergonomics), demography (urban design), environmental
challenges (eco-design) and social exclusion (design for all).

In an effort to develop a better picture of the extent of policy attention accorded to this topic, a
questionnaire-based survey was conducted in 2008 using the network of Country Correspondents of
the INNO-Policy Trend Chart initiative of DG Enterprise and Industry.

1.2 Methodology
The information contained in this report is based on supporting information provided by the INNO-
Policy Trend Chart Network of National Correspondents and was collected by means of a brief
questionnaire.

Specifically, the questionnaire sought information on the following issues:

4
 5. The existence of policies and initiatives (at national, regional and local level) to support
design as an activity or as a sector.
6. The presence of national and regional policies and initiatives in support of creativity
specifically as a source of innovation, and in support of user-driven innovation.
7. Evidence for the success or failure of any existing measures addressing the issues specified
above.
8. The rationale for, and opportunities, at the European level, for the support of design as a tool
for innovation.

The author gratefully acknowledges the inputs from the Network of National Correspondents in
connection with this study.

At the time of analysis, responses had been received for the countries noted below:

Austria Czech Republic Iceland Luxembourg* Slovenia

Belgium Denmark India Malta Spain
Brazil Estonia Ireland Netherlands Sweden
Bulgaria Finland Israel Norway Switzerland
Canada France Italy Poland Turkey
China Germany Japan Portugal UK
Croatia Greece Latvia Romania USA

Cyprus Hungary Lithuania Slovakia Russia

Notes: Orange highlight indicates no response. * No relevant activities were reported for Luxembourg

The results are synthesised in the following sections.

5
2 Policies and initiatives for the support of design
The specific question posed by the questionnaire was:

“In your country, what policies and initiatives exist at national, regional and local level
to support design as an activity or as a sector. Examples could range from mentions
in high level policy documents to concrete measures such as state aid schemes for
design, the existence or creation of a ‘design council’, the provision of support to
design centres and schools, design awards, labels, etc.”

2.1 Activities in the EU member States

Creativity and design are both mentioned by Austrian policy makers at the national level (e.g. the
creative industry report of the Federal Economic Chamber and Federal Ministry of Economics and
Labour1) and the regional level (e.g. creative industries in Upper Austria2). There are several initiatives
promoting both policy fields at either level.

Design companies are represented by “Design Austria” 3, a member of the representative body BEDA
(http://www.beda.org). Another representative body is the “ARGE creativwirtschaft” (see Section 3).
The “design forum” initiative (http://www.designforum.at) provides a networking platform for creative
industries firms, other companies, policy makers, politicians and the public. It organises exhibitions,
workshops and grants design awards (such as the Joseph Binder Award 2008 and the Staatspreis für
Design4 – initiated by the Federal Ministry of Economics and Labour in collaboration with the
Raiffeisen bank and the Federal Ministry for Education, the Arts and Culture). The platform is active
both nationally and internationally, but unlike other initiatives such as ‘departure’ or creativwirtschaft, it
does not undertake promotional activities. In addition, one of the thematic lines of the “impulse
programme creative industries” is design (see “creativwirtshcaft” in Section 3).

At the regional level, the “departure” programme supports creative companies in Vienna through the
development of an economically sustainable basis for the city’s professionals. This includes the
strengthening of entrepreneurial know-how and cooperation between creative professionals and the
economy. It supports individual creative and entrepreneurial top performances and the promotion of
creative services such as design5. Similar objectives are embedded in other regional programmes, for
instance, those run by the TMG, the Business and Innovation Agency of Upper Austria 6. Other
initiatives and platforms include “Das Möbel” (http://www.dasmoebel.at/) focusing on innovative
furniture, TGA (http://www.typographischegesellschaft.at/), combining typography and design, the
fashion oriented Unit-F (http://www.unit-f.at/), etc.

A major problem with the Austrian design industry is that ‘design’ is not an official profession (perhaps
due to the multifaceted job description – e.g. industry, graphical, product design). This poses a
problem to the many graduates each year from universities and vocational secondary schools (HTLs).
Developing a legal definition of the design profession is the subject of ongoing debate.
1
http://www.creativwirtschaft.at/download.php?
folder=standard&file=cwb2006_summary_en_v3.pdf
2
http://www.liqua.net/liqua/images/dokumente/
krw_kreativwirtschaft_in_der_stadtregion_linz_studie_kurzfassung.pdf
3
http://designaustria.at
4
http://www.designaustria.at/aktuelles/i/adolf-loos-staatspreis-design-2007
5
see http://www.departure.at/
6
http://www.tmg.at/

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Several initiatives are underway in Belgium. Launched in 2005, “Wallonie-design” is a platform for
design, which brings together 16 organisations active in design promotion, supported by the Walloon
region. It aims at valorising Walloon design promotion activities as well as reinforcing relationships
between designers, industrials, public institutions and the broader public. It provides information,
partnerships and services.

The AWEX (Walloon Agency for export) provides the services of designers to companies wishing to
adapt the design of their products for export. It also offers legal support (notably for IPR issues) to
designers wishing to export their products. A design competition “Odyssey of the object 2008-2009 -
materials and design” was recently launched by the General Directorate for Research and Technology
of the Walloon region. It is open to pupils aged 11-18 years old, who have to present a new innovative
useful object prepared with preselected materials.

Design is one of the areas eligible for regional support through the Walloon innovation grant directed
towards Walloon SMEs conducing innovative projects. Under the Walloon Marshall Plan, Strategic
Transversal Plan 1, Area 13 is devoted to ”Creativity and innovation”. Initiatives of the regional
government in this area notably include the fostering of aesthetic innovation and design through
global coordination (notably through the competence centre on design), employment schemes and
schemes for specific consultancy with the general aim of creating a Walloon identity of design.

In Flanders, Design Flanders promotes designers and their designs and stimulates companies and
the public in the use of design. Design Flanders works for companies, designers and the public, but is
part of VLAO (a government agency for entrepreneurship). It supports companies in their search for
designers, guides managers who use design (through workshops, company visits, contact days, etc.),
shows their new products in its gallery, stimulates participation in fairs and subsidises projects that
stimulate design in an economic manner. It looks for design talent, selects and promotes designers,
subsidises designers who do research in a creative way, organises exhibitions, colloquiums, lectures,
workshops, international competitions and (for the general public) makes inventories of design in
Flanders, provides information by way of the website, newsletters, magazines and the Design Library,
presents the Henry van de Velde Awards and Labels and organises the Design Triennial.

There is no specific policy to support design in Bulgaria and while the positive role of design is
mentioned in the National Innovation Strategy, no concrete policy issues are proposed. Clearly, there
is a need for policy development in this regard. However, a number of schools and universities (both
private and public) offer education in the area of design, together with several schools of arts and
culture. Incidentally, the Technical University of Sofia has organised (August 2008) an international
conference “Challenges in Higher Education and Research in the 21st CENTURY“, within which one
panel was focused on Design and Manufacturing.

One of the few measures in the Czech Republic dedicated to enhance creativity in design as well as
awareness of intellectual property rights is the DESIGN programme (CZ_47). This is one of the
measures of the state support to SMEs administrated by the Ministry of Industry and Trade. Since
1999, financial support through the DESIGN programme was provided by the Design Centre of the
Czech Republic. It aimed to provide methodological support to SMEs in incorporating design into their
business strategy, assist in choosing the proper designer, contribute to financing the design work (up
to 50% of costs, with a limit of €3,200) and to promote the resulting new quality-design products.

However, the Design Centre was dissolved at the beginning of 2008, while the DESIGN programme
was transformed into two subsequent programmes of support. The first, a state support programme
“Design for export”, administrated by CzechTrade is aimed at the support of export capabilities of

7
industrial quality-design products made by Czech SMEs. Through the programme, SMEs will be
provided by a two-segment service – design development and design promotion. Individual
consultancy services will be targeted solely to industrial and product design. The second programme,
PORADENSTVI (CZ_51), is aimed at improving the quality and availability of advisory, information
and training and education services for SMEs. It is also intended to strengthen the general awareness
about the necessity of carrying out innovation (including design strategy) and also supports modern
enterprise methods. The programme runs within the Operational Programme Enterprise and
Innovation (2007 – 2013) and it is thus funded from the Structural Funds. PORADENSTVI has yet to
be launched. The (former) Design Centre organized several design contests, such as “Excellent
product of the year” and “Student design”.

The increasing focus on collaboration between the creative industries and the business sector in
Denmark began with the publication of the culture and trade policy report Denmark’s creative
potential in November 2000. Here, for the first time, the potential fruitful mutual collaboration between
the trade and the design sector received particular attention in a policy report, which resulted from a
collaboration between the Ministry of Trade and the Ministry of Culture. The report included a
comprehensive study of the Danish cultural industry and the interaction between the arts and the
business community. It also included an ideas catalogue outlining 13 concrete proposals designed to
develop Denmark’s creative potential. The focus, however, was not exclusively on design but on the
intersection between the industry and the cultural sector in general.

In 2005, a comprehensive study of the growth potential in the Danish fashion design industry was
conducted by the Danish Ministry of Economy and Trade. The intention was to investigate the
possibility of turning Denmark into the fifth Global fashion design cluster after New York, London Paris
and Milan. The study concluded that the goal is achievable through facilitation of user-driven
innovation, improved network organisation and more knowledge centres related to the design
process. The financial means to achieve the goal was backed up by the 2007 policy initiative funding
user-driven innovation in general with 50 million DDK (approximately €7 million). Whether the goal is
realistic is another issue – the report states that there is a long way and that Denmark is far from
having a design infrastructure comparable to the above mentioned clusters.

As a part of the government’s strategy to promote design and strengthen the brand Danish Design, it
has been instrumental in mounting the world’s largest design award show: INDEX. The event took
place for the first time in Copenhagen in 2005 and every second year after that. INDEX is the catalyst
for ‘Design to Improve Life’ with the aim of spurring “public and professional awareness of the great,
and too often unnoticed, human and commercial potential of “Design to Improve Life”. The event
includes five designers each winning €100,000.

Continuing the work of the 2005 report mentioned above, in 2006, a report launched by the
Government agency for Trade and Construction focused on the possible growth potential from
intensified collaboration between the business sector and the design sector. The shift towards user-
driven innovation as the intersection between design and business formed a strong focus. The report
concludes that there is a major need to improve the framework conditions for collaboration between
business and design. It furthermore stated the need for a change in the perception of design and that
all enterprises should consider design activity as a possible source of innovation and growth.
Furthermore, the report mentions necessary improvements in the area of design education, largely in
terms of business orientation and, finally, the need for an advanced branding strategy with regard to
Denmark’s history and current position as design nation. This recommendation was followed up in
2007 in the comprehensive branding strategy ‘Creative Nation’ worked out by DI (the Danish industry)
and the Ministry of Economy and Trade.

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In April 2007 the government released a white paper, DesignDenmark7 concerning the new aspects of
Danish design policy. The publication can be seen in relation and as a counterpart to the official
innovation policy report InnovationDenmark, also released in 2007. The report has a strong focus on
design as a central part of the innovation process. The paper is partly based on the 16
recommendations and proposals of the appointed ‘Commission for Danish Design Promotion’. On this
basis, the Government has allocated DDK 23 million a year for design promotion for the period 2006–
09.

In general, there is a strong focus on the potential of design in Denmark. This has to be seen in
relation to Denmark’s traditionally strong position in, for example, furniture design, which had its peak
in the 50s and 60s. Thanks to this tradition, Danish Design is a relative strong brand that delivers a
firm platform for further development. According to the report Danish Design – good business? by the
Danish Growth Foundation, design is also a very frequently used notion among politicians although
key stakeholders in the design industry point out that there is a lack of correlation between the rhetoric
and the funding of design in general. Furthermore, the sector needs public support not only in direct
funding but also in terms of disseminating a more broad understanding of design as source of growth
among enterprises as well as a more comprehensive presentation of Danish design abroad.

Support for design in Estonia has been mainly a national level initiative. Building up the Design
Innovation Centre at the Estonian Academy of Arts was supported via the SPINNO Programme 2004-
2006 of Enterprise Estonia (with €448,000 of public support). The new period of the SPINNO
Programme will commence in Autumn 2008 and will open new funding sources. At this stage the
intended development of the Design Innovation Centre is not clear and the Centre’s activities have
declined rather than progressed in 2008.

The year 2007 was known as DESIGN YEAR; this was organised by the Design Innovation Centre
but supported by the programme Innovation Awareness Programme” of Enterprise Estonia. Several
seminar series were organised with invited foreign as well as local lecturers from business and other
fields. The final event, “ABS Design“, took place in November 2007 with participation by all innovative
entrepreneurs and public sector representatives. During the year, 400 participants from private sector
and municipalities took part in design seminars in different counties. A number of other activities were
also organised, such as “The Award of Improving Life”, exhibitions and workshops for children.

Recently, product design was added as an eligible activity to the R&D Projects Financing Programme
of Enterprise Estonia. Thus, a company may get extra support from Enterprise Estonia if it plans to
make changes in product design, provided the project meets other programme criteria8.

The role of design and creativity for competitiveness has been understood from an early stage in
Finland. For instance, according to Valtonen and Ainamo (2008) “the history of industrial design in
Finland is interlinked with the general socioeconomic development of the country”. The authors argue
that in the post-war period in the 1950s and 1960s, design was used by the government and various
economic and societal actors to express and emphasise national identity as well as to promote
economic development. It was during this period when the notion of “Finnish Design” began to be
used "as a label for marketing Finnish design products abroad". Internationally known Finnish

7
The publication can be downloaded in English: www.ebst.dk/file/7260/designdenmark.pdf

8
See: http://www.eas.ee

9
designers and the success of Finnish designers in international design competitions provided
substance and cultural and symbolic value for the newly created brand.9

The role of design in Finnish society further developed in the following decades. As for many other
things, the deep economic recession of the early 1990s proved to be a major turning point for design
in Finland. The recession impacted the mechanisms on which the Finnish welfare society was built
and which also supported design. At the same time, the industries which previously had had a leading
position in the design area (textiles, furniture, glass, ceramics) had difficulties in competing with
growing imports from countries with lower production costs. The need to face emerging internal and
external challenges gave an impetus to Finnish companies and Government alike to seriously
reconsider the factors and tools on which the competitiveness of individual firms and Finland as a
national economy would be built on in the future. In order to find new competitive advantage there
was a need to modernise strategies and tools used. It was in this context that companies and policy
makers became acutely aware of the opportunities and complementarities provided by (industrial)
design in the renewal of industries and existing practices. The requirements of the traditionally
influential export industries and, in particular, the fast growing electronics industry with Nokia as its
flagship, gave a further thrust for policy attention on design.10

In 1996, Sitra, the Finnish National Fund for Research and Development, invited "a group of design-
related persons into round-table discussions on the condition and future of Finnish design. As a result,
Sitra commissioned a survey and a report on the state and future of design in Finland, which was
published 1998. According to the report key questions to be handled in the review were:

"if design had in the Post-War decades been an integrated factor in creating wealth
and quality of life so could it again, in a different context, do the same? What is the
condition of the different operation areas, professions and institutions related to
design and how do they function together? How to build a renewed competence level
through education? And finally, how to integrate the “system of design” into the bigger
framework of the “national system of innovation”?" (Pekka Korvenmaa:
Finland,Design and National Policies of Innovation 21-03-2007).

Further, the Sitra report gave an impetus to the preparation of a governmental action plan on design.
The Ministry of Education, supported by the Ministry of Trade and Industry formed a working group
with an extensive representation of key stakeholders. International examples of similar types of
programmes under preparation were also considered. The initiative resulted in a Government
Decision-in-Principle on Finnish Design Policy approved in 2000 (Design 2005!).11 The goal was to
create a dynamic design system that would take Finland to the forefront in the utilisation of design.
The significance of design for new service and product innovations was clearly understood in the
document. A major policy objective of Design 2005! was to improve competitiveness by raising the
standard of design education and research. Leading design universities and institutions, together with
government and industry, were seen as key actors for the realization of the objective. According to
Korvenmaa (2007) "the official culmination of the consensual design policy was reached in 2000 when
the Ministers of both Culture and of Trade and Industry, together with high-ranking representatives

9
Valtonen A. & Ainamo A.: The Professionalization of Product Design: Reflections on the Finnish
Case. A paper in International Design Management Institution Education Conference Design
Thinking: New Challenges for Designers, Managers and Organizations. 14–15 April, 2008, Cergy-
Pontoise, Paris, France, 2008
10
Pekka Korvenmaa (2007) Finland,Design and National Policies of Innovation. Also, Valtonen A.
& Ainamo A. (2008) The Professionalization of Product Design: Reflections on the Finnish Case.
11
Valtioneuvoston periaatepäätös muotoilupolitiikasta, 15.6.2000

10
from the industrial organizations and employers signed an agreement to make the new design policy
operative".

The policy paper led to various actions, some of which are touched on below. For instance, a Round
Table of Design was installed as an open forum for innovation generation with the task to make
suggestions for both the private and public sector (ibid.). Another example was the establishment of
Designium, the Centre for Innovation in Design in the University of Art and Design Helsinki in 2001.
The centre provides consultation services in all matters relating to the identification, analysis and
protection of innovations. The services are available for the University's students and researchers, as
well as external design entrepreneurs. Innovation services focus on producing new information about
the identification and management of innovations. Furthermore, Tekes and the Academy of Finland
launched separate but simultaneously integrated programmes targeting design field. Tekes’ Industrial
Design Technology Programme (2002-2005) was launched early in 2002 with the intention of making
industrial design an important part of international competitiveness. The aim was to raise the standard
of design research and make use of design expertise in corporate product development and business
strategy and to develop the services provided by design firms. The total volume of the programme
was around €25 million. The Academy of Finland carried out its Industrial Design Research
programme between 2004 and 2007. The two programmes were closely coordinated and the
Academy's programme was directing grants primarily to those theme areas not included in the Tekes'
programme.
Finnish industries have been closely involved in this development of the design field in Finland and
this is evident from their statements. EK, the Confederation of Finnish Industries notes on its website
that creation of innovations "can be enhanced by, for example, investing in R&D operations,
networking, utilising IT technologies and expertise-intensive corporate services, developing
organisations and employees, and focusing on design". At branch level, for instance, the shortage of
design experts alongside of business and environment experts was one of the current challenges
identified in scenario and strategy work for the Finnish wood products industry12.

In addition to the above strategies and policy initiatives for design there is a wide variety of activities,
events and organisations promoting design. For example, Design Year 2005 was a nationwide
campaign year with a wide range of events organised by a wide group of actors presenting public and
private sectors, associations etc. The objective was to increase awareness of the importance and
potential of design as a creative resource and a source of competitiveness.

Design Forum Finland, maintained by the Finnish Society for Crafts and Design, promotes the
competitiveness and development of Finnish industry and culture through the means of design. The
organisation seeks to improve the exposure of Finnish design and to increase the use and
applications of design in industry. The activities of Design Forum are numerous: it works as an
information centre for design, participates and organises projects promoting the use of design,
information services and publications and organises exhibitions both in Finland and internationally.
Design Forum Finland coordinates, in Finland, a joint Nordic research and development project
addressing responsibility driven innovation and design. The project aims at creating practical tools for
integrating design, innovation and corporate responsibility into the business operations and product
development of companies13.

Various design prizes and competitions are also used to promote design services to companies and
to point out the importance of design as a competitive advantage in the international market.
Examples include the biennial international Fennia Prize competition for companies organised by
Design Forum Finland together with the Fennia Insurance Group. The purpose of the Fennia Prize is
12
Suomen puutuoteteollisuus 2020. Skenaario- ja strategiatyön loppuraportti
13
http://www.designforum.fi

11
to support the manufacture of high-standard products and to promote the competitiveness of industry.
Other initiatives include the Young Designer of the Year and a series of exhibitions entitled Young
Forum, run since the mid-1990s. There are also other design awards such as the Kaj Franck Design
Award to an established designer or team of designers with solid professional achievements and the
Estlander Prize awarded to bodies or organizations, even outside the field, that have promoted design
in significant ways14.

Finland also hosts a number of design-related educational institutions both at the university and the
polytechnic level. The University of Art and Design Helsinki has a visible role in the field in Finland.
Designium, the Centre of Innovation in Design, and the Media Centre Lume both function under the
auspices of the University. The International Design Business Management (IDBM) curriculum is a
joint education and research programme of the Helsinki School of Economics, the University of Art
and Design Helsinki and the Helsinki University of Technology. The University of Lapland hosts a
Department of Industrial Design, which is active also in research. The Institute of Design in the Lahti
University of Applied Sciences is probably the best-known institution at the polytechnic level in
Finland. The activities of the Institute for Design Research are aimed at enhancing the
competitiveness of Finnish companies through user-oriented design. Established in 1997, the Institute
began its work with two projects related to the mechanical wood-processing industry. Since then, it
has expanded its client base to include also many other industries. The Institute aims to serve small
and medium-sized firms in particular, ones which often have limited resources for research supporting
product design.

An interesting recent development at the university level is the Helsinki School of Creative
Entrepreneurship (HSCE), a joint initiative of design, business and technical universities in the
Helsinki Metropolitan region. HSCE was established in late 2005 to act as a catalyst to develop
entrepreneurial capacity and to stimulate and support research commercialization efforts in the region.
Through combining design, business and technology disciplines, HSCE has aimed to stimulate
creativity by providing an innovation platform to test out new ideas and approaches. Start-up funding
and support was provided by industries, cities and development agencies in the region and the
Ministry of Interior. With hindsight, this initiative preceded the decision to merge the three universities
which officially takes place in the beginning of 2009. The Government in power approved the plan in
May 2007. The new Aalto University brings together design (TaiK), business (HSE), and technical
(TKK) university level research and education in Helsinki region

Non-technological innovation is becoming more and more recognised in France as a factor for
economic growth. In 2006, a report from a special commission on the intangible economy15 provided a
diagnosis on the existing situation and recommendations for future French action in the field of
innovation and creation. The report called for international benchmarking of best practices.

Policy for supporting creativity and design is implemented in France by the Ministry for Economy,
Finance and Industry in the General Directorate for Enterprise (DGE).In 2007, the DGE ordered two
comparative studies. One concerned the French design schools and the other examined policies
supporting design, with an international perspective. These reports paved the way for actions that are
to be carried out in 2008.

As far as policy tools are concerned, it is worth mentioning the Agency for the promotion of industrial
activity (APCI)16, created in 1983 by the Ministries of industry and of Culture. This was privatised in
1993). The APCI develops tools and collective actions to promote French design in France and
14
http://www.designforum.fi/prizesandcompetitions
15
2006, “Intangible economy, tomorrow’s growth”.
16
www.apci.asso.fr

12
abroad. Since 1999, the APCI has organised the “design observer award” which rewards the best
creations and products from enterprises and designers. About 1,500 products have been awarded the
prize since 1999. OSEO (the national agency for SMEs and innovation), the French Environment and
Energy Management Agency (ADEME) and INPI (National institute for Industrial Property) are
involved in this activity and give specific prizes to enterprises. The other tool is the French institute for
fashion and design (IFM). The IFM is the French centre for training, research and expertise in the
fashion-design and creative industries. It was set up in 1986 by the French Ministry of Industry in
tandem with textile and fashion professionals17. An in-depth reform of all public initiatives in support of
design is planned in the course of 2008 by the DGE.

In Germany, public funding of design activities takes place through various R&D and innovation
programmes since industrial design activities are part of R&D activities and therefore eligible to
funding under almost any R&D programme, particularly the thematic R&D programmes and co-
operative R&D programmes such as ProInno or InnoWatt. Policy activities directly targeted at design
(including particularly non-technical design activities such as art design) include:
 Design Award of the Federal Republic of Germany: The best designs of products and
communication activities (i.e. advertising) are awarded annually by the Federal Ministry of
Economics and Technology. A jury selects the winner from proposals submitted by the Ministers
of Economic Affairs of the 16 Federal States as well as the German Design Council (“Rat fuer
Formgebung”). The Design Award was introduced in 2006.
 The German Design Council was founded as an initiative of the German Federal Parliament in
1953 to meet the growing need of the business world for information about design. Today, the
German Design Council is one of the world's leading competence centres for communication and
know-how transfer in the design field. With competitions, exhibitions, conferences, consulting,
research and publications, it offers new perspectives for representatives of business and design
disciplines. Today, the donors of the German Design Council include 140 of Germany's leading
companies18. The council advises on strategy and the implementation of all corporate design
measures, and helps companies to communicate their design expertise. The Council does not
provide any design services, but aims at providing the foundation for a successful working
relationship between companies and designers. Services for companies include trend and theme-
related studies, strategy workshops, networking, the development of communication concepts
and publications, conducting audits and organising competitions, conferences and exhibitions.
 Probably the most important policy activity in favour of design are design patents (or registered
designs) which give the patent holder an exclusive right to use a particular design. Design patents
can be registered at the German Patent and Trade Mark Office (DPMA). DPMA also offers a
database on already existing design patents and runs three information offices. The network of
patent information centres also helps firms and individuals seeking design protection. At the EU
level, design protection is available through the Registered Community Design.

There are no particular incentive measures for industrial and/or aesthetic design in Greece. The
measures supporting innovation and investment may provide, among other eligible expenditures, the
development and the protection of design and the purchasing of related specialised advisory services.
This is the case of support to private investment [GR_1}, to spin-out companies [GR_39], to
microelectronics clustering [GR_65], etc. The small unit on design of the EOMMEX (the organization
for Small and Medium Size Entreprises and Handicrafts) lost its only expert on the issue, who retired
recently.

Despite the lack of particular measures, private initiatives are quite active: a furniture company
(Dromeas) granted awards to designers in its own field. Moreover, a Greek firm (Beetroot of
17
www.ifm-paris.com
18
www.german-design-council.de

13
Thessaloniki) was granted the European Design Award 2008 “agency of the year”. In this same
contest, the Greek participants won the third place among other Europeans. Moreover, the Greek
Association of Graphic Design19 brings professionals together and organises contests for designers.
Design activity is organised mostly around the user industries (fashion, furniture, printing etc). The
very recent repatriation of many young designers from abroad has created a renewed interest in this
activity. Greece implements all international agreements on intellectual property rights, which also
cover the issue of design.

High level Hungarian policy documents do not explicitly address the issue of design, but a few
initiatives can be identified in this area. For example, the Hungarian Design Council (MFT) is an
advisory organisation representing the interests of design professionals. It monitors and evaluates the
state of developments of domestic design, and its economic opportunities. Based on its findings, it
formulates recommendations with regard to public policy and strategy pertaining to domestic design.
Its main objective is to foster the competitiveness of the Hungarian economy via the use of design
tools, and the development of domestic design culture. Notable initiatives include the Hungarian
Design Award and the Moholy-Nagy László design scholarship. The Hungarian Design Award is
announced annually by the Ministry of National Development and Economy with the cooperation of
the Hungarian Design Council (MFT). Other organisations, e.g. the Hungarian Patent Office, award
special prizes. The applications to be awarded are selected in an open procedure.

The Design Terminal Public Benefit Company was established in 2004 by the (then) Ministry of
National Cultural Heritage (NKÖM) and the Hungarian Patent Office (MSZH). Its main tasks are
providing professional orientation, information, and consultancy services; running the designers’
database; recommending design professionals; partnering; and organising training, exhibitions,
conferences and other events.
The University of Art and Design in Budapest is the main education institute in this area, receiving
public funding as a state university.

Some private initiatives (such as VAM Design Centre) can be identified with the objective of
disseminating international and Hungarian (so-called “Hungaricum”) design by organising international
exhibitions, trainings, conferences, publishing design books, etc.

Over the last 10 years there have been no formal government policy statements or studies on the role
of design in Ireland, but the development agencies, the advisory bodies and the private sector have
focused on the need for both industrial and service design. In 1998 Enterprise Ireland commissioned
a report, Opportunities in Design, which highlighted the need for a national policy for the Irish design
industry. As a consequence, Enterprise Ireland established a formal Design Unit in 1999 20. Its
objectives were both strategic and operational, from creating a media profile for Irish design to
providing a tailor-made design service for Enterprise Ireland clients.

In 2002 Forfas published a report on Irish design and the Science Advisory Council (formerly the Irish
Council for Science Technology and Innovation - ICSTI) published statements on design and
development in 1999 and 2003. The 2003 statement commented that:

“The systematic use of design throughout the innovation and new product
development process is critical to the survival and growth of Irish companies.
Companies that place design at the centre of their business strategy can gain a

19
http://www.ebge.gr
20
Design advice has been an integral part of Enterprise Ireland since it's inception. Enterprise Ireland's
predecessors, An Bord Trachtala and before that Coras Trachtala (CTT) all had a design role. In fact
Kilkenny Design Workshops was a subsidiary company of CTT.

14
 sustainable advantage in an increasingly global and competitive marketplace. Design
assists companies in achieving product differentiation, and can play a key role in
delivering greater efficiencies and cost savings”.

Today (2008) Enterprise Ireland's Design Service offers expert independent operational advice and
support on a wide range of business needs including branding and brand development; new product
development and product enhancement; marketing communications; website design and
development; and regional design showcase events.

All reports and articles over the years agree that only a minority of indigenous companies have made
strategic use of design. Many indigenous SMEs view design as something to be considered at the
end of the new product development process, rather than as a key strategic input from the start. This
is the main challenge in Ireland.

There are a number of private design related organisations that promote better design in both
manufacturing and service companies. These sometimes work together on common challenges. For
example, the Graphic Design Business Association (GDBA), the Institute of Designers in Ireland (IDI),
the Royal Institute of the Architects of Ireland (RIAI) and the Institute of Creative Advertising and
Design (ICAD) worked together under the brand Design Ireland from 2000 for a number of years.

Generally, the level of design outside the Dublin area is limited as most designers are located in the
Dublin conurbation area. This was verified by CIRCA Group’s innovation audit of the BMW Region in
2004. Outside of Dublin, design is strongest in the area of design for efficient manufacturing and final
physical product, and weakest in the area of packaging, presentation and communications. This
situation is changing, but at a slow rate. For example, a study of the design needs of companies in the
North West (Donegal) was undertaken by the County Enterprise Board and there are a number of
design services associated with the Institutes of Technology in Sligo (North West - Sligo Applied
Design Research Centre) and Carlow (South Midlands).

Over the past 50 years, part of Italian industry has been widely recognised at the international level
for its design and creativity. These characteristics are the result of spontaneous traits that derive from
a strong sensibility for the aesthetic and qualitative dimensions of the product. The “made in Italy”
sectors where the country has shown a competitive advantage are: fashion, shoes, lighting, interior
decoration, home furniture, automobile and motorcycles. However, institutions have paid little
attention to design as a crucial competitive advantage for the “made in Italy” sector. The attention
shown by the government, national and regional institutions, business associations, etc, has been,
until recently, rather limited. The majority of design schools and specialised curricula, University
degrees and specialised higher education courses in industrial design were established in the second
half of the 90s. An earlier initiative was the European Institute of Design founded in Milan in 1966
(nowadays with sites in Milano, Roma, Torino, Venezia, in Italy and in Madrid, Barcelona and San
Paolo abroad) which offers specialised courses in fashion, design, visual and communication art).
Unlike in other countries such as the UK, Germany and France with Design Councils or Design
Centres, the Italian system also lacked institutions to support designers, to offer them opportunities for
a professional career and to put them in contact with the world of business

This situation is changing and the creation of the Italian Association for Industrial Design (ADI-
Associazione Italiana per il disegno industriale) in 2001 represents the first attempt to create an
institution whose objective is the promotion and valorisation of industrial design. ADI aims to create
links with businesses; it offers designers a package of services with high value added (e.g.
professional training to protect the intellectual property of design) and launches projects and initiatives
of broad scope. ADI is a national association (the headquarters are in Milan) and is structured in

15
seven territorial offices (in the future there should be an office in every region). Every year ADI
launches two important prizes: “ADI Design Index” and the Golden Compass (“Compasso d’Oro”).

The International Council of Societies of Industrial Design (Icsid) has elected Torino as the World
Design Capital 2008. Torino and the Piedmont region are characterised by numerous achievements in
the design field and the city wishes to renew its image of “industrial city” for that of “European city”,
based on the innovation and creativity. In the framework of this event, the Chamber of Commerce of
Torino has commissioned a report on Piedmont’s design-related economy, with the objective of
identifying and mapping all firms in the region that use or produce design contents. The results of the
survey confirm the central role of Torino, where 50% of design firms are concentrated with 2/3 of
turnover. The Chamber of Commerce of Torino has also launched (January 2008) the “Designer’s
Counter” (Sportello del Designer), a free service for designers. This`offers designers information on
how to start a new business, about national and international contracts, about design protection,
technological brokerage, etc). Also, since 2007, the “Industrial Property Protection Counter” (Sportello
Tutela proprieta industriale) offers guidance on patent/models/design/marks protection at national, EU
and international level. Torino’s Chamber of Commerce is also undertaking activities such as the
organisation of an international conference (Design-driven innovation) in collaboration with the Italian
Patent and Trade Mark office; and the creation of an Observatory against counterfeiting. The 2008
edition of the Chamber of Commerce’s National Award for the best University thesis will be on the
theme of Design.

At national level, there are some recent developments in design protection that reveal the
government’s interest in the field: (i) since 2007, the first five years of protection of a design are free of
charge; (ii) low-priced registration tax of a design or model; and (iii) revocation of the ceiling of 100
designs for multiple requests (in 2005) which principally favours the fashion sector for products
presented under the form of a collection. In addition, a new body has been created: the Industrial
Property Consultants (Consulenti in Proprieta Industriale) to support firms, especially SMEs, in the
construction of the best mix between protection of technological/aesthetic/brand innovations. Another
interesting initiative has been the publication of a practical guide for SMEs about the available
instruments to protect design at the national and international level (Industrial design: protection and
valorisation of products - How to protect aesthetics and turn it into an asset) published by Convey-
ItaliaOggi in April 2008.

In 2005, the former Ministry of Productive Activities established the Foundation Valore Italia with the
objective to create, in Rome, a “Permanent Exhibition of the Made in Italy and of Italian Design”
(Esposizione Permanente del Made in Italy e del Design Italian) to have a physical place to exhibit in
an orderly and constructive manner Italian design, creativity and “way of life”.

Finally, in October 2007, the Italian Design Council (Consiglio Italiano del Design) was created under
the initiative of the Ministry of Cultural Heritage (Ministero dei Beni Culturali). This institution is
expected to become a key instrument in the formulation and coordination of policies in the field and
will aim at stimulating the interaction between the design world, industry and the public administration.
With the creation of the Council, design should “formally” enter the country’s cultural policy agenda.
The council is formed voluntarily by key actors, namely designers, academics, businessmen, firms,
public institutions, etc. Out of its 57 members, 53 are nominated by the Minister of Cultural Heritage
and four by the Minister of Economic Development. The main tasks of the Council are: (i) the
identification and evaluation of actions to be developed to promote initiatives with the objective to
show interactions between industry, culture and creativity; (ii) to raise awareness of the culture of
design in the public administration, in firms and within the public opinion and (iii) the selection of major
international events in which Italy should participate.

16
As a final point, design will be also supported through “Industry 2015” - the former government’s
industrial plan to foster competitiveness - since one of the industrial innovation projects will be
specifically dedicated to the Made in Italy sector.

One of the first Latvian policy documents to make specific reference to design as a tool for boosting
the competitiveness of companies is the Programme for Promotion of Business Competitiveness and
Innovation for 2007-2013. The Programme points to the limited development of individual brands,
trademarks and new products by companies in several industrial branches in Latvia, which are mainly
orienting themselves towards the execution of orders placed by foreign companies. In order to
increase the total value added of industrial branches, the Programme emphasises the necessity of
improving and developing of product design given the currently weak link between the sectors of
professional design and industry. Therefore, one of the main tasks for industrial development set by
the Programme is related to the further development of clusters that could also contribute to the
development of industrial design. The action plan of the Programme envisages certain measures for
promoting application of professional design in industrial companies, including design audits in
companies, provision of design consulting services for increasing the value added of products, as well
as development and maintenance of an industrial design portal.

So far no specific state aid schemes for design have been launched, yet among the current initiatives
in promoting design in Latvia, the annual design award, presented by the design journal “DEKO” since
2004, includes nomination categories such as ‘Industrial design’, ‘Industrial design concept’ and
‘Unique design’. In 2008, a new competition “The Design Challenge – 2008” was launched by the
journal “Design Studio”. There is also another competition of package design organised by a printing
company “Pilot Plus”. Moreover, in October 2008, a special forum on design will be organised by the
Riga City Council including a conference on design in services, a youth competition and a youth
conference “City and design 2008”. Finally, there are plans to establish a design college in the city of
Liepaja. It should also be noted that, as of 2008, the Design Council established in 2006 as an
advisory body at the Ministry of Culture has been placed under the authority of the Ministry of
Economics, given its closer ties with production and development of new products.

Malta’s National Strategic Plan for Research & Innovation 2007-2010 has highlighted Energy-
Environment as one of the areas in which to prioritise public funds – good building and design in
relation to more efficient energy consumption is earmarked as a sub-area in which to invest further
research. In the Pre-Budget Document 2008, the Government is considering the introduction of
incentives and training on energy saving building design. The new Malta Enterprise Act (2007) has as
one of its key objectives introduction of new concepts in incentive design.

The cultural and creative industries, which include design and architecture and which rely on the
contribution of the self-employed and SMEs are to benefit from incentive schemes (also through
structural funding streams) and tax credits to incentivize investments in the sector. They have been
given prominence in the Pre-Budget Document 2008.

A success scenario workshop organized by the Council for Science & Technology (MCST) in 2007 to
involve industry in the development of innovation policy identifies the difficulty of industry to
incorporate client requirements in product design as an inhibitor of innovation. A threat is the absence
of support infrastructure such as design centres, research organisations and specialised laboratories.

Specific initiatives in this field include the following. In 2007, the Design Malta Action Committee was
launched by the Ministry of Finance, Economy and Investment in collaboration with the University of
Malta’s Department of Industrial & Manufacturing Engineering and the College for Arts, Science &
Technology (MCAST). Its main remit is to promote and implement a design culture, through

17
appropriate initiatives and policies, in the manufacturing and service sectors. The target groups
include small business owners (SMEs) in industrial zones and those registered with the Malta Crafts
Council. The first scheme launched by Design Malta is the placement of design students from MCAST
and the University with local companies to exchange experiences on design practices.

Until 2005, Malta Enterprise (ME), the national innovation agency, ran an Industrial Design Scheme in
collaboration with the Malta Incubation Centre that provided mentoring services to industry on
Innovative Product and process design. ME launched a pilot scheme on Eco-innovative actions for
energy efficiency. The Malta Standards Authority (MSA) implements the EU Eco-Label scheme for
environmentally friendly products and services. Malta also has experience of participation in
international-level awards, such as the successful participation of a Gozo-based SME in the Energy
Global Award21.

In the Netherlands, at the national level, the “creative industries” are recognised (by the Innovation
Platform and the Government) as a “key area” for the Dutch economy. They therefore “qualify” for
support from the “programmatic package”. However, because of the typical structure of the creative
sector, no plans or programmes have yet been developed by the sector; the idea of the “key area
approach” is that the sector itself has to take the initiative to develop innovation programmes.
Recently, in 2008, the “ICT Innovation Platform” for Creative Industry 22, presented a Strategic
Research Agenda, developed by a broad range of stakeholders. This agenda “proposes a mix of long-
term research with short-term demonstrations and high-profile applications, to form new chains of
knowledge for an enduring advantage”. The agenda focuses on the ‘hottest’ spots supporting local
initiatives, wherever they originate. The aim is to introduce vouchers for the production of creative
ideas, creative pioneer vouchers, and creativity vouchers for the production industry and coaching.
For the restoration of chains, the aim is to build large-scale programmes and new reward systems.
For community building, suggested activities include the development of public awareness
programmes, registration of best practices, and the maintenance of open-source technological
sources. The agenda also suggests programmes on education and a PhD on the basis of a work of
art and on the basis of a start-up company. The agenda also aims to develop a programme for
stipends to artists, and for public broadcasting to be a lead customer.

In 2006, the ministries of Economic Affairs (EZ) and Education, Culture & Science (OCW) jointly
published the policy document Our Creative Potential: Paper on Culture and Economy.23 The paper’s
goal is to intensify the economic potential of culture and creativity by boosting the creative potential of
Dutch trade and industry. This works two ways: the business community gains more insight into the
opportunities offered by the creative sector, generating a wealth of ideas for the development and
utilisation of new technologies and products; and it encourages businesses operating in the creative
sector to look more closely at marketing opportunities.

At the regional level, local ecosystems are growing in Amsterdam, Utrecht and Eindhoven, each with
their own emphasis. The region around Eindhoven is particularly known as a design region, where the
Design Academy Eindhoven, Faculty of Industrial Design TU/e and ROC Design & Engineering are a
source of new talent. The Eindhoven region is also known for its large high-tech industries (Philips,
AMSL, Océ, DAF, etc.). The regional organisation “Brainport” organizes bridges between industry,
universities and knowledge institutes in the region. Brainport has been instrumental in bringing parties
together in the recently started Creative Conversion Factory. “Design Connection Brainport” 24 is
21
http://www.energyglobe.com/en/energy-globe-award/winners-2007/national/
22
http://www.iipcreate.com
23
EZ & OCW (2006) Our Creative Potential: Paper on Culture and Economy, The Hague. Downloadable at
http://www.cultuureneconomie.nl/ons_creatieve_vermogen.html.
24
http://www.designconnectionbrainport.nl

18
responsible for the implementation of the programme Design in Brainport 2005–2010. The
programme is committed to the reinforcement and growth of the top position of Southeast Brabant in
the field of design and technology. In collaboration with the business sector, the creative industry, and
knowledge institutes, Design Connection Brainport is thus contributing substantially to the region’s
increasingly stronger international competitive position. The focus is on reinforcing design as an
independent economic sector, and developing new business opportunities at the interface of design
and technology by connecting, inspiring and facilitating all stakeholders in the Brainport region. In
order to achieve these goals, Design Connection Brainport manages and supports a wide range of
projects in collaboration with the field of action. At this moment Design Connection Eindhoven region
has the following projects in its portfolio25:
 Dutch Design Awards: an annual design competition organised by the Dutch Design Awards
Foundation, and the City of Eindhoven.
 The programme NL4Design: aims to promote the export of Dutch design, and to reinforce the
position of the Netherlands as Holland Design Land on the international map. NL4Design is an
initiative of Brainport Eindhoven, the cities of Amsterdam, and Rotterdam, BNO (Association of
Dutch Designers), and Premsela, the Dutch platform for design and fashion.
 Creative Conversion Factory: an open innovative initiative aiming to give companies, designers,
technology institutes, and market partners the opportunity to meet and develop intelligent,
promising ideas into brilliant products, chiefly in the field of ‘ambient experience’.
 Design Café: a meet-and-greet network gathering for designers and the manufacturing industry.
 Design Management Europe: a European project aiming to encourage entrepreneurs to integrate
design into their business operations as a generator of innovation and product development.
 Ambassadors’ Board: composed of culturally oriented and design-driven people of foreign origin,
who are working in the Netherlands. They couple the essence of Dutch design to foreign cultures.
 Brainport Design Agenda: a web agenda stating design-related activities for the design
community in the South-east Netherlands.
 Capitalogue: a full colour magazine about the developments in the field of design, technology and
business in the Eindhoven region. The magazine appears twice a year, in April and October.
 Design Acquisition plan: Scheme and implementation of an acquisition plan for the Brainport
region, focused on attracting national and international design studios, knowledge and
educational institutes and companies that have incorporated design and design management into
their business operations as a strategic factor.
 Design(er) shared: a digital and interactive centre for information and knowledge exchange set up
for designers and the industry. This project is under development and expected to start in 2009.
 Design Forum: a network of designers and producers collectively conceiving and specifying ideas
for new projects with the aim of establishing closer ties between the creative industry and the
business sector.
 Designhuis: a platform and meeting place in the field of design, technology and innovation; a
home for Dutch Design.
 Design Incubator: The foundation Incubator 3+ encourages techno and design starters who are in
the process of developing ideas and planning a company or a product, and supports them with
financing, coaching, a network, etc.
 Design in Detail: an incentive programme for the cooperation between designers and retailers. It
focuses on creating innovative retail outlets in the Brainport region.
 Dutch Design Week: this takes place in Eindhoven from October 20-28. The Week has developed
into the largest design event in the Netherlands, with increasing international attention.
 Redevelopment NatLab (Philips): Construction of a unique 24/7 housing and working environment
for small-scale enterprises focusing on the combination of design and technology.

25
http://www.designconnectionbrainport.nl//allprojects.php

19
 Made in Brainport: This travelling exhibition puts design from Eindhoven into the international
limelight and offers designers and entrepreneurs from the Eindhoven region a chance to show
their distinctive qualities.
 Material Matters: the lynchpin of a knowledge network in the field of (new) materials, and a link in
the knowledge exchange between design bureaus, knowledge and educational institutions, the
business sector, and trade organisations.

Poland has a long history of industrial design that goes back to 1950, when the Institute of Industrial
Design26 was established and which has been carrying out its activities since then. The Institute will
be implementing a special programme, ‘Design your own profit’, in the framework of the EU Structural
Fund interventions, notably the Operational Programme Innovative Economy 2007-2013, as a key
indicative project. These projects have been pre-selected and, because of their strategic importance,
will be financed without having to go through the standard application procedure. The major objectives
of this programme are to prepare a manual on designing new products, raise awareness by promoting
good practices, design e-learning activities and organise workshops to target both entrepreneurs and
designers. The total funding earmarked for this programme during the 2007-2013 programming period
is estimated at €5 million.

To support the preparation and implementation of industrial designs and utility models by companies
a special measure was included in the OP-IE (Measure 4.2 of the OP-IE), known as ‘Stimulating
business research and development activities and support for the industrial design’. Total funding
earmarked for this measure is €186 million, although it has to be noted that the other objective of this
measure is to support companies in carrying out R&D activities. During the planning of the 2007-2013
programming period it has been recognised that increasing investments in design and innovation
require relevant IP initiatives. Hence, the OP-IE includes a special Measure (5.4), ‘Management of
intellectual property’, the aim of which is to support companies in protecting their IP rights. For this
purpose, €39 million has been allocated.

Since 1993, the Institute of Industrial Design, in co-operation with the Ministry of Economy and the
PAED has been organising a special competition - ‘Good Design’ 27. This is organised in three
categories, including home, working environment and public sphere (mainly the producers of the
automotive sector). The distinctive feature of the programme is that it is open not only to Polish
companies, but also retailers representing or authorised by foreign companies can enrol in the
competition. Although there is no direct financial reward, the winners receive the statute ‘Good
Design’ and a right to use the emblem of ‘Good Design’.

The Institute of Industrial Design is also organising training sessions for enterprises and is launching
the first edition of the competition, ‘Fortis Young Design’28. The initial idea of the competition is to
create co-operation between businesses interested in design and young designers. The theme of the
2008 competition is ‘How will leisure time look in the future?’. The main prize includes €6,000, training
in the studio of Designer of the Year and exhibition in the Design Centre of the Institute of Industrial
Design. In the coming months, the Institute, in co-operation with the School of Economics and Trade
in Warsaw with the support of the Ministry of Science and Higher Education, will launch a three-year
post graduate programme in design management. The initial idea is to train specialists on how to
manage design initiatives in companies. The programme will be open both for graduates of design
and management.

26
http://www.iwp.com.pl
27
http://www.iwp.com.pl/dobry_wzor
28
http://www.iwp.com.pl/fyd

20
There is also evidence suggesting a growing interest from local and regional authorities in promoting
design and innovation. For example, the City of Gdynia is organising, in cooperation with the Institute
of Industrial Design (11-27 July 2008), Gdynia Design Days to promote the designs of the Baltic
States, while the results of recent study The expectations of the companies and students from
Małopolska towards industrial design in this region revealed that companies know little about
industrial design services and that the majority of them supported the idea of establishing the Design
Centre in Małopolska, the capital of which is Cracow.

The characteristics of Portugal’s industrial fabric have long generated a concern with the
development of design activities and capabilities. In fact, the clothing and footwear, industries in which
design plays an important role, still account for an important share of GDP. The argument behind the
development of design has been that in those industries design was a relevant value added factor.
Therefore, the development of those industries should not be so much based on manufacturing, which
accounts for a tiny share of value added, but rather on mainstream (especially design) and
downstream (notably marketing and distribution) activities. Although the concern with design may be
associated with other fields, including engineering design, aesthetic design in connection with
clothing, footwear and other traditional industries, such as glass and chinaware, has been dominant
from a policy standpoint.

The main policy initiative aimed at promoting design in traditional industries has been the ‘Dinamo’
programme, launched in 2003, and later endorsed by the Technological Plan. This programme has
supported initiatives to promote Portuguese design and designers. Design was envisaged as a means
to escape price competition and to leverage creative capabilities to compete in more demanding and
affluent markets.

There is no ‘design council’ in Portugal, but an important organisation in this field is the Centro
Português de Design (CPD, the Portuguese Design Centre). This is seen as a technological
infrastructure, and is aimed at both promoting design and providing design services to companies.
CPD has launched a design prize (the ‘Sena da Silva Award’), as a way to stimulate design activities.
Another initiative of CPD is the ‘Design +’ programme, aimed at promoting the recruitment of
designers by companies and the strategic use of design. In the last decade or so, there has also been
a development of design schools, even in the context of architecture and fine arts schools and there
has been significant interest amongst youngsters in following design courses.
The promotion of the use of intellectual property rights to protect designs has also been pursued by
INPI, the National Institute for Industrial Property.

In Romania, there are no policies or initiatives that specifically support design as an activity or as a
sector. RDI projects with a design component can be funded on a competitive basis through one of
the publicly funded programmes that support the creation of new products, technologies and services
and the modernising of existing ones, within the broader objective of technological development and
enhancing of the innovative capacity of RDI units. These include: The Innovation Programme of the
2007-2013 National RDI Plan, Module 1: Product-System Development; The “Research of
Excellence” programme, Module 1: Complex R&D projects; The Core RDI programmes, which are
complementary to the National RDI Plan and specific to national R&D institutes and/or public research
institutions. These support specific medium- and long-term RDI strategies for the sectoral
development of the respective institutions. All these programmes have a national coverage, as
Romania has no regional RDI policies.

There are no national, regional and local policies supporting design in Slovakia.

21
Over recent years, the issue of creativity, design and innovation has been in and out of Slovenian
policy discussion. While the topic has not yet led to a specific policy paper or support measure, it has
been introduced in strategy papers, mainly as two streams of thought. On one hand, the creativity
concept is promoted in connection with the overall attitude of entrepreneurs, employees and
especially youth, while on the other hand, creativity and innovation are seen in connection with the
“creative” industry, especially design. With this in mind, the Reform programme (2005) proposed the
formation of a National centre for industrial design as a project of national importance. The idea was
that good technical product solutions often need to be upgraded by more sophisticated design in order
to be accepted by global markets as higher value products/services. Since individual enterprises lack
the human resources in the “creative” area, it was felt that a national centre could contribute to this. In
fact, the establishment of the SLO-DESIGN centre was included in the Resolution on development
projects -2023- a Government long-term strategy paper produced in 2006. However, to date, no
specific information on the time-frame for the implementation of this has been published.

More recent initiatives in this area include the creation of a horizontal development group for creative
industries within the Competitiveness Council of the Government’s Office for Growth 29. The group is to
cover the following fields:
 design (industrial, graphic, interior) as an important element of the competitiveness, promotion
and visibility of Slovenia
 architecture: innovative approaches, environmental impact, new materials and aesthetics (quality
of living environment, importance in tourism)
 market communications and trade marks (positioning in the international market, visibility of trade
marks, national/entrepreneurial approach, visibility and recognition of Slovenia as a trade mark,
recognition and the importance of trade marks of Slovenian enterprises, etc.)
 other issues the experts appointed to the development group identify as relevant.

The group is composed of people from the university sector, from design firms, public relations and
marketing firms as well as from manufacturing. Since the appointment only dates from April 2008, it is
too early to assess what impact such a group can make, but it does show how creativity is currently
understood in Slovenian policy circles.

Design has been perceived by Spanish Governments as a fundamental tool for innovation and for
better quality products and services. Hence, successive Economic Delegates of the Spanish
Governments have insisted on the need to promote design in enterprises, especially in SMEs.
Currently, there are two operational design policies/ programmes:

The Programme for Design Support (2007-2013), was developed and implemented by the National
Society for Design and Innovation Development (DDI), appointed to the Ministry of Industry, Tourism
and Commerce. The aim of the Programme is to improve the competitiveness of small enterprises. It
puts more emphasis on the autonomous regions where the average per capita income is lower than
that of 75% of EU members. The programme is co-funded by the Regional Development European
Fund.

InnoEmpresa (2007-2013), is governed by the Royal Decree 1579/2006 on business promotion and is
developed by the General Direction of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (DGPYME). InnoEmpresa
establishes three action areas in order to foster innovation in SMEs. One of these focuses on design
(Section 1.3 of the ‘Cooperative Innovation and Advanced Management’ action area). Section 1.3
encourages SMEs to incorporate external industrial and product engineering services as supporting
bodies in the development and market introduction of new products and it supports enterprises in the
re-design of their products. The total budget of InnoEmpresa is €500 million, partly co-funded by the
29
see TrendChart Country Report Slovenia 2008 for details

22
Regional Development European Fund and the autonomous regions. It is managed by the General
Administration (where enterprises from different autonomous regions participate in a project) or by
regional governments (if only enterprises from the same autonomous region participate).

In addition to the DDI and the DGPYME, there is a considerable network of organisations for Design
promotion, diffusion and training such as:
 Organizations integrated in the Spanish Federation of Design Promotion (e.g. Innovation Agency,
Disseny Centre of Barcelona, Industrial Design Centre of Aragon, Integral Design Centre of La
Rioja, Innovation and Services Centre of Galicia, Design Centre of Castilla-La Mancha, National
Society for Design and Innovation Development, Institute for Economic Development of Asturias,
Institute of Business Innovation of the Baleares, Institute of Small and Medium-sized Enterprises
of Valencia). These organisations offer training and design services and some also provide
financial support (e.g. the Design Centre of Castilla-La Mancha).
 Public and private schools and universities, mostly located in the regions of Catalonia, Madrid and
Valencia (e.g. Eina, Elisava, ESADE Chair for Design Management).
 Technology Centres, regional Institutes of Public Works, Association of Interior Designers, the
Spanish Association of Professional Associations, and the Institute for the Promotion of
Decorative Art.
 Publications (e.g. ON, Temes de Disseny, Experimenta).
 NGOs, like Design for the World.

The importance of design in Spanish society is also reflected in the numerous presentations of prizes
(National Prizes of Design, FAD Prizes of architecture, Delta Prizes of industrial design, Laus Prizes
of graphic design, etc.).

In common with several other countries, the topic of design has for many years been highlighted in
Sweden. Despite this, there is no explicit policy area on design at the national level. However, policy
areas, such as research, education, culture, etc., often include measures to support design. The
Ministry of Culture has generally been responsible for most of the government bills and committee
reports within the design area, but policy makers within the Ministry of Enterprise have also paid
attention to the issue.
In 199530 an evaluation concluded that measures for design had been insufficient as a result of explicit
policy goals and a lack of understanding about the importance of design. The following year 31 a
government bill put greater emphasis on the area of design, suggesting increased education
measures directed towards design aspects and the establishment of a design council. In 1997 32 a
government bill proposed an action programme with measures to strengthen the awareness of
architecture and design. In a committee report33, presented in 1999, an attempt was made to clarify
the definitions: design, layout and handicraft; the conclusion was that design, both graphic and
industrial terms, means to identify and solve problems. In the same year, the Government appointed a
committee to give a broad picture and make an evaluation of policy measures in the design area. The
evaluation identified insufficient allocation of resources as a major issue as well as organisational
weaknesses (i.e. absence of a governmental agency with dedicated responsibility to prioritise, initiate
and coordinate design related measures). As a result, increased coordination (among actors) was
proposed and efforts to increase research and education directed towards design among SMEs. In
2001, the government pledged to strengthen the Swedish industry through the use of design. Svensk
Industridesign, a business association, together with Svensk Form, a non-profit group, responded to
the call by proposing a national action programme. This covered ten different projects. One of those
30
SOU 1995:84 ”Kulturpolitikens inriktning”
31
Proposistion 1995/96:3 ” Kulturpolitik
32
Proposistion 1997/98:117
33
SOU 1999:123, Mötesplats för form och design

23
that received most public attention was for the labelling of 2005 as “the year of Swedish design”. In
2004, the Council for Architecture, Layout and Design, RAFD, was established. The council has a
vague mandate to push for implementation of the action programme mentioned above, and to report
on annual basis (to the Ministry of culture) about progress.

The United Kingdom can trace its modern historical interest in design issues back to the creation of
the Design Council in 1944 (as the Council of Industrial Design). Its objective was 'to promote by all
practicable means the improvement of design in the products of British industry', a mission that has
remained largely unaltered through half a century of social, technological and economic change. Early
initiatives examined ways to reform design education and took the case for good design over the
heads of manufacturers to retailers and consumers. In 1956, the Design Centre was opened to the
public in London. The Council of Industrial Design combined exhibitions with product endorsements,
direct services to industry, commercial publishing and retail and became a model widely imitated in
other countries. In the 1960s, increasing emphasis on was placed on technology and, later,
engineering design and in the early 1970s the name was changed to the Design Council. In the late
1980s and early 1990s there followed a shift from public campaigning to a focus on business and
education, although the Council, which had more than 200 staff and an annual DTI grant of
£7.5million, was seen to be out of touch, remote from the design community, viewed with indifference
by much of industry and isolated politically. New Government plans, such as using Business Links to
deliver industrial services including design, threatened its purpose. Its retailing and product
endorsement were closed and industrial services were regionalised. In 1993, the Government
announced a major review of the Design Council's work, which proposed a smaller, agile,
collaborative think tank organisation with around 40 staff, which would develop and disseminate new
knowledge and inspire action, while devoting more resources to activities and initiatives, and far less
to fixed costs like salaries and rent. In 1995, the Design Council was effectively re-launched with a
focus on communications with business, education and government, largely aimed at inspiring
audiences to use design. New initiatives included annual national events such as Design in Business
Week and Design in Education Week, and Creative Britain, which focused on how Britain's design
strengths could help to improve the country's global standing. Another initiative was Millennium
Products, which by 2000 had identified 1,012 outstanding examples of British design and innovation,
backed up by dissemination and show casing of these through publications, learning materials and
web-based case studies, together with international touring exhibitions. Although awareness of design
among businesses increased in the late 90s, this was accompanied by uncertainty about how best to
use design and prompted a shift in the Design Council's purpose to include 'enabling', as well as
inspiring the use of design. In addition to providing online knowledge and other design resources, in
2002, the Design Council launched a series of projects aimed at getting designers and other experts
working directly with selected businesses, schools and public services organisations to integrate
design thinking and methods into their strategies and systems. More recent work has pioneered new
thinking about design-led solutions to social as well as economic problems.34

At a national level, “design” is mentioned in several new policy documents, for example: 'Creative
Britain: New Talents for the New Economy' is the UK government’s strategy regarding the creative
industry launched in February 2008 by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, BERR and
DIUS. This sets out the Design Skills Alliance - a partnership between Creative & Cultural Skills, The
Design Council and other leading figures of the design industry world.

Recently (March 2008) the policy White Paper Innovation Nation recognises the major role of design
in innovation, both in the private and in the public sector. In collaboration with the Design Council,
partners such as the Office of National Statistics, DIUS, BERR, and the Technology Strategy Board,
are devising a new Innovation Index, which will include “design” amongst other innovation indicators.
34
http://www.designcouncil.org.uk/en/Design-Council/1/Our-history/

24
In addition, the White paper announced that the government is working with leading businessmen
(Peter Jones, a leading businessman in the telecommunication industry and Sir James Dyson, a
leading industrial designer) in order to set up a National Enterprise Academy and the Dyson School of
Design Innovation led by the principle that design is fundamental in creating innovative products and
services and that firms with high design-intensity activities will ultimately accomplish higher rates of
growth.

2.2 Other ‘European’ countries

Instead of a top down policy model, the area of design in Croatia has witnessed several projects that
have been initiated by professionals and their associations, and which have then generated policy
attention and triggered or facilitated specific changes. This bottom-up approach has been largely the
result of work of strong advocacy by a professional association (Croatian Designer Society). Although
this society predominantly gathers graphic designers (which is in accordance with the current demand
for design services), it has taken a broader perspective of the design issues. Namely, unlike graphic
design, which has prospered in the last decade, industrial design in Croatia, despite a long-standing
tradition, has suffered from the lack of demand because of unfavourable competitive position and/or
lack of strategy of most manufacturers of consumer goods whose marketability depends on design
(e.g. furniture and ceramics).

The Croatian Designer Society has founded a limited liability company (Croatian Design Centre) and
used it to develop projects and seek the support of various relevant ministries for design as a vehicle
of competitiveness. One of its key projects was Competitiveness through design (2004 - 2006), which
has entailed an information and education campaign for target groups in public administration, media,
PR and marketing professionals and the general public. Following this project and several analyses,
the need for a National Design Strategy has been identified. The Government of Croatia has
supported a collaborative process through which a National Design Strategy has been drafted. The
process has involved designers, researchers, as well as representatives of the public and private
sectors. This strategy is still awaiting adoption by the Government. Finally, the Croatian Design
Centre has been included in an international network of 18 design institutions from 14 countries,
which implement Admire, a large design project within the Pro Inno Europe initiative (2007-2009). The
project aims to use design management to foster innovation and competitiveness in SMEs. Croatian
SMEs will also be able to take part in the project, which will provide awards and organise workshops
and exhibitions with best practice examples, as well as to promote them in the European media.

In the latest resolution (end of 2007) of the Icelandic Science and Technology Policy Council,
programme-based funding will be increased by a factor of four and will concern, inter alia, the creative
industries (art, cultural media production, design and others). Policies in support of creativity and
innovation are, however, a recent phenomenon. Debate on the importance of public support for the
creative industries has been intensive and recently there have been some initiatives and even support
measures touching upon creativity, both as a competence and as an economic activity (cfr. the
Innovation Award). However, so far these efforts have been insufficient, in view of the enormous
potential of the creative industry of Iceland.

IMPRA has recently been given the mandate to promote design and as such has been involved in a
project for the Ministry of Industry, where designers and people from the ministry met and made
recommendations for the future. The result was the establishment of the Icelandic Design Centre 35,
which is not related to IMPRA or the Icelandic Innovation Centre. The role of the Design Centre is to
build a powerful network of collaborators in projects where innovation and competitiveness in local

35
http://www.icelanddesign.is/english/

25
businesses are the main guiding principles. It will also emphasise the value of design in social and
cultural contexts. Among the services offered by the centre are the promotion of Icelandic designers,
informing the broader public about developments in the Icelandic design scene, a job advertising
service, and the provision of a listing of design stores and selected design items. Moreover, the
Centre will promote projects (and calls for applicants and proposals) in the area of innovation. The
Design Centre is run as a service contract between the relevant ministries and the players in the field.
The Centre will be publicly funded for the next few years (estimated about ISK 20 million/€166,000 per
year. This step is a positive development in line with the identified challenges. It is interesting to note
that the formal establishment of the Centre was not preceded by advice from or consultation with the
STPC.

In Israel, there is one small programme run by the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Employment
specifically aimed at design. The programme, which targets SMEs, allows for payment of up to 75% of
the costs of up to 200 hours of consultancy provided by industrial designers.

A large proportion of Israel’s largest innovative exporters do not sell goods targeted at end customers,
which could be one reason for the relative paucity of measures and the limited budget devoted to this
subject. It could well be argued that firms would do well to look more seriously at design and that the
government could make good use of taxpayers’ money by encouraging such efforts. Companies such
as M-Systems have made much more sales from a design concept such as disk-on-key rather than
the core technology behind the ubiquitous sticks. However, this issue has not been high on the
agenda in Israeli public debate about innovative industries.

The government of Norway sees design as a central factor in the innovation process and as a driving
force for innovation and value creation (Report from the Ministry of Trade and Industry, Design as
driving force for the Norwegian industry, 2001). In 2006 the Ministry of Trade and Industry launched a
plan to foster industry oriented design. The Norwegian Design Programme provides consulting
services tailored to companies needs. Moreover, the scope of support schemes for design was
increased in the 2006 state budget.

Several design awards are distributed by the Norwegian Design Council. Every year the Council
acknowledges the best innovative solutions developed by companies and designers, through the
annual Award for Design Excellence. Among its recipients the jury nominates projects that distinguish
themselves for the Honours Award for Design Excellence. Products that have been on the market for
more than ten years are acknowledged through The Classic Award for Design Excellence, and
aspiring young designers are recognised through the Young Talent Award.

Companies that wish to invest in design-related R&D can apply for tax deductions under the R&D tax
credit scheme, SkatteFUNN. Innovation Norway also offers information services for interested firms
and runs a support measure for design projects, the so called “Ice-breaking scheme”. The measure is
targeted at companies that use design for the first time and companies that want to use design in a
strategic way.

Currently there is no specific “design” promotion programme in Switzerland, however, the KTI/CTI
(the country’s most important innovation promotion agency) follows a bottom-up approach. Thus, all
types of innovation activities and all sectors are eligible for promotion.

In Turkey, policies in support of design and creativity are not yet seen as a part of innovation policy,
although there have been academic studies and initiatives by several non-governmental organisations
highlighting the need for supporting creativity and innovation. For instance, the strategy document
prepared by the National Innovation Initiative (a platform created by leading executives from the

26
private sector, rectors of several established universities and leaders from some of the influential non-
governmental organisations in Turkey) highlights the need for the dissemination of creativity and
innovation training opportunities and the importance of the development of a design capacity in
sectors, such as automotive and consumer electronics, to increase the efficiency of innovation and
R&D activities.

Since creativity is not dealt with a part of innovation policy there have not been any explicit innovation
policy measures introduced. The only measure that can be noted here is the support provided for the
registration of industrial designs by SMEs. The measure is implemented by KOSGEB under the
‘Industrial Property Rights Support’ (TR 9). One notable effort to stimulate innovation and creativity on
a sectoral basis is the award organised since 1999 by the ‘Turkish Association of Electronics and
Information Industries’ (TESID). TESID’s “Innovation and Creativity Award’ is organised annually as a
prestigious award for companies in the electronics and ICT sector.

2.3 Developments outside Europe

Formerly there had been no tradition in design or in product innovation in the growth of Brazilian
industry. However, as international markets began to open up, the Brazilian productive sector came to
realise it was competing against imported products. Local industry was thus forced to invest
increasingly in improving the quality of its products. The central role of design became seen as a
process capable of enhancing competitive advantages and of providing national products with both an
identity and added value. Furthermore, it contributes to enhanced production procedures, reducing
development time and its related costs. In order to convey this awareness to Brazilian companies,
several public agencies – namely, the MDIC alongside private institutions such as the state-funded
Sebrae (Brazilian Micro and Small Business Support Service) and the SENAI (Brazil’s National
Industrial Training Service), began to channel investments into projects to foster a better use of
design nationwide. These projects were focused mainly on coordinating and promoting actions within
the Brazilian states and in the so-called Local Productive Arrangements, enabling local institutions to
provide companies with the necessary support, through which design management can be adopted in
their own productive processes. This support comprises actions ranging from holding lectures on
worldwide market trends to offering consulting services during the stages of creation of new products
– services which include pinpointing new opportunities, selecting materials, analysing possible
environmental impacts, among others.

At the national level, in 1995, the Ministry of Development, Industry and Foreign Trade (MDIC)
launched the Brazilian Design Programme36 (Programa Brasileiro do Design – PBD) aimed at the
uptake and increase of design management in the country's productive sectors. Its mission is to
promote technological and industrial modernity through design, contributing to the quality and
competitiveness of Brazilian-produced goods and services, and its diffusion. The PBD goal is to
promote the development of Brazilian design, taking advantage of the fact that Brazil is a country with
a strong and creative identity, ready to develop a Brazil trademark in the competitive international
market. The programme's strategy includes supporting initiatives that promote the participation of
Brazilian products in international design awards, in view of the fact that these awards are a sound
guarantee of competitive advantages on the market.

In the current industrial policy launched in March 2004 (PITCE37), design is implicit in the general
guidelines for innovation and technological development, for product, process and management
innovation and in Brazil's foreign image programme, thus consolidating PBD’s objectives. These are
convergent with the objectives and activities set out in the Brazilian Productive Development
36
See: www.debrazil.com.br.
37
see TrendChart Brazil Country Report 2007

27
programme (PDP) introduced in May 2008 by the inter-ministerial industrial development agency
ABDI, linked to the ministry MDIC. In this framework, the PBD is implemented in a decentralized
manner and seeks to motivate business to insert design in the productive system. The PBD objectives
are articulated with the Productive Chains Competitiveness Forum programme, towards the larger
objective of obtaining greater recognition of Brazilian products for their design, quality and price.
Some of its main projects include Design Workshops, Design & Excellence Brazil, Social Design
Competition, Brazilian Design and Innovation Biennal.

PBD plays an active role in the awards programmes in design through projects such as Design &
Excellence Brazil. It provides companies with support during their participation in events such as the
IF Design Award, in Hanover, Germany and in Social Design Competition. In connection with the
Productive Chains Competitiveness Forum programme, several activities have been taking place,
among them, the creation of design contests, for example, the Brazilian Association of Plastics
Industry Design Contest. The sector is also assisting in the creation of a design contest within the
scope of the Mercosur trade agreement. The PBD also provides institutional support to organisations
that promote design contests, assisting them in drawing up the regulations, marketing, and prize
winner selections in the largest design contests in Brazil (e.g. the Design & Excellence Brazil
launched in June 2003).

Sebrae selected design as one of its priority activity areas in support of SMEs through the Via Design
programme, launched in April, 2001. By providing national products with added value, higher
standards of quality and innovation, Via Design gives companies the opportunity to compete in larger
markets. Via Design aims to:
 support the development of design and its insertion in the production process, strengthening
partnerships between supply and demand;
 build awareness in society about the concept and importance of design;
 stimulate institutions to develop design actions for SMEs;
 support the structuring of State Networks of Centres and Nuclei of Innovation and Design oriented
to the development of design and provision of consulting services to SMEs and
 make feasible the access and use of design by SMEs.

Via Design targets established SMEs that need to apply design principles to their products, services
and image and entrepreneurs and craftsmen with potential to grow with design initiatives. The
programme also aims to reach other design-related entities involved in the support of small business
such as universities, technical schools, faculties, R&D institutes, government agencies, etc.

By means its Network of Support Centres, the SENAI helps industries implement design management
processes in their own business strategies, a key factor that allows companies to supply differentiated
and innovative products. Local manufacturers can thus add new values to their products while
strengthening their competitiveness in the global market.

In the government Productive Development Programme (PDP), launched in May 2008, design is
considered a key component for adding value and competitiveness in a variety of sectors. In the
textile and garment sector, MDIC has a Design and Competitiveness Forum and is supporting
activities in design, branding and customization through professional training courses. In the shoe and
leather goods, sector in order to address the challenge of strengthening brands, design and image of
Brazilian footwear in the international market, one of its objectives is to strategically position Brazilian
footwear in terms of culture, comfort, environment and design.

A human resource capacity-building initiative of the PBD aims to support graduate and professional
training courses and create deign management programmes. Another aims to reinforce the

28
infrastructure of design through support to R&D, public-private partnerships and the consolidation of
sectoral technological institutes to promote design. Brazil's premier national development bank
BNDES and innovation agency FINEP have set up special finance lines for design with FINEP setting
aside about €40 million over three years and the Ministry of Science and Technology allocating
resources (PACTI e PADCT) and fellowships (CNPq managed RHAE and PCDT fellowships) to
support design.

Over the past few years, several design prizes have been established. The Brazilian Home Museum
Prize was created in 1986 to promote design in Brazil and maps the major advancements in habitat
equipment in the categories furniture, utensils, light, textiles and covers, electronic equipment,
construction equipment, published works and new ideas/concepts. The Design and Package Prize of
the Brazilian Package Association started in 2000 with the objective of recognizing those firms that
make a professional use of design to generate social, economic and environmental gains to society.

In Canada, there do not seem to be any policies or initiatives to support design as an activity.
Certainly there is nothing to define design as a sector. The concept of design as a separate, distinct
factor in innovation does not seem to have become an issue in Canada. Although there are in a few
cases separate awards for design, the issue is usually considered as a factor when making choices
for awards for excellence in new product development.

China does not have a national design policy. However, initiatives such as awards and major projects
are used to support design as an activity. The country offers several awards to recognize design-
related activities including the Red Dot Award (focused on early career designers), the Red Star
Award (granted through the China Industrial Design Association), and the China Product Innovation
Design Award (targeted toward integrating traditional Chinese culture with modernized elements).

Major construction projects in various regions also support design as an activity in China. For
example, the Beijing Municipal Science and Technology Commission (BMSTC) established the
Design Innovation Funds to support and encourage indigenous design innovation among domestic
enterprises. BMSTC launched the 2007-2008 Design Innovation Upgrading Project to encourage and
fund joint collaboration between corporations and innovative designers. In Hunan province, there is an
emphasis on industrial design development, while in southern China, Guangdong province has hosted
Guangzhou Design Week since 2006.

Design, as a major activity in innovation and industry, is a recent development in India. Even though
India established a major research and teaching institution, the National Institute of Design (NID) in
Ahmedabad, about 40 years ago, national design policy has emerged only recently. The last decade
has witnessed a sudden rise of interest in the promotion of design both by the government and
business enterprises in India.

In February 2007, the Union Cabinet approved the National Design Policy for India. This has the
following objectives:

 Preparation of a platform for creative design development, design promotion and partnerships
across many sectors, states, and regions for integrating design with traditional and technological
resources;
 Presentation of Indian designs and innovations in the international arena through strategic
integration and cooperation with international design organizations; and
 Global positioning and branding of Indian designs and making 'designed in India' a by-word for
quality and utility in conjunction with 'Made in India' and 'Served from India' .38
38
http://pib.nic.in/release/release.asp?relid=24647

29
The Action Plan prepared for the design policy aims at setting up specialised Design Centres or
“innovation hubs” for sectors such as automobile and transportation, jewellery, leather, soft goods,
electronics/IT hardware products, toys and games, which will provide common facilities and enabling
tools such as rapid product development, high performance visualization, etc., along with enterprise
incubation and financial support through mechanisms like venture funding, loans and market
development assistance for start-up design-led ventures, and young designers’ design firms/houses.

The National Institute of Design (NID), Ahmedabad, is India’s premier institution for teaching and
research on design. The Business Week, USA has listed NID as one of the top 25 European & Asian
programmes in the world. Four more institutes will be set up following the pattern of NID in different
regions of the country during the 11th Five Year Plan (2007-2012).

There are about ten major design institutions and colleges with 12 major programmes which produce
10 000 students every year. In addition, there are around a dozen design associations operating in
the country. InDeAs is a pan-India networking, showcasing and events platform for India's design
community. Similar associations include Indian Institute of Interior Designer; Fashion Design Council
of India; Crafts Council of India; AIDI Association of Industrial Designers of India etc.

Design is a very much a Federal government and business enterprise centred activity rather than one
covered by the State governments.

Several activities are underway in Japan. Since the establishment of the Japan Industrial Design
Promotion Organisation in 1969, on the basis of a report by the Ministry of International Trade and
Industry (MITI – now METI) JIDPO has borne responsibility for the comprehensive promotion of
Japanese design. JIDPO is an incorporated foundation and works in cooperation with government
bodies, industry and the design industry.

At the regional policy level, some prefectures and cities have introduced design-related promotion
policies. These include Yamagata-ken (policy established in 2005) which aims to link design with the
manufacturing industries. Kumamoto, which established a Universal Design Declaration in 2002; and
Hiroshima, which implements both design-related prizes, events and advice facilities. Amongst similar
activities to the above areas, Nagoya City provides support to a Design Incubator, which is subsidised
accomodation for design related companies. These illustrative areas were randomly selected but are
amongst a range of local authorities holding design-related policies or promotion activities of some
kind. It is not known, however, how much real activity is directed to these policies. Regional bureaux
of the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry also play some role in regional design activity through
stimulating networking activities, and events.

There are also a number of relevant design related organisations. In addition to JIDPO, the Japan
Design Foundation (JDF) aims to promote design-related activities and industries, fostering public
awareness of design values, and developing international design relations. There are also a number
of awards and prizes. Since 1957 there has been a Good Design Award (“G-Mark”) which is overseen
by JIDPO, while the JDF has operated an International Design Competition since 1983. These are in
addition to regionally implemented design competitions. Many regional governments also operate
design related prizes.

At the national level in the United States, there are no formal policies that recognise or target design
as an explicit activity or sector. Nevertheless, there are broad framework policies that support design
as an activity. For example, intellectual property regulations and laws are administered by the

30
USPTO. The USPTO has authority over three types of patents: utility, design, and plants. A design
patent defined as having ornamental surface characteristics as compared to a utility patent which
focuses on functionality, although both may be filed.

The state and local levels are most apt to have initiatives targeted to design activities. Most of these
are situated in general-purpose public universities and colleges or in specialized private colleges
through offerings such as visual arts, design (apparel, graphic, industrial, product), architecture, or art
education.

31
3 Policies and initiatives supporting creativity and user-driven innovation
This section deals with responses to the question:

“In your country, what (national and regional) policies and initiatives exist in support of
creativity specifically as a source of innovation, and in support of user-driven
(employee-driven, customer-driven, etc.) innovation?”

3.1 Activities in the EU Member States

In Austria, both start-ups and established companies are being promoted by the initiative “Impulse
Programme creative industries”. Hosted by the promotion bank AWSG and co-financed by the ARGE
Kreativwirtschaft (see below), the initiative offers training and education, financial support as well as
awareness programmes39. Thematically the programme is split up into design, multimedia and music.
Furthermore, the Austrian Federal Economic Chamber hosts the “consortium creative industries”
(ARGE creativwirtschaft40). This is a platform aiming at maximising the potential of creative industries
by representing companies, institutions, individuals etc. that have a diverse background (e.g. design,
multimedia, culture etc.). The initiative addresses awareness, along with the development of new
instruments focusing on support, networking, national and international collaboration, etc. The
“departure” programme (see Section 2.1) is also relevant to the creative industries. Design is also
funded by the Austrian Research Promotion Agency (FFG) if it is considered in the application for
promotion.
User- (customer or employee) driven innovation is typically regarded as intrinsic to the system and
thus expected to occur anyhow, i.e. it is assumed that there is no market failure. Hence, user-driven
innovations are not reflected (by the very broad) array of innovation support instruments. Yet, in the
consulting services of the WIFI branches in the provinces (Institute for Economic Promotion of the
Austrian Federal Economic Chamber), both clients and employees are considered as factors in the
discussions on the innovation process.

The Belgian Federal Government has decided to stimulate 'a dynamic and culture of innovation in
enterprises' through a fiscal measure (one-off innovation premium) to encourage employers to awards
'premiums' (or bonuses) to employees who have contributed to the development of an innovation in
the company.

In Wallonia, the Strategic Transversal Plan 1, Area 13: of the Marshall Plan is called “Creativity and
innovation”. Some Walloon initiatives also exist aimed at stimulating and enhancing creativity,
including: awareness raising of the public, annual awards for creativity, training of young apprentices
to become independent, creation of masters in the domain of creativity and innovation, and the
conduct of more research on creativity and innovation, notably through public procurement.

The stimulation of creativity in Flanders is an explicit part of the mission of the department for
Economy, Science and Innovation of the Flemish Government. Flanders is considered to be in a
process of transition from an efficiency-driven economy to an innovation-driven economy. The
creative processes of innovation, entrepreneurship and internationalisation are the foundations for
such an economy. 41 In order to stimulate these creative processes, in 2004 the Flemish Government

39
http://www.impulsprogramm.at
40
http://www.creativwirtschaft.at/

32
created the competence pole Flanders DC (Flanders District of Creativity 42). Flanders DC is part of an
international network of Districts of Creativity and organises, with its partners, an annual conference
on entrepreneurial creativity (the Creativity World Forum, every second year in Flanders). With these
partners, international projects are set up (e.g. exchanges of young designers; joint programme
development on creativity stimulation, etc.), while other activities include monthly creativity talks,
brainstorming sessions, training sessions in creativity for entrepreneurs, presentations by creative
entrepreneurs in companies and schools, trend watch activities, etc.

Creativity is recognized as a driving force of R&D and innovation in the draft version of the Bulgarian
National Scientific Strategy. The document is expected to be adopted and concrete measures
developed accordingly. In Bulgaria, there are measures to support creativity in cultural works.
Measures to support creativity and artists are included in various acts of Bulgarian legislation referring
to different aspects of the creative activity of authors: labour relations, taxation, levies, tax exemptions
for donors in the cultural sector, etc.

There are no explicit measures on user-driven innovation reported in Cyprus. Public procurement
follows strictly economic criteria.

In the Czech Republic, systematic public support to creativity skills is rather limited and there are no
explicit and coherent policies for the support of creativity. No references to the enhancement of
creativity are to be found in major papers and polices on R&D and innovation in the Czech Republic.
Nevertheless, the issue of insufficient creativity and entrepreneurship in the Czech population is
addressed by the White Paper on Research, Development and Innovation and by the White Paper on
tertiary education, which both propose several changes in the system of primary, secondary as well
as tertiary education towards strengthening creative thinking, increasing the ability to solve practical
problems and improving entrepreneurship.

As mentioned in Section 2.1, there has been a strong general emphasis on creativity in relation to
innovation within the past couple of years in Denmark. There is, however, a strong tendency to use
the notion in relation to all types of innovation without any clear distinction between innovation and
creativity. The Danish Council for Technology and Innovation mentions creativity in relation to
practically all initiatives also when it has very little to do with the original artistic sense of the notion.
Investments in nanotechnology and improved facilitation of possible high-tech patents, for example,
are generally also advertised as investments in creativity. The Danish innovation policy is still partially
governed by a linear paradigm with a strong focus on increasing the numbers of S&E graduates in the
private sector. In other words, the focus on creativity in the original and more artistic sense of the
notion is to some extend confined to the rhetoric – at least in relation to the more traditional areas of
innovation.

Also as mentioned above, the focus on user-driven innovation in relation to the creative industries has
received increased intention from politicians and stakeholders over recent years, however, primarily
as a way for the creative industries to improve their growth potential and less in the sense that
creativity can contribute to user-driven innovation within other fields of innovation. Nonetheless, all the
white papers noted above stress the fact that design and creativity can be a potential source of growth
and include proposals and initiatives to promote the integration of design and creativity in the
corporate sector.

41
Beleidsbrief 2008: Economie, Ondernemen, Wetenschap, Innovatie en Buitenlandse Handel;
Patricia Ceysens, Vlaams Minister, November 2007; page 7
42
www.FlandersDC.be

33
In Estonia, creativity, as a source of innovation, has been supported via different programmes
operated by Enterprise Estonia, for example, the R&D Projects Financing Programme and the Inno
Awareness Programme. However, such support tends to be indirect.

The creative economy has attracted attention as a result of studies carried out by public institutions,
for example, the Mapping and analysis of Estonian Creative Economy by the Estonian Institute of
Economic Research in 2005, Development of Creative Economy in Estonia – Proposals for Future by
the Estonian Institute of Future Studies in 2005, but there have not been any specific policy
documents developed which focus on the Creative Sector in Estonia. However, the policy area has
begun to get more attention at the agency level. Thus, the new awareness support programme of
Enterprise Estonia includes a specific action plan for developing the Creative Sector in Estonia. At the
policy level, the area comes under the responsbility of the Ministy of Cultural Affairs but, apart from
some studies, no strong policy statements exist.

As with design, creativity and user-driven innovation have become an integral part of the innovation
policy vocabulary in Finland. Some policies on creativity and user-driven innovation at the highest
political level are described below. Both notions are still somewhat 'fuzzy' concepts, which,
nevertheless, form the focus of increasing attention and are often used in policy discourse. Next,
some examples of concrete initiatives are given although it must be noted that the identification of
concrete examples of policies focusing on creativity and user-driven innovation is a challenging task.
This is because both concepts refer to phenomena and approaches, which have been gathering
increasing attention only in recent years and, in comparison to design, there are fewer examples
available.

The need to broaden the scope of innovation policy derives from various policy documents published
over recent years. As an example, a report reviewing challenges and opportunities of the global
economy for Finland points out that the country excels in international comparisons in the production
of new information and technology. However, if we shift the focus to the application of information,
competence and innovations the performance is not so strong. The report concludes that there are
clear shortcomings in the innovative commercial exploitation of opportunities, which is an issue of
marketing, brand sharpening and design. The report also highlights the interaction between producers
and users and the promotion of creativity in society. According to the report, the latter may be
influenced through focusing education and R&D policy. At the same time creativity is seen a
competitiveness factor crucial to all sectors.

Another report examining the adjustment of the Finnish economy to globalisation and Finland’s
economic strategy, underlines the increasing importance of the user-driven approach and services in
business development. It notes that:

"focus on product design is shifting from technology-based product concepts towards

customer, user or service orientated ones. The increased importance of service
businesses in many traditional industrial sectors points in the same direction (...)
However, with a few exceptions, Finnish service companies have not been
particularly successful in creating internationally competitive chains, concepts or
brands" [if compared for instance with Swedish and Danish companies].

This 'under achievement' is seen as a consequence of the fact that the clear majority of international
Finnish companies tend to belong to producer-led value chains.

The Government called for a more effective broad-based innovation policy in order to reach the
targets set for improvement in economic productivity and competitiveness. According to the

34
programme document, attention is focused on education, research and technology policy – and:
"apart from technological innovations, the Government will underscore the importance of innovations
in business practices, design, and organization. The point of departure for development is businesses’
needs".

A proposal for a national innovation strategy submitted in June 2008, notes, inter alia, that "(m)eans of
strengthening Finnish innovation activities include reinforcing international operations, involving users
and customers in innovation and understanding creativity and innovation in a broader sense, beyond
high-quality expertise".

Also, the Science and Technology Policy Council of Finland has, on several occasions, underlined the
importance of creativity and interaction, and particularly creative environments for a society built on
knowledge. For instance, in its review 2003 (35-36) it is noted that "one of the preconditions for
successful innovation is the development and maintenance of creative innovation environments. This
is a central task for the public sector in a knowledge society". Three years later, the Council's review
2006, when commenting on the state's role in development of the framework conditions and
capabilities of the economy and society, points out that it is the task of public authorities to put in
place the basic prerequisites for innovation with the aim to ensure that conditions are favourable for
creating competitive and creative innovation environments".

Prime Minister Vanhanen's first cabinet (6/2003-3/2007) initiated the preparation of a national
creativity strategy. From the beginning, the idea was that efforts to promote creativity in Finland are
not limited to the creative industries alone. Instead, creativity should be fostered across all fields and
sectors of society. The drafting of the creativity strategy was based on these premises. Preparation of
work on the strategy started in late 2003. At the end of 2004, the Ministry of Education set up a
working group to coordinate work on the national creativity strategy outlined in the Government
programme. Different task forces, with wide contact platforms in NGOs, public administration and
business and industry, were involved in drawing up the strategy and several reports were prepared
during the process. The working group led by Esko Aho, President of Sitra, completed its work in late
2006. During the process, the group identified eleven steps to a creative Finland covering the
following areas: education, culture, values, built environments, work life, industrial policy and public
administration. The common theme running through the strategy is the view that society's
regeneration ability has to be improved in order to make most of the factors which have formed the
corner stones of Finland's success so far. The latter include stability in society and investment to
education, research, product development and culture, to name a few.43

Based on the strategy work, the Ministry of Education proposed that a new policy programme for
creativity, knowledge and innovativeness would be included in the new government programme after
the parliamentary election in March 2007. In addition to the eleven proposals made by the working
group, there were several dozen proposals from the sub-groups which cut across the administrative
fields. However, there was neither a forum nor an organisation for the implementation and monitoring
of the drafted strategy. The new government, which came to power in April 2007 did not include the
proposed policy programme in its programmatic document.44

In late 2006, the Ministry of Trade and Industry assigned a working group to prepare a development
strategy for entrepreneurship in the creative industries sector for 2015. The strategy published in
March 2007 is based on the notion that in the future, Finland will be able to enhance competitiveness
in other industries as well as nationally by developing entrepreneurship in the creative industries. The
43
Yksitoista askelta luovaan Suomeen. Luovuusstrategian loppuraportti. Opetusministeriön
julkaisuja 2006:43.
44
Opetusministeriö: Luovuuden, osaamisen ja innovatiivisuuden politiikkaohjelmaehdotus

35
development strategy aims to establish a favourable operating environment for creative companies
that encourages their inventiveness and enables the creation of novel products and services for
various industries. The strategy's objective is to develop creative companies’ business operations in
such a way that even more companies can grow and go international. The strategy defines three key
projects for developing entrepreneurship in the creative sector to be implemented by 2015. The first of
these is the successful commercialisation and promotion of the Jalostamo ('refinery') concept, the
second focuses on developing training activities and networks in the sector and the third aims at
creating horizontal service innovations and concepts targeted at consumers and other companies.

Examples of initiatives in support of creativity include the following:

 The SILE project, co-funded by the Ministry of trade and industry and EU structural funds, has
been used as a good practice case of how to strengthen the business skills and networking of the
content production sector throughout Finland. The project at the end of April 2008, but the so-
called 'refinery' services, a key activity of the project, have been continued. Besides business
development (including legal and internationalisation services), the 'refinery' services assist
companies in using existing public support services. The provision of services was taken over by
a consortium of actors involving PKT-säätiö (SME Foundation), Neogames (centre of games
business, research and development), Music Export Finland (an association representing the
Finnish music industry), Diges ry (a national association for developing the digital content industry
in Finland) and Jykes (Jyväskylä Regional Development Company Ltd.). Experts working at those
organisations are familiar with branch, national and regional actors.
 The Oulu region provides good examples of regional activities in support of creativity. The ELVI
(Environment for Lucrative Virtual Interaction) project was tailored to support the creation of
companies that design, develop and publish interactive entertainment and games in the Oulu
region in Northern Finland. ELVI's primary mode was to guide and offer general and more specific
expert services to accepted concepts. The project also offered networking and lobbying for the
concepts, and aimed to improve the situation in the region in general by co-operating with national
and international industry members. ELVI was operated and administered by the department of
information processing sciences in the University of Oulu and funded by the Council of Oulu
Region (through EU objective 2, ERDF) and the City of Oulu. The project lasted almost three
years until the end of 2007. According to the final project report, nine new game-related
companies were founded in the region during the project period. The project also contributed to
organization of the biggest games conference in Finland

In recent years, particularly at the local and regional level, a new type of concept/meso-organisation
has emerged, which connect different actors (private, public and third sector alike) to the development
of new environments supporting creativity and bringing users in contact with the product/service
developing community. For instance, Forum Virium Helsinki is a neutral, independent cooperation
cluster bringing together ideas and content creators with high-growth and established companies as
well as public sector organisations. The cluster organisation has a key role in creating Living Lab test
environments in the Helsinki metropolitan area. Its goal is to advance next-generation digital services
and business models. Forum Virium Helsinki has a wide group of members consisting of companies,
public authorities, funding agencies and research institutions.

The POEM Foundation, an audiovisual production resource centre, is another interesting example
from the Oulu region. The foundation provides grants for scriptwriting, as well as interest-free loans
and investment funding for development and production. In addition, the POEM Foundation allocates
funding for projects that develop the operating environment and entrepreneurial activity or services in
the audiovisual sector. The North Finland Film Commission (NFFC) functions as a part of the POEM
Foundation. NFFC provides production services for domestic and international productions. The
POEM Foundation coordinates the development of cultural activities in the film and audiovisual sector

36
in the Oulu audiovisual network. The founding members of the POEM Foundation include the City of
Oulu, the Oulu University of Applied Sciences and the Council of Oulu Region. The establishment of
the POEM Foundation was announced in August 2005 in connection with the 400 th jubilee of the City
of Oulu. Its operations officially started on 27 February 2006. Before that, POEM ran for six years
(1999-2005) as an EU-funded project managed by the City of Oulu. The POEM Foundation annually
receives operational financing from its founding members and support from the Ministry of Education
to develop audiovisual and film culture and production.

POLTE, the regional creative industries development programme around the city of Porvoo and the
Itä-Uusimaa region, provides another good example of recently launched initiatives in support of the
creative industries. Co-operating partners have defined a new Porvoo Campus 2010 concept - Living
lab for creativity, learning and innovations. The aim is to create an open innovation milieu for
innovations close to users. In Living Lab, a company developing new services and products can meet
users, researchers and consultants in an everyday setting. Porvoo Campus 2010 concept with its
living lab methods aims to unify in one campus studying, working, living and leisure time in a user-
driven way.

Lastly, Creative Tampere (Luova Tampere) is the City of Tampere's business development policy
programme (2006-2011). The programme has been established to accelerate this growth by
promoting interaction among representatives of different sectors in order to develop new creative
concepts. The programme offers a framework and funding for kick-starting projects that create new
business. It also acts as an accelerator and as a creator of networks. Companies and organisations
plan and implement the projects selected in the programme. The programme is divided into three
theme areas: the cultural industry, service innovations and structures for creativity. Each theme has
its own individual goals that guide the selection of projects to be implemented45.

In 2006, the French Directorate General for enterprises (DGE), part of the Ministry of the Economy,
Industry and Employment, launched a call for projects on “innovation-creativity and design” which
financed 16 innovative projects for €3 million46. This call for projects was specifically aimed at
supporting collective projects involving SMEs and SMIs in the consumer goods sector. The projects
were offered a grant up to 50% of the total project costs.

Non-technological innovation is also supported by sectoral policies in textiles and arts and crafts and
a tax credit measure was launched in 2007 for a three-year period. In association with the French
Institute for fashion and design (IFM), the DGE is also supporting47 the creation of the city of Fashion
and Design (Cité de la mode et du design), which will allow for a wider supply of training and will
double the number of students of the IFM.

In Germany, innovation support mainly consists of funding for the R&D activities of enterprises,
including collaborative R&D involving public research organisations, and efforts to transform research
results into marketable products and services (including industry-science link programmes). Most
R&D funding programmes also support industrial design activities since industrial design is regarded
as a part of R&D activity. Important programmes in this respect are the thematic R&D and the R&D
programmes run by the BMWi. However, since R&D is ultimately related to creativity (i.e. to create
new knowledge and new approaches to solve problems), any R&D programme is likely to unleash the
creativity of the programmes’ target groups.

45
http://www.luovatampere.fi/index.php?lang=en&id=17
46
www.industrie.gouv.fr/biblioth/docu/rapports/pdf/radge200708.pdf
47
http://www.industrie.gouv.fr/dge/listeDiff/lettre34/DGE34.pdf

37
A number of innovation policy programmes directly target sectors of the economy that are considered
to produce “creativity” (i.e. creative content to be used by other producers, or creative ideas, e.g. with
regards to design). This includes, inter alia, the software and multimedia parts of the thematic R&D
programme on information technology.

Cluster programmes at the regional level that target creative industries most often contain a strong
innovation support component and thus contribute to linking creativity and innovation. Examples
include regional initiatives to foster the media sector (e.g. in the regions of Cologne, Munich, Berlin,
Hamburg) or the arts sector (e.g. Berlin). In addition, innovation cluster programmes such as the new
Top Cluster Competition or the East German cluster programmes also contain elements in support of
creativity.

Many programmes in support of entrepreneurship address creativity, i.e. to help entrepreneurs to

transfer creative ideas into competitive business models and to enter the market. This is particularly
true for spin-off programmes at universities (e.g. EXIST) and programmes in support of high-tech
start-ups, such as the High-tech Start-up Fund. In some thematic R&D programmes, there are specific
entrepreneurship elements specifically targeting creative start-ups (such as the Multimedia Start-up
Competition which offers awards to the most promising start-ups in this business every year).

User-driven innovation is the dominant form of innovation in the German business sector, as revealed
by results from the German CIS (with respect to information sources used for directing the innovation
activities of firms). Integrating user needs into R&D and innovation efforts is a part of innovation
management in most firms engaged in innovation activities. Many public R&D programmes targeted
at enterprises, both Federal and State, indirectly support a user-oriented view on innovation by
demanding a commercialisation plan, or at least a statement about the market potential of new
products or processes that may result from R&D and innovation projects. This usually involves
evaluating new technologies with regards to market requirements and user acceptance. Conducting
such an evaluation early in an R&D project is likely to ensure user demand is incorporated in the
project design. Most of the thematic R&D programmes provide examples for such an approach.

In a more direct way, the Federal government has frequently attempted to involve users actively in
technology development. In the early 2000s, the BMBF’s “lead projects” initiative (implemented as
part of the thematic R&D programmes) supported networks of producers and users in seven
technology areas found to be particularly interesting for user-producer interaction, including transport,
health and environmental technologies. Following this tradition, the High-tech Strategy also stressed
the role of bringing together users and technology producers in each of the 17 key technology areas
identified in the Strategy. In this context, the BioPharma programme (part of the Federal government’s
activities to support biotechnology) may be regarded as a typical example. The main goal of this
programme (which is part of the thematic biotechnology R&D programme) is to link different actors
such as researchers, hospitals, biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies, agencies and health
insurers along the supply chain in order to develop and commercialise new biopharmaceuticals. Co-
operation between the different partners is expected to lead to strategic optimisation, accelerated
innovation processes and less failure of new biopharmaceuticals in approval and market introduction
stages. BioPharma is among the few technology programmes that consider the whole value-added
chain from basic research and clinical testing to production, approval and market launch. BioPharma
is a competitive programme under which consortia, led by a company, are invited to submit concepts
for how to interlink the various actors and stages to deliver commercially successful
biopharmaceutical innovations. Public support is provided only to those consortia that present the
most promising concepts. The BioPharma programme consists of two stages: At the first stage, the
creation of concepts is promoted, and on the second, a steering committee selects the most
promising concepts, based on a list of eligibility criteria, each of which receives a significant amount of

38
public funding. A considerable share of private funds is expected (over 50%). The concepts must
contain a business plan, which must include statements on the following topics:
• Technology platform: Quality and implementation
• Pipeline of the resulting products
• Patent basis and know-how in processes; protection of intellectual property
• New products and their application; regulative framework
• Potential: Application of the results, relevant market segment and volume, chances of refund,
potential market shares
• Partners: Description, competences, roles
• Personnel: Project leaders, personnel development, management
• Plan: Continuous evaluation of practicability, proofs of concept, of technology, of market; clinical
studies, health technology assessment; internal monitoring; milestones and timetable;
documentation of progress; finance plan
• Productivity: Quality management, production and commercialisation
• Perspective: Business models

A special type of user-driven innovation is public procurement that aims at generating demand for
certain new technologies. Public procurement is particularly important in areas where technologies
are developed for use in public services such as security, health or education. The German Federal
Government recognises the role of public procurement for generating innovation demand, and it is
mentioned as an important instrument in the High-tech Strategy. It is difficult to evaluate the role of
public demand for generating successful innovation, however. A very recent paper shows that state
demand can have positive effects on innovation success for certain types of firms in certain sectors48.

In Greece, creativity is mostly promoted in the business sector through various types of awards (on
entrepreneurship, export performance, RTD spending etc). A process for promoting excellence in
entrepreneurship through the Operational Programme for Competitiveness ending in 2008 was
concluded at the end of June 2008: the competent Minister of Development and the President of the
Parliament (former Minister of Development) praised three companies for their excellence in
entrepreneurship and gave distinctions to five others.

A process to grant awards to patent applicants for 2006 by the Greek Patent Office is still pending. A
more detailed description of the situation in this area is found in the TrendChart annual report 2008 for
Greece. For the most part, creativity is debated in the primary education area and in the field of
cultural policies and intellectual property protection (authors’ rights).

Employee-driven innovation is regulated by the legal framework on patents that provides for sharing
the benefits of inventions between the employer and the employee when the invention of the latter is
not foreseen in his contractual obligations. In the universities and public research centres, the
interpretation of the law elaborated by the academics considers the researchers’ inventions as “free”
and therefore belonging to them. In general, public researchers and academics are more or less free
to exploit their ideas and benefit from this exploitation entirely.

Customer-driven innovation, as a policy concept, has acquired high importance in economies where
large and very large enterprises, organised as “mechanistic bureaucracies”, dominate the market and
may benefit from the innovativeness of their smaller and more flexible customers and suppliers to
enhance their own innovativeness. In Greece, there are no such conditions. The SMEs for the most
part are in close contact with customers and suppliers and whatever new ideas that emerge from the
needs of each party are discussed in informal ways and put into practice, if adopted. Public policies, in
48
Aschhoff, B., W. Sofka (2008), Innovation on Demand - Can Public Procurement Drive Market
Success of Innovations?, ZEW Discussion Paper , Mannheim (will be published in July 2008)

39
order to reinforce this cooperation process, tend to promote “clustering”. These measures are
demonstrating differentiated success in the traditional industries [GR_58] and in modern sectors
[GR_65], the latter being much more inclined to clustering.

Current innovation policy measures in Hungary do not explicitly address questions of creativity and
user-driven innovation. Major innovation (or other) policy documents do not devote attention to the
issue of creativity. There are a few measures targeted at the “creative industries”, but with some
elements that might be considered as relevant for creative activities in other sectors, too. One such
measure is to be launched under the aegis of the Central Hungary Operational Programme (co-
financed by the EU Structural Funds), entitled “Infrastructure and service development of business-
development organisations”, sub-scheme 3/C: “Development of the creative economy”. Among its
objectives, “the exploitation, dissemination and adaptation of creative developments” and “supporting
the integrated research of talents in creative industries” is mentioned. It is intended that, as part of the
focus of the Economic Development Operational Programme on innovation clusters, schemes will be
launched to foster so-called creative clusters, but the details of these initiatives are not known yet.

The only relevant national programme operated in Ireland, is the Innovation Capability Building 2008,
funded by Enterprise Ireland, and which operates in seven chosen sectors including: Construction;
Seafood; Business process outsourcing; Time (Telecoms, Information, Media, Entertainment);
Functional foods; Orthopaedics sub-supply; and Environmental goods and services. In each sector, a
consultant will work with a group of approximately 8-10 companies. The aim is to help these
companies understand the key technology and demand drivers of the industry sectors in which they
compete and enable them to develop innovative solutions in response to identified customer needs.
The key elements of each initiative are: providing companies with an in-depth analysis of relevant key
market and technology drivers; one-to-one in-house training to enable them to develop market led
solutions based on the analysis above; an overseas visit and one day innovation development
workshop with an international expert in the relevant sector.

As an example at the regional level, located in Kilkenny (Southwest of Dublin) and associated with the
Kilkenny County Enterprise Board is the Irish Centre for Structured Creative Thinking (NC4C), which
promotes demand for, and develops programmes to deliver, structured creative thinking techniques
into both the private and public sector. Last Spring/Summer, NC4C in association with Kilkenny
County Enterprise Board held a series of pilot workshops for a group of owner/managers. Now it
supports a network of interested entrepreneurs. In addition, NC4C will cover topics such as
technology tools for structured creative thinking; the creative and innovation attitude; and scenario
and foresight planning. Creative thinking is also beginning to be provided in some HE institutions.

Creativity has become the “buzz” word among the Italian innovation community as well as in public
debates and events. Even the head of the state, Mr. Napolitano, in the closing speech for the year
2007 highlighted that in this period the recent success of Italian exports lays in the culture of Italian
creativity, which is a value of paramount importance and which, at the same time deserves more
attention. In spite of this, there is no specific policy to support creativity. However, there are some
interesting initiatives at national and regional level:
 At the beginning of 2008, the public administration commissioned a White Book on Creativity to
give indications for policymaking. The White Book should (i) analyse the state-of-the-art in several
sectors from fashion, contemporary art to IT, (ii) report international good practices and (iii)
propose concrete solutions to further stimulate creativity in the country.
 A regional measure of support to creative and innovative enterprises has been launched by the
Chamber of Commerce of Milan, the Chamber of Commerce of Monza and Brianza and the
Province of Milano, with €1.5 million for the establishment and development of new innovative

40
 and creative SMEs in several sectors (R&D, Energy, Publishing, Radio &TV, cinema, music,
design & architecture, Fashion, Art, games &videogames).
 The Tuscany region has organised the Creativity Festival over three years: 2006, 2007 and 2008.
 Another interesting initiative, “Scena creativa: un progetto per Milano”- Creative Scene: a project
for the city of Milan was promoted by Assolombarda (a business association, part of
Confindustria) in 2004 to promote the city as a vibrant engine of creativity and innovation and to
get the attention of institutional, cultural, and economic leaders. The association commissioned
research from Università Bocconi following the framework described by Richard Florida in his
book The Rise of the Creative Class”. Assolombarda chose Florida’s approach for two main
reasons: to identify a creative class and to develop a statistical model to analyze the factors which
push the creative class to move to an urban context. The results showed that Milano had the
highest rates for technology and for most of the indicators but its creative workforce ranked only
as the fourth creative workforce of the Italian cities. Considering these results, the authors of
Assolombarda research raised the following question: how could Milano develop and attract more
creative people? Their recommendations were to create an urban context of systematic creativity,
following three steps: 1. Work on excellent individual creativity in order for successful creative
firms to identify themselves with the city and recognize being in Milano as essential for their
success. Encourage competition and cooperation among the excellent creative actors following
the model called “co-opetition”; 2. Work on creating connections between the excellent (firms and
individuals with a worldwide recognize creative leadership) and the average (firms and individuals
working in the creative sector with just a local outcome); 3. Work on the group of creative
professionals to create community, characterized by mutual incentives and supports. However, it
is unclear from these recommendations as to the role of public institutions in the development of
this networking effort, i.e., whether public institutions should be involved and if so, how. The
research had a follow-up involving the organization of conferences and workshops. These
activities showed the vitality of the project and the strategies developed to spread its results:
public education, raising awareness of the actual situation to the entrepreneurial world, and
mobilization, pushing towards action through the recommendations.
 Finally, the theme of creativity has been dealt with in the different sessions of the Forum of the
Public Administration held in Rome in May 12-15 2008. In addition, a survey on innovation and
creativity has been carried out by the PA Forum and Ipsos with the objective to uncover the
opinions of young people regarding the concepts of creativity and innovation.

The first major emphasis on the development of creativity at a national policy level in Latvia can be
traced to the National Development Plan of Latvia for 2007-2013. This sets the aim for Latvia, within
seven years, to achieve an economic growth and technological excellence based on educated and
creative individuals, technological excellence of companies and developed science and research. One
of the six expert groups at the National Development Council overseeing the implementation of the
plan and drafting respective policy recommendations is specifically devoted to the subject of educated
and creative individuals (including life-long learning for increasing a person’s creative potential). A
special public forum, addressing the related issues of human resource development, including
creativity as the driving force of employment and entrepreneurship, was also organised by the public
policy centre Providus in September 2006.

The National Development Plan also makes explicit reference to the development of the creative
industries under the subject area of technological excellence and flexibility of companies with an
underlying aim of effectively employing Latvia’s creative and cultural environment resources,
increasing the work efficiency of existing creative sectors and expanding and diversifying the
economic activities of creative individuals. References to the potential of creative industries have also
been made in the National Lisbon Programme of Latvia for 2005-2008, the declarations of the
intended activities of the two last cabinets of ministers (November 2006, December 2007), the

41
Cultural Policy Guidelines for 2006-2015 as well as the medium-term budget priorities for 2008-2010.
At the beginning of 2008, the development of creative industries was also defined among the urgent
tasks of the current Cabinet of Ministers with an aim of elaborating a relevant support policy by mid-
2008. A task force for the elaboration of policy guidelines on the creative industries has been set up.
Several seminars and conferences have been organised since 2005, with the aim of promoting the
understanding of the contribution to the national economy made by creativity and the role of creative
industries in economic growth, as well as facilitating the synergies between creativity and
entrepreneurship.

An additional trend at the national policy level is related to the elaboration of the Sustainable
Development Strategy of Latvia until 2030, which emphases the promotion of creativity, especially in
the field of education in order to facilitate the tieback between creativity and innovative
entrepreneurship. The respective strategic dilemma, and discussed in public fora, has been
formulated as a choice between education directed towards generic creativity and innovative thinking
or specialised education aimed at the acquisition of specific knowledge, with the latter model used as
an illustration of the current system of education in Latvia. Currently, innovation in the field of
pedagogy is promoted via the Educational Innovation Fund with calls for proposals which aim to
facilitate the introduction of modern and creative ideas in the field of education and promote the
development of the creative potential of education.

Finally, together with a nationally defined policy with the aim of promoting innovation-related creativity
among the population of Latvia, there is also a range of additional stand-alone initiatives that could be
assigned to this concept. For instance, since 2007, an annual science and technology day “Robotics”
has been organised for schoolchildren and enthusiasts of technical creativity. This display of
engineering, technological and scientific achievements, supported by the Centre of Future education,
Riga Technical University and the Ministry of Education and Science, aims at popularising technical
sciences and provoking the interest of schoolchildren in this field. Among other things it includes a
robotics competition and workshops of technical creativity. A similar, but more long-standing initiative
of this kind is represented by the so-called stations of young technicians, which attracts many
schoolchildren.

At the same time, however, there is almost no reference to and support for user-driven/centred
innovation in general, which remains a rather underdeveloped area and an unfamiliar concept in
Latvia, at both the company and, even more so, at the policy level.

Maltese policy documents discuss creativity and innovation mainly within the context of education and
pedagogical systems, as a means of instilling a culture of entrepreneurship and risk-taking and thus
stimulating enhanced R&I activity (for example, the National Strategic Plan for R&I). More recently
(and as mentioned in Section 1), creativity and innovation are considered pivotal in promoting the
competitiveness of the culture industry (Pre-Budget Document 2008).

Specific initiatives include a Master of Arts Degree in Creativity & Innovation managed by the Edward
de Bono Institute for Design & Development of Thinking at the University of Malta. This has been
running since 2005 and is increasingly attracting international collaboration e.g. the agreement
between the Basque Communications Group EITB and the University signed in April 2008, awards
scholarships to Basque students to attend the Masters degree in Malta. The course includes a study
module on foresight. A new Bachelor of Science Degree in ICT course was launched at the University
in 2007. This includes Creativity, Innovation and Entrepreneurship as one of the subsidiary subjects.
In addition, various training initiatives on creativity and innovation are organised by Malta Enterprise
(e.g. mentoring services in Innovation Management Techniques) and by the private sector.

42
The concept of customer/user-driven innovation is still not well developed and there are no specific
initiatives to report, although this topic is mainly linked with the DesignMalta initiative discussed in
Section 1).

There are no specific policies and initiatives in support of creativity specifically as a source of
innovation in the Netherlands. Policies are aimed at stimulating the “creative sector”, not at
stimulating creativity. The same is largely true for policies and initiatives specifically in support of user-
driven innovation. Public-private partnership, however, is a requirement for most large innovation
programmes in the Netherlands. The idea is that users are involved in sharing the agenda. (The
“innovation paradox” is still an important rationale in innovation policy-making).

A broad notion of creativity is used in Poland, which extends beyond the idea of design.
Entrepreneurship has been a hot topic for some years and is now is being taught in secondary
education institutions (gymnasiums) as a part of the course, known as ‘Knowledge about the society’.
Entrepreneurship is also promoted by the programme, ‘Creator of Innovation’ (2007-2009), the
objective of which is to promote entrepreneurial skills in research institutions, higher education
institutions, academic entrepreneurship incubators, centres of technology transfer, technology parks,
science-industry consortia and other entities active in the promotion of science. The funding will be
used for different type of activities, e.g. establishing and developing systems of commercialisation of
new technologies, putting in place IP procedures, organising workshops for students and academics
staff as well as the purchase of equipment. In 2007, 24 projects were recommended for financing for a
total value of almost €2.5 million. During the period 2008-2011, the foreseen budget is estimated at
slightly more than €7million at current prices. More recently, a new portal ‘Invent Tree’
(https://www.inventree.pl) was launched with the support of the Ministry of Science and Higher
Education. The initial idea is quite simple, notably aspiring entrepreneurs pitch their business ideas to
the potential investors, who in return for share in businesses offer help in developing and
commercialising new ideas.

The other Programme, known as ‘Academic Entrepreneurship Incubators’, was launched in 2004 by
the Ministry of Economy to support the establishment of incubators in higher education institutions. It
is expected that the programme will create favourable conditions to business development, precisely
because it will offer opportunities to create new and attractive jobs for graduates, students and
academic staff of higher education institutions. In 2007, 23 projects obtained funding for a total
amount of about €88,600. The Programme of Academic Entrepreneurship Incubators will be
supported by the OP-IE, as the key indicative project. The total budget of the programme during the
2007-2013 is estimated at €7 million. To promote the creation of novel products and technologies, a
special competition, known as the ‘Polish Product of the Future’ was initiated in 1996
(http://www.ppp.pi.gov.pl). It covers two categories, notably products and technologies of the future.
The award winners gain the opportunity to use the emblem of the competition and participate in
various fairs organised by the PAED. Also, presentations about the new products and technologies
are included in a number of publications and presented by the PAED during various conferences and
seminars devoted to innovation. In the same year, the National System of Services (known as KSU)
was launched to support the development of SMEs by providing high-level business advisory services
and later some organisations obtained accreditation of National System of Innovation (known as KSI).
In 2006, the KSU network provided advice to 173,000 clients, i.e. roughly 1,000 clients per
organisation.

At the regional level, interesting trends are taking place as well. For example, in 2007, the region of
Wielkopolska launched a regional competition, known as ‘i- Wielkopolska’ to select the most
innovative invention and innovative micro-enterprise. In the same year, the City Council of Łódź in
cooperation with regional science and technology parks initiated the competition, known as ‘Leader of

43
New Technologies’. More recently, (beginning of June 2008) Poland’s capital region of Mazowieckie
launched the competition, known as ‘Innovator of Mazowieckie’, the aim of which is to select young
innovative companies and innovative scientists.

The emerging finding is that policies in support of design and entrepreneurship are relatively new
initiatives. The OP-IE will play a major role in supporting SMEs with concrete policy measures. It is
for the first time the importance of creativity and innovation has been recognised. This partly explains
why there are still no projects on user-driven innovation

There are several initiatives to promote creativity in Portugal; most have been concerned with the
development of the creative industries. An interesting action has been launched by the Serralves
Foundation and IAPMEI, to set up an incubator for creative industries. In some instances, the
involvement in Living Labs programmes has also encouraged the development of creative initiatives.
Several actions were undertaken with regard to ‘Creative Cities’, aimed at developing urban creative
areas. The ARDU programme, on the revitalisation of urban areas, also includes a strand regarding
the development of creative industries. Also of note is INOV_ART, a programme under the
Technological Plan, which, over the next 3 years, aims to grant 200 internships in reputed
organisations abroad to young artists and executives working in the artistic sectors. However, in
contrast there appear to be no initiatives specifically in support of employee-driven innovation.

Creativity, specifically as a source of innovation, and user-driven innovation are not explicitly
addressed in the existing RDI policies and initiatives of Romania.

There is no special programme and/or policy measure aimed at the support of creativity and
innovation in Slovakia, although one policy approach may support creativity and innovation indirectly:

An existing policy measure (SK 13) makes reference to the support of exploitation and protection of
intellectual property rights and the introduction of industrial designs aimed at increasing
competitiveness levels of enterprises. The 2008 Innovation Policy suggested 13 new policy measures,
six of which were implemented in 2008. There are seven proposed policy measures, which have no
financial background yet. Two of these may provide significant support to development of creativity
and innovation: (a) The ‘Innovation of the Year’ prize, to be awarded in three categories: product,
service and ecological achievement; (b) The ‘Protection of Intellectual Property Rights’ measure
should include activities aimed at support for creativity and innovations.

In the Slovenian context, creativity is understood as an element of innovation awareness-raising,

where as a policy focus to raise awareness the need to stimulate creativity as such has been
stressed. A good example of this is the SLORITTS project (2004), where a special working group on
raising innovation awareness drew attention to the need to promote creativity and innovativeness
among the young as one of the first steps towards raising the innovation culture. This idea can be
found in the formation of the Centre for student entrepreneurship, innovation and creativity at the
Faculty of Economics, University of Ljubljana as well as in some of the initiatives of Maribor University
such as the incubator ‘Factory of Ideas’. Individual companies, especially those that are more
innovation-active, have internal competitions supporting employee-driven creativity. One such good
practice example is the company Trimo, which has an annual contest on the craziest/most creative
idea from the employee. However, these activities are not part of national or regional policies and,
apart from a financially very modest and somewhat sporadic government financing of the project
“Innovation for Youth“, no other measure focusing on creativity can be currently found in Slovenia.

In Spain, there is no evidence about the existence of national or regional policies in support of
creativity and only a few examples of initiatives oriented to promoting creativity can be found. One of

44
these initiatives is the strategy of the city of San Sebastian (Guipúzcoa, Basque Country). The
purpose of this strategy is to make San Sebastian an international creativity and innovation hub for a
wide range of disciplines (e.g. art, new technologies and health). Public participation plays an
essential role in the strategy as inhabitants are asked to propose creativity measures and evaluate
creativity policy options. Another example is that of the Foundation for the Diversification of Navarra
(FND). This foundation aims to encourage an innovative culture in Navarra. Four different
programmes have so far been proposed. One of these the ‘Innovarium Programme’, which includes a
set of activities to enhance creativity amongst the population.

The concept of creativity has long been highlighted in Sweden as well as elsewhere in the OECD.
The work of the American researcher, Richard Florida, been particularly influential and his theories
about soft values such as tolerance, openness, equality and social welfare fit the Swedish context well
although, currently there are no explicit policy papers on creativity and innovation at the national level
in Sweden. It is, however, fair to say that policy areas, such as industry, education, culture etc. often
include measures to support the topic. This means that instruments to spur entrepreneurship, IPR and
processes for renewal as well as targeted support to SMEs occasionally stress “creativity” in their
rationale.49 At the moment, VINNOVA has some pilot projects to involve users in the innovation
process. One initiative, “Living labs”, is a concept where real life environments are used as test beds
to improve the ability of Swedish companies and organisations to develop competitive, IT-based
services or products in co-operation with users. VINNOVA has embraced the Living labs concept and
underlined its importance as an arena for innovation and a way to develop the concept of user-driven
innovation. The budget for the pilot initiative is approximately €1.1 million (SEK 10 million) and the
programme issued its first call for proposal in April 2007. So far, five Living labs have received funding
of around €160,000 (SEK 1.5 million), meaning that the total budget including co-funding, is some
€360,000 (SEK 3.4 million).

The idea of creativity is considered by the Government of the United Kingdom as one of the critical
determinants of the country’s prosperity. For example, in December 2005, the Cox Review of
Creativity in Business enquired into how to enhance business productivity by drawing on British
creative capabilities. The review included the findings of consultations with the creative industries,
businesses in a range of other sectors, education institutions and regional and devolved bodies, as
well as international contacts and other organisations. The Review called for actions to raise the
profile of creativity for innovation and for using public procurement in order to stimulate greater
creativity in UK businesses including SMEs. Meanwhile, the Gowers Review on Intellectual Property
(December, 2006), argued that the Intellectual Property (IP) system provides an essential framework
both to promote and protect the innovation and creativity of industry and artists.

The Creative Industry has also been at the centre of the policy debate and is regarded as a sector
that contributes heavily to the innovativeness of the UK (78% of the companies in the creative industry
sector are innovators) and has a great potential to continue to innovate. The recent paper “Creative
Britain”50 sets out the Government’s strategy for the creative industry aiming at removing barriers to
innovation and exploiting innovation potentials from developing and introducing new technology.
Likewise, the recent UK innovation White Paper, Innovation Nation (March 2008)51 argues in favour of
including in the Innovation Strategy produced by the OECD broader international frameworks to
incorporate creativity and design, the role of users and innovation in public services. The rationale is
that, in addition to the scientific and technical skills traditionally associated with innovation in
manufacturing and services, a successful innovative knowledge-based economy should capitalise on

49
These types of support are mainly financed by governmental agencies such as Almi and VINNOVA.
50
http://www.culture.gov.uk/reference_library/publications/3572.aspx
51
http://www.dius.gov.uk/docs/home/ScienceInnovation.pdf

45
advanced management skills, creativity skills and other softer skills in order to support open
innovation practices.

3.2 Developments in other ‘European’ countries

Croatia has no consistent or comprehensive national or regional policies in these areas. In the past,
some regional development agencies have organised occasional workshops for entrepreneurs in
order to support creativity in enterprises. More recently, a Network for Development and Creativity has
been founded by several experts in order to facilitate and award creativity in different sectors. This is a
civil sector initiative, but it has generated support from several National Competitiveness Council
members.

The focus in Iceland is on the creative sector, rather than creativity. Special incentives are granted for
film and television production, if certain requirements are met. Legislation allows companies in certain
sectors to set up International Trading Companies (ITCs), which pay only 5% corporate income tax
and no net-worth tax or stamp duty on documents related to their general business activities. As
exporters, companies of this type also qualify for a refund of all VAT paid in Iceland. Film producers
can benefit by having an ITC acquire their distribution rights and/or copyrights. The increasing
emphasis put on the creative sectors in Iceland, is a step towards attempts to further develop new
industries that could partly compensate for the loss of traditional economic activities. Similar efforts
are being made in rural tourism and local food.

There are no measures that specifically target creativity reported for Israel. In many ways, it is taken
for granted that projects that win support from the Office of the Chief Scientist must be creative. There
are a large number of Israeli web 2.0 firms that are based on user driven creativity. However, these
firms usually do not ask for government support, and would be unlikely to get such support if they did
as they would not be considered truly innovative.

Over the last five years, there has been a growing interest and awareness amongst policymakers in
Norway that it is important to foster individuals’ creative and innovative abilities for the future
economic growth and value creation in the country. Policies in support of the creative industries and
competitiveness policies are, therefore, being increasingly interlinked. Measures to stimulate creativity
and entrepreneurship include:
 Start Norway is a student organisation that aims to promote an entrepreneurial mindset in
students. Start Norway is the largest organisation of this kind in Norway and is recognised by the
government as an important initiative to establish the leading business of tomorrow. Every year
Start Norway organises Norway’s largest business plan competition, Venture Cup.
 The Norwegian Entrepreneurship Programme (Gründerskolen) established by the University of
Oslo in 1999, teaches students basic skills related to founding a company.
 Industry-oriented user-driven research programmes are consolidated into a general Programme
for User-driven Research-based Innovation (Norwegian title: Brukerstyrt innovasjonsarena).

Creativity and innovation are increasingly considered in tandem by government agencies. Since 2007
Innovation Norway has made the Culture and the Experience Industries one of its priority areas. The
initiative primarily targets SMEs, entrepreneurs with ambitions to grow, networks and clusters. A
precondition is that the project has a clear commercial intention.

At a regional level, several activities are taking place to enhance creative and innovative skills. There
is a strong commitment to culture and creativity as central to local and regional competitiveness and
innovation. Local policymakers see the potential of integrating culture and industrial policy in their

46
regional development strategies. One region that has in particular made creativity and innovation a
slogan for the development of the region is Trøndelag (Trøndelag Creative Region).

There are also no specific initiatives on creativity or user-driven innovation reported for Switzerland.
However, as noted in Section 2.2, the KTI/CTI (the country’s most important innovation promotion
agency) follows a bottom-up approach. Thus, all types of innovation activities and all sectors are
eligible for promotion.

As already noted in Section 2.2, policies in support of design and creativity are not yet seen as a part
of innovation policy in Turkey although there have been academic studies and initiatives by several
non-governmental organisations highlighting the need for supporting creativity and innovation. As
creativity is not dealt with a part of innovation policy there have not been any explicit innovation policy
measures introduced, apart from the support provided for the registration of industrial designs by
SMEs. The measure is implemented by KOSGEB under the ‘Industrial Property Rights Support’ (TR
9). One notable effort to stimulate innovation and creativity on a sectoral basis is the award organised
since 1999 by the ‘Turkish Association of Electronics and Information Industries’ (TESID). TESID’s
“Innovation and Creativity Award’ is organised annually as a prestigious award for companies in the
electronics and ICT sector.

3.3 Developments outside Europe

There are no specific policies or initiatives to support creativity or user-driven innovation reported in
Brazil.

A similar situation exists in Canada, where, as is the case for design, creativity is considered as an
element of innovation, but is usually not considered separately. Customer driven innovation is usually
a factor in business led innovation, rather than included explicitly in public policies. Unfortunately,
public policies are usually driven from top down rather than responding to customer or client input.

China has become aware of the importance of fostering creativity and user-oriented innovation in the
global knowledge-based economy. In the 11th Five-Year Plan Guideline, the central government
expressed its determination to develop the creative industries, while at the regional and municipal
levels a set of policies and initiatives were released in support of creative activities.

One example is Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (SAR), which initiated the Reinventing with
Design Programme. The three primary themes of this week-long programme are Service Design,
Hospitality & Experience Design and User-Centred Innovation & Management. In June 2008, the
Hong Kong Design Centre organized a special seminar to promote the application of a user-centred
approach to innovation. “Creative industries” were taken as the new pillar industries on which Hong
Kong will focus to rejuvenate its economy.

Developments have also taken place across mainland China. In Beijing, the Chaoyang District
Government inaugurated a joint project with the American Chamber of Commerce called the
"Chaoyang Model Anti-Copyright Infringement and Piracy-Free Zone" in 2006. The 2007 Shanghai
International Creative Industry Exhibition was jointly organized by the Shanghai Creative Industry
Association and the World Expo Group Shanghai International Exhibition Co. Ltd to build connections
in the creative industry value chain.

The mass media industry is China’s first sector to experiment with creative training programmes. In
2005, the Shanghai Media Group (SMG) and Hunan Broadcasting System sent their senior
executives and producers to the UK for intensive training on creativity and innovation. In addition to

47
the staff creativity training programme, research and activities were established to foster creativity
among college students. The Ministry of Education (MOE) has launched a three-year research project
on China’s strategy towards the creative industries. It also initiated the Freescale Cup National Smart
Car University Design Competition to explore college students’ creativity. Many engineering students
from leading Chinese universities took part in this design competition. In April 2008, the China Higher
Education Society launched a training programme called Developing Creativity and set up training
bases in Chinese colleges and universities.

In India, policies and initiatives in support of creativity as a source of innovation exist mostly at the
Federal level. Awards given for science and technology advancement and innovation are considered
as an important medium for unleashing creativity. For example, the Council of Science and Industrial
Research’s Diamond Jubilee Technology Award and the Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar Award are two
important national awards for motivating creativity and innovation. There are about ten technology and
innovation awards given by different government departments and industrial associations in sectors
such as electronics, banking, automotive, ICT, etc.

India’s leading national Software Association (NASSCOM) considers its Annual Survey on IT usage
and IT User Awards across the board (from banking, hospitality, travel, petrochemical and fertiliser,
business, manufacturing etc) as important sources of innovation. Similarly, the National Innovation
Foundation has instituted Technology Awards for grass-root innovations.

For students from class VIII to XII, there are annual National Talent exams for mathematics, science,
computer software and analytical skills, which are seen as an important source of creativity and
innovation among young students. The Homi Bhabha Centre for Science Communication (HBCSC),
Mumbai, is the nodal agency for conducting national level Olympiad programmes in physics,
chemistry, maths, biology and astronomy.

From the perspective of Richard Florida’s (2005), ‘Cities and Creative Class’, two Indian cities are
notable. Bangalore, which is known as India’s ‘silicon valley’ and Bombay known for ‘Bollywood’ –
India’s film and Television industry cluster. Bombay and Bangalore are emerging as cosmopolitan
hubs for entertainment and knowledge, which provide the enabling ecology for creativity and
innovation in a number of ways.

Various initiatives are reported at both the national and regional levels in Japan. The former Prime
Minister Shinzo Abe (2006-7) sought to promote a “Cool Japan” policy with the promotion of Japanese
goods and culture. A policy strategy document for Japan’s cultural industries was published in May
2007. This document observed the popularity of Japanese anime, manga, game software, and other
pop culture products, but also recognised the appeal of fashion, foods, health, manufactured products
and services. The document sought to bolster these industries, promote them to overseas consumers
and strengthen Japan’s role in the world. The strategy outlined measures relating to greater emphasis
on creativity in the education system, greater international exchange, promotion of Japan’s traditional
culture overseas, and other related measures. There were also proposed changes to the business
support scheme for the Japanese contents industry, which has also featured in other policy papers.
This initiative has largely gone quiet since the change of Prime Minister in autumn 2007.

However, it is acknowledged, for instance in cultural industries promotion documents, that there is a
limited role for government policy in this area, where individual personality and character are of such
importance. Other policies relating to the contents industry exist; these have mainly been in relation to
intellectual property initiatives. Here the protection of IP rather than the stimulation of creativity has
gained priority, yet there have also been initiatives to promote the contents sector through the Japan
International Contents Festival. At one level, the cultural industry promotion strategy viewed policy in

48
this area as a means of generating “soft power” for Japan in terms of cultural appeal, and generating
a stronger interest in Japan. At another level, the policies in this area are more practical and relate to
the expansion of markets, helping firms expand and introduce Japanese products to new markets.

Various regional initiatives are also in place or are emerging. Two examples are:
 Yokohama has initiated a Creative City Yokohama plan in 2006. The objective of this initiative is
to develop a cluster of creative industries including the design, film, new media, music and
software industries. Some subsidies are provided for firms to relocate or establish establishments
in Yokohama, to artists, as well as event organisers.
 Fukuoka Creative Cluster is an initiative in place and comprises a ten year strategy built around
reviewing current policies with a view to promoting a creative Fukuoka. The types of areas relate
not only to music, contents and design, but also to Fukuoka’s traditional culture and artistic
heritage.

In the United States, most of the emphasis on initiatives associated with creativity is at the level of
the city rather than the nation or states. There are national agencies that play an important role in
encouraging and protecting creativity in the US. For example, intellectual property regulations and
laws are administered by the USPTO. The American Inventors Protection Act (AIPA) passed in 1999
(amended in 2002) was one of the most significant pieces of patent reform legislation in the US,
particularly in its provision for increased intellectual property protection in other countries of US
inventions, software, music, movies and the like. Intellectual property reform legislation nevertheless
continues to be raised to protect creativity, for example the Design Piracy Prohibition Act introduced in
2007 to provide copyright protection to fashion designs from low price copies; this proposed act raised
controversy and has not proceeded through further legislative channels. Another example, is the
National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), a federal government agency created in 1965 to fund and
support cultural activities in music, art, design, literature, media arts, theatre, and dance in the US.
NEA offers grant funding through competitive application, bestows awards such as the National Medal
of Arts, and confers fellowships to pursue the arts and to recognize lifetime achievements.

Richard Florida’s Cities and the Creative Class (Routledge, New York, 2005) has stimulated
programmes and activities within cities to attract and retain “the creative class.” Many of these
programmes are targeted at younger residents and artists. These programmes often focus on
enhanced quality of life through multi-use living arrangements (such as the Arts Business Ecosystem
in Tahoma) or through new amenities such as Louisville Kentucky’s Extreme Park. These initiatives
usually fall under the rubric of cultural or residential development policies rather than industrial
policies. More often than not, they are justified in terms of their ability to advance regional economic
development.

49
4 Evidence for success and failure
Building from the answers provided to the previous two sections, this Section focuses on the evidence
for the success or failure of existing policies and initiatives in support of design, creativity and user-
driven innovation.

Overall, there was limited evidence, with many countries noting that initiatives (where they existed)
were too young to be able to assess their results, although some examples were reported.

4.1 Evidence from Member States

In Austria, all promotions are typically evaluated internally while the programme is active and, after a
certain period, externally (i.e. both interim and ex-post). For instance, in 2006 the impulse programme
“creative industries” was evaluated. The assessment founded strengths in the programme’s PR
activities, general management, speed of decision-taking, etc., but problems were seen in unclear
criteria for obtaining funds, which also resulted in a lack of transparency in promotion decisions. This
problem seems to be immanent to the combined promotion of creativity on the one hand and rather
technical innovations on the other hand52.

Some evidence is available concerning the one-off innovation premium scheme operated at the
federal level in Belgium. At first sight, the behavioural additionality effect of the scheme seemed likely
to be limited since the innovation has to take place strictly within one calendar year and was not
announced sufficiently in advance to generate a prior awareness. In 2006, federal authorities awarded
innovation premiums for a total amount of €607,961. Some 62.5% of this amount went to Flemish
companies, 25% to companies in the Brussels region and 12.5% to Walloon firms. By the end of
October 2006, 587 applications had been registered, 95 of which came from SMEs. One employer in
1000 had made use of this premium by this date. Two-thirds of the approved projects concerned
processes and one-third products. The most highly represented sectors were electrical engineering,
metalworking industry, electronics, pharmaceuticals and chemicals. In the newspaper l'Echo
(04.04.2007, p.8), the minister of Economy stated: "the beneficiaries of this measure belong to the
different hierarchical levels of companies, which shows its contribution to the internal culture of
innovation”. The professional partners asked explicitly for a continuation of this measure for 2007-
2008, without any modification of its eligibility criteria.

In partnership with the Vlerick Leuven Gent Management School, the Flanders DC Knowledge Centre
was set up to conduct research into entrepreneurial creativity, innovation and international
entrepreneurship. The results range from macro-economic insights and policy advice to concrete tools
to help business organisations. In this context, for example, a Composite Index of the Creative
Economy was developed and tested on the DC regions.53

Creative industries is a fast growing sector in Flanders; since 1996 the number of workers in this
sector increased by 3% per year (compared to 0.6% of total employment) reaching 55,557 employees
in 2003 (1.36% of the Flemish Economy).54 The fashion industry is an example of these creative
industries with a strong tradition in Flanders; Flemish cities play a major role in the creative industries.

52
The evaluation is available in German on http://www.fteval.at/files/evstudien/creative.pdf
53
A Composite Index of the Creative Economy. With Application to Regional Best Practices, Harry P.
Bowen, Wim Moesen and Leo Sleuwaegen (Vlerick and KU Leuven), November 2006
54
Fashionate about creativity; Isabelle De Voldere, Tine Maenhout and Marion Debruyne, Flanders
DC research report, November 2007

50
In 2007, the Czech Republic’s DESIGN programme (see Section 2.1) supported 95 projects with the
total amount of € 400,000. The interest of SMEs for the support provided through the DESIGN
programme was outstanding. Therefore, it has been maintained and continues in its transformed form
mentioned above.

The most recent Danish design policy is still in the implementation phase and has not yet been
evaluated. Generally, the design policy area is comparatively small, and has never been viewed in the
same way as ‘traditional’ fields of innovation. The only comprehensive analysis of the design sector,
which includes an additional evaluation of the political framework conditions, was published in 2003.
This analysis does not cover the recent expansive growth in the design sector nor does it consider the
new political initiatives. However, the 2003 evaluation stated that there was an overall satisfaction with
the framework conditions in relation to international competitiveness among the design companies. A
large number of the enterprises were using the initiatives set up in the design policy, including
counselling and advisory activities performed by DDC – the Danish Design Centre. Furthermore, the
companies were satisfied with the potential access to qualified labour and relevant information. About
60% of the companies were satisfied with these overall framework conditions.

In March 2008, an evaluation of the design award event, INDEX, was conducted. The overall outcome
of the evaluation was positive and most of the stakeholder interviews characterised the event as
visionary, relevant and ambitious: the latter particularly as the award focuses on the utility of design
and the possible relationships to innovation in general.

In Finland, there seems to be a rather unanimous view that progress in the design field has been
positive since the mid-1990s, whereas it is too early to assess if the policies and initiatives drafted for
support of creativity and user-driven innovation have succeeded or failed.

As noted in the above sections, the concept of design not only became integrated in national
strategies for innovation policy, but policy formulations were successfully translated into concrete
actions. This is often not the case with strategy documents and official memorandums, despite the
good intentions of policy makers and stakeholders. According to Korvenmaa (2007), several factors
accounted for this success; a rapid upswing in the Finnish economy backed the national efforts, as did
changes in global markets, putting more stress on design as an important source of competitive
advantage. In addition, the significance of Nokia Corporation as a domestic role model cannot be
underestimated - Nokia is a highly design-intensive company. Korvenmaa (ibid.) assumes though,
that "the key importance for the realisation for the policy paper was the fact that it was realised by the
same people and institutions (design community together with its most vital partners) that wrote it" –
thus the process was bottom-up rather than top-down.

Recent policies supporting design were also favourably assessed in an analysis of how the Finnish
design and design system impacts the competitiveness of Finnish society and business. According to
the report, progress has been considerable since 2000 when the Design 2005! Programme was
launched. During the period, challenges were specified, business commitment was achieved,
designer skills were augmented, design education and research was reformed and information and
the promotion of design were focused. In conclusion, recent developments in the Finnish design field
are deemed to be positive.

In addition, the report foresees that there is a good chance that progress will continue and may even
accelerate in the near future. At the same time, it is acknowledged that that the continued progress of
design largely depends on developments taking place in the market, particularly in the corporate and
consulting fields and, in this sense, development is not deemed to be predictable or manageable.
Moreover, the authors emphasise that design-related education and research will need government

51
support and programmes in order to remain effective and able to adapt to the future challenges of fast
changing environments. Whilst Finland has already invested heavily in research to understand why
design works and how it should be applied, there is still much potential for continued research. The
report highlights that design research connects closely with Innovation and Creativity, all of which are
new frontiers. It is suggested that Finland should put more effort into cross-functional, user-centred
research, as exemplified by Living Labs and similar initiatives.55

A report prepared by a working group of the Ministry of Trade and Industry examines Finnish projects
related to business in the creative industries, implemented between 2000–2006. The report’s
objective is to direct funding to projects with the best potential for promoting business development in
the creative industries during the programme period 2007–2013. The number of projects undertaken
during the programme period was remarkably large and some achieved good results in inter-regional
networking. However, the ‘big picture’ at the national level remained obscure. The working group
concluded that, in the future, co-operation with the regions in the area of business development in the
creative industries will require improved nationwide coordination. The key areas proposed by the
report include the preparation of a national development strategy for the creative industries and the
development of the operating environment, firms’ growth, internationalisation and know-how.

Although no evaluations or evidences of successes or failures of relevant French policies/initiatives

have been carried out so far, an assessment of the call for projects “innovation-creativity and design”
will be undertaken mid-2008 with project coordinators, with the goal of exchanging best practices.

Existing Greek evaluations refer principally to the specific measure for the support of spin-out firms in
universities and public research centres (GR_39, see Section 2.1). The measure is composed of two
phases; the evaluation of the second phase was too summative, but demonstrated the positive role of
the subsidy in the creation of spin-out firms. The evaluation of the first phase, which aimed at bringing
new scientific and technical ideas into a market context, is still ongoing and the results are expected
soon.

A recent survey of the “National Observatory for SMEs” of the EOMMEX analysed the results of a
series of measures [GR_40, 46, 48, 52, etc.] in favour of entrepreneurship and concludes that (a) the
product quality and the market visibility of existing firms has been improved, (b) the penetration of
Internet use has been increased, (c) the sales and profits of the beneficiaries were enhanced;
employment was improved but mainly for low educational level workers (except for “go on line”);
impact on exports was “very limited”, and (d) most new firms are established in traditional industries,
mainly in personal services, car workshops, etc.

Evidence in Latvia comes mainly from a number of studies into design services. In 2004, a study
“Design for Latvia” looked at the structures and strategies for development and supply of design
services with the aim of improving and increasing the application of professional design in Latvian
companies. According to the study, which was carried out by a Danish company, there is a limited
supply of and demand for design in Latvia; there is a small number of professional designers and
design companies, inadequate education on the topic characterized by the lack of research and
business components and a limited understanding of the role of design in competitive business
development. Since then, no explicit evaluations of the domain have been undertaken.

There have also been several studies on the creative industries; one in 2005 examined the potential
and development of creative industries, looking at four cases including theatre, design, cultural
tourism and cinema together with cultural consumption. Another study in 2007 looked at the
55
Lindström M., Nyberg M., Ylä-Anttila P. (2006) Ei vain muodon vuoksi. Muotoilu on kilpailuetu.
Elinkeinoelämän Tutkimuslaitos ETLA: Sarja B 220.

52
contribution made by creative services, but as a basis for assessing the current state-of-the-art of the
sector and its performance in Latvia as an input for policy-making in this area.

Although, in common with many other countries, Poland reported that it is still to early too appraise
the measures in support of design and creativity, it was noted that the major weakness of the existing
initiatives is that there is lack of support for projects that focus on user-driven innovation.

Although there have been no specific evaluations on the Portuguese initiatives mentioned above,
there have been appraisals of the operation of ‘Dinamo’. These have been positive in a broad sense.

In Slovenia, most of the on-going activity in design is more closely connected to marketing and
advertising, since there are several small advertising firms who are active in their association and
organise an international competition. This “Golden Drum” is a competition for the most creative ideas
in advertising and covers Central and Eastern Europe. The event has been organised since 1996 and
is attracting increasing numbers of international participants56.

The contribution of design to the Spanish national economy is low; according to the Strategic Study
of Design of Spain, the turnover of the design sector in 2001 was €817 million, 0.12% of Spanish
GDP. The design sector is characterised by the following aspects:
 Lack of accurate data on the number of employees in design enterprises, the number of
designers, expenditure on design activities, and the number of freelance designers. A better
understanding of the design sector may be developed in 2009, when the National Classification of
Economic Activities (NACE) publishes the first report in this area.
 Acute fragmentation. It is estimated that there are 20,000 professional designers working in 4,000
enterprises57. Twelve percent of these enterprises work in product design, 30% in graphic design,
32% in interior design and 9% in fashion design. The rest of the enterprises (17%) are not
specialized. It is estimated that many designers work as freelancers and that each enterprise has
an average of five employees. In this context, it is difficult for companies to establish a
management team, to formulate action strategies in the medium- and long-term, and to export
products and services.
 Limited demand for design products. Enterprises, especially SMEs, mistrust professional
designers and it is generally considered that design work is not a contributor to effective business
management. In general terms, it has been claimed that design is not useful to enterprises.

The importance of design has increased among Swedish companies. Therefore, the absence of an
explicit policy is quite surprising – particularly since Sweden is relatively famous for its design.
Companies like IKEA (furniture) and H & M (clothes) have explicitly used innovative design (and
business models) as a means for competitiveness. They are now followed by start up design-based
companies like Odd molly, Acne, Nudie, etc. Even among more traditional manufacturing companies
like Volvo (automotive) and Ericsson (telecom), design is a critical part of their competitiveness.

The growing awareness of creativity and design among the business community can be seen in
various ways. One indication is the development of community trademarks and design. Between 2001
and 2006, the number of registered trademarks increased from about 108 per million population to
some 16458 trademarks. The number of registered industrial designs shows a similar development.
56
www.goldendrum.com
57
Given the unavailability of reliable assessments, the numbers considered here are orientative. The
data is derived from the Strategic Study of Design of Spain.
58
The development rate has been quite volatile during the relevant. The figures dropped sharply after
2001 following a peak (155 trademarks per million population) in 2000. However, the most recent data
(2006) indicates that the top level has been surpassed.

53
During the period 2003-2006, the level increased from some 112 designs per million population to
nearly 145 designs. In general, the evaluations tend to stress that more coordination between actors
is needed and that more attention should be given to design.

4.2 Other ‘European’ countries

No evaluation or other evidence was available for these countries.

4.3 Evidence from outside Europe

Although there have been, as yet, no full evaluations of either design or creativity policy/initiatives in
Brazil, some activities are of relevance. In the design area, in October 2002, the PBD organised an
important meeting in Brasília in which strategies were reassessed. Altogether, 37 institutions
representing the entire Brazilian design community took part in this encounter. A major outcome was
the drawing up of a set of strategic guidelines for the area – the “Caminhos do Design” (“The Paths of
Design”). The 2006 Brazilian Design and Innovation Biennal, organized by MDIC and the private
Competitive Brazil Movement (MBC), included the Competitive Brazil Design Forum and a meeting of
the PBD Strategic Planning Board. A new National Design Policy was validated and the PBD was
restructured. In addition, an agreement was signed between the Brazilian Association of Design Firms
(Abedesign) and the Brazil Agency Export and Investment Promotion Agency (Apex Brasil) to
promote Brazilian design abroad.

The impacts of China’s efforts in promoting creativity and user-oriented innovation are noticeable. At
the macro-level, according to The Creative Economy Report 2008 released by the United Nations,
China’s export of value-added creative goods (in the mainland alone) has reached a 19% share in the
global market and the exported values have surged from US$18.4 billion in 1996 to US$61.3 billion in
2005. In the same year, China (including the Hong Kong SAR) had export values that exceeded those
of Italy, the United States and Germany combined. China’s exports of design goods (including Hong
Kong SAR), are the most important element of the creative industry for its international trade. The
country accounts for more than 30% share of global design goods.

At the meso-level, some creative clusters and hubs are emerging: the Zhangjiang Culture and
Technology Creative Cluster, the Jockey Club Creative Arts Centre in Hong Kong SAR, and the
Beijing Daishanzi Art District (also called Factory 798) have become national creative centres for
talents, which are not only conducive to cultural communities but also attract huge investments
globally.

At the organizational level, Chinese institutions that focus on the cultivation of creativity have
outperformed their domestic counterparts. The Hunan Broadcasting System and SMG have benefited
from their intense creativity and innovation training programmes. Today, SMG is the second largest
broadcaster in China, while Hunan Broadcasting System has become China’s most influential
broadcaster at the regional level and has generated billons of yuan through organising entertainment
programmes. International events and large projects targeting design innovation have stimulated the
exchange of creative ideas and have made domestically famous Chinese brands better known and
accepted in overseas markets.

Despite the remarkable strides that China has made, the Chinese government still has a long way to
go to reach its promise of becoming an innovative nation by 2020. Like culture and heritage, design
innovation and creativity cannot be implemented overnight along with government initiatives and
international events. Patent infringement, piracy, illegal design copying and reverse engineering are
still rampant in China. This not only impedes technology transfer from international firms but also
dampens the enthusiasm of domestic Chinese firms in deciding to innovate. Without effective

54
protection of intellectual property rights and deep-rooted respect for innovators, the sustainable
nurture of creativity and innovation can only be empty rhetoric.

In terms of design issues, the role of the National Institute of Design has been quite visible in creating
an impact on the Indian high technology industry. The success of the institute has led to the creation
of four more such institutions in other regions of India. In terms of the national policy on design, it is
too early to comment on the success or failure of initiatives.

With regard to creativity and user-driven innovation, S&T awards and Science and Maths Olympiads
are recognised as quite successful in having a national impact. The success of Bombay and
Bangalore as knowledge hubs is evident in the growth of the film and entertainment industry and the
software industry, respectively.

While there have been no formal evaluations of design or creativity initiatives in the United States.
However, Richard Florida’s work has generated considerable attention and criticism. Some of the
critiques argue that his work rehashes long-standing urban planning concepts, does not prove
causality, promotes definitions of creativity that are overly broad, and holds an elitist concept of what
constitutes a creative class.

55
5 Rationale and opportunities for European-level support for design
The final question was:

“What could be done at a European level to support design as a tool for innovation?
What would be the rationale and added-value of European action (as opposed to
national or regional action, with recognition of the principles of subsidiarity and
proportionality)?

The results have not been aggregated into country-specific sets, as this adds little value to the
synthesis.

5.1 Suggestions for EU support for design

5.1.1 External support to Member States’ activities

The following were suggested options for EU action towards the Member States:

 The provision of a knowledge platform about state-of-the-art design solutions, organising

travelling exhibitions with awarded design solutions of Member (or perhaps participating)
countries. This already occurs with an award in Austria, which is shown in neighbouring countries
and which seems to be a great success (Adolf Loos Staatspreis Design).
 Wallonia is part of the INTERREG IIIa initiative Euregio Design Platform 59. One option might be to
support more research into the effects of design and the effectiveness of design policy.
 On a European level, policy in the area of design should support companies to better understand
its strategic contribution for increasing competitiveness. There is a need to improve awareness
and practice in product design. The ability to design excellent products is a fundamental source of
commercial success. In many small companies, however, effective product design practices are
not adopted. There are many empirical studies that capture good design issues, but these are
often inaccessible to industrialists. Good practices in the area should be presented. For example,
a Good Design Practice Programme could capture 'good design' practices in a form that would be
accessible to industrialists and have the potential to improve the performance of design in
industry.
 Given that design is linked to communication of identity (of an object, organisation, region, country
etc.), the subsidiarity principle is important. At the European level, two types of initiatives could be
useful. The first one is access to design in areas that are inadequately addressed by some
national or regional policies (e.g. linkages between design and competitiveness, user-driven
innovation). The second one is networking and sharing of best practice between entrepreneurs,
designers and mediating institutions (in line with Pro Inno initiatives).
 Design is an integral part of the innovation process as well as of the competitive advantage of the
enterprise and its products. It should be taken into account not only during the marketing phase
but already during product creation and even before the product is created. Nevertheless, the
general support of creativity and innovation is probably more useful than a focus on design only.
The European Commission should therefore continue in its efforts into promoting creativity and
entrepreneurial spirit at all age levels, but focusing mainly on children.
 From the perspective of Estonia, it appears that design has not been viewed as a single policy
area, but has rather been integrated into existing public programmes. Design is one element of
innovation and must also be taken into account in policy planning and implementation at the
national or EU level. Like R&D, design needs awareness raising; organising Design Awards, such

59
http://www.euregiodesignplatform.eu

56
 as the Best SME at a European level, could increase the awareness of this field and instigate
actions by the private or public sector at a national level.
 The EU could act in a number of ways, including:
- Promote EU-wide training on industrial and aesthetic design
- Reward best practices in design promotion at national and regional levels
- Coordinate / cluster specialised organisations and disseminate good practice
- Enhance the entrepreneurship of university graduates and, particularly, that of
researchers and PhD holders.
 The EU can play a facilitator/coordinator role by identifying and disseminating good practices.
 To setup an EU-programme in support of design and innovation (e.g. under the FP). The
advantage would be that European knowledge and expertise in this area would be leveraged and
generate more possibilities. Moreover, its recognition at the EU level could motivate more national
governments to pay greater attention to this important aspect of innovation.
 From an Indian perspective, design activity is generally considered very important for innovation
but unfortunately, it is not included as a metric or factor for measuring R&D by indicator regimes.
Thus, the EU should take a lead in the consideration of design as an important parameter of R&D
by manuals such as the Frascati.
 An option would be for the EU to sponsor, with national and regional development bodies, an
awareness campaign in the form of regional, national and European awards. The awards would
be based on the principle of commercial success, i.e., branding and design or re-branding and
design that yields significant profits and increased turnover. Categories could be by turnover and
industrial sector. The winners would gain significant publicity and the non-users would be more
inclined to use designers.
 Concrete actions and initiatives for cross-border cooperation at European scale could be
promoted, for example:
- the EU “capitals of design” could collaborate and set up pan-European Networks to foster
collaboration;
- a “made in Europe” brand of “European style or design” could be created;
- a European School of Design could be established created encompassing good practices
and relevant experiences already available in some of the EU countries;
- a European Award for Design could be launched on the basis, for example, of the
European Price launched through the INNO Action ADMIRE - Award for Design
Management Innovating and Reinforcing Enterprises, as an annual European Design
Management Award (EDMA) to promote good practices in Design Management
developed by European businesses; the award should address different sectors and
technology areas that may be relevant in terms of design innovation;
- formulate and launch favourable financial schemes for investments and innovation
initiatives related to design (e.g. voucher schemes, thematic priorities specifically focused
on design in the CIP workplan, launch of support actions addressing the theme of design,
establish favourable regulation for design/model protection).
 Design is clearly an area that has long been valued by Japanese policy makers, dating back to
the late 1960s. Design continues to be of importance and a number of organisations are involved
in its stimulation and diffusion. In the Japanese case, the government has given responsibility to a
special organisation involved in the promotion of the design industry. This organisation provides
prizes, performs awareness-raising activities and promotes human resource development; it
provides little in the way of policy. Regions and regional organisations for central government
have developed their own promotion policies, which include incubation, networks and advice.
Other organisations develop international links and award prizes. Activity therefore rests amongst
the specialist community or at the regional level. The scope for policy therefore appears to be
relatively limited and enforced through a number of mechanisms that chiefly relate to prizes,
networking and information dispersal, international relations and human resource development;

57
 but also subsidy of accommodation facilities. In terms of scope for policy action, drawing on this
Japanese review, there may be scope for similar measures at the EU level – for instance prizes,
network creation etc., depending upon the risk this may pose to crowding-out pre-existing
initiatives and informal networks. Furthermore, should policy be generated, the Japanese case
suggests that activities in this area may best be performed by the specialist organisations, or
those at the regional level rather at the general level. Protection of IP, trade promotion of the
creative and design industries also comprise a key part of Japan’s policy efforts and this could be
where efforts may also possibly be directed.
 The European level could serve as a platform for policy learning, sharing of good practice and
expert discussions on the subject in order to promote the comprehension and application of
design as a tool for innovation.
 Initiatives at the EU level in support of design could include:
- Initiatives for design as a solution to societal challenges (ergonomics, urban design, eco-
design, design for all)
- Pan European conferences on design
- Directives (such as Directive 2005/32/EC on the eco-design of Energy-using Products)
 A welcome activity at the European level would be, for countries such as Slovenia, which has no
clear policy in the area of design and creativity, to place the issue in the forefront of innovation
policy debate and to draw out possible good practices from those Member States (and others)
that are more advanced in this area. This would certainly have added-value and would not limit or
contradict national or regional efforts.
 The following actions could support design as an innovation tool in Europe:
- Encourage the participation of designers in enterprises. This would require changing the
view of enterprises towards designers and the usefulness of their work. The benefits
derived from the participation of designers in enterprises are varied, ranging from the
better presentation of results, to the creation of a better working environment, and the
development of higher-quality products.
- Knowledge transfer between countries could be useful to disseminate ideas and
successful experiences. It could also be useful to foster the implementation of successful
design policies/ initiatives in countries with less experience in design.
- Encourage design research in enterprises. Given the aforementioned benefits of design
in enterprises, design research should be promoted. This might require structural and
financial changes in enterprises (e.g. more financial resources in R&D, establishment of
new departments) but there is some reason to believe that benefits would be substantial.
 Several opportunities exist:
- The Commission could highlight the importance of design as a means to differentiate
products (keeping companies out of pure price-competition);
- A Commission-supported “Innovative Design Award” could be introduced in cooperation
with European business associations.
- Good practise and added-value from measures with user involvement and design aspects
could be highlighted. In this case, ex ante impact assessments are important (to clarify
how added-value can be generated from design and user involvement).
 Opportunities for EU action include:
- Awareness raising;
- To inform about cases of success and failure;
- To investigate the innovation impact of “design” activities (impact analysis);
- Value added of European action: To initiate international comparisons.
 Design as a tool for innovation can be promoted and awareness raising activities can be carried
out on the subject. It is important to create awareness not only at company level but also at the
level of national and regional policy makers. Support measures directed to this issue can be
designed or projects falling into this topic can be supported under the Framework Programmes.

58
5.1.2 Internal opportunities
 Design should be embedded to a greater extent in the innovation policies of DG Enterprise, which
currently are rather product- and process-oriented and could improve with a stronger focus on
services, creativity and design. For instance, the EC could provide European platforms for
designers and manufacturing as well as service firms (e.g. design as part of the firm strategy –
also for firms in event management, tourism etc.; clusters could perhaps be organised within the
Europe Innova Framework).
 In terms of organisational challenges, there should be a better-coordinated EU strategy for
design, and the creation of a clear ownership for design issues within the Commission.
 To understand the impact of measures in support of design it is necessary to develop a
methodological framework for such analysis and then monitor the developments over a minimum
of a five year period. The results of such studies could be regularly used as inputs to prepare and
launch actions at the EU level.
 This question requires knowledge that goes beyond a prompt answer; it requires in-depth
research not only on the national policy measures in place to support design for innovation but
also their impact on the wider economy. Necessary stages would be to: 1) find a common
denominator in order to identify a rationale for designing relevant support measures and, 2)
identify common ground to be taken as a launching platform for a common European design and
creativity policy. Once these issues are clearer, transferability issues can be discussed. The
backbone of such a policy framework, by designing a common platform for European creativity,
design and user-driven Innovation, would contribute towards the harmonisation of national
strategies and the fostering of national, regional and local excellence.

5.2 Rationale for EU support for design

The following responses were obtained, not all of which were positive towards the existence of a
rationale for EU action:
 Design is in many ways cultural determined, and the success of Europe in this area highly
dependent on cultural diversity. Support for design might therefore be best organised at the
national level.
 Design allows an enterprise to exploit innovation and expand or redefine its market, and to create
and build on its relationship with its customers and stake holders. In recent years, an increasing
number of design and production tasks are being outsourced to low-cost, large-scale
manufacturing enterprises in China, India and other Asian countries. This is a challenge that
European enterprises must meet if they are not to be outcompeted. Understanding the needs of
European consumers is a task that still has to be done locally and nationally, and inclusive design
is a key tool with which to achieve this broad-based understanding of the customer. In competition
with companies from low-cost countries, European enterprises need help. European companies
should be encouraged to relate design to strategy. Strategic design allows an organisation to
exploit innovation and expand or redefine its market, and to create and build on its relationship
with its customers and stake holders. Design's strategic importance is increasingly recognised,
but its contribution has not been widely addressed in established strategy models.
 Generally speaking, the small size of domestic markets 'push' Finnish small and large companies,
and particularly the growth-oriented ones to look for foreign markets at an early stage. This holds
true for the design field, too. The study that analysed the impacts of Finnish design and the
design system on the competitiveness of Finnish society and business found that just over 20% of
companies are using design regularly. The share is probably much lower among service firms.
Therefore, the international and European dimension and international interaction is not an

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 existing precondition for the future development of design as a tool for innovation in Finland.
However, there is no single answer as to how (through which type of arrangements and at which
level) such support should be organised. Most probably, actions are needed at different levels at
the same time.
 “I am sceptical about the need of policy intervention in favour of design activities. It is hard to see
any market failure in this respect that could motivate policy intervention, except from offering legal
protection for designs through design patents/registered designs. It is part of entrepreneurship to
identify the right design for the product in order to address the right customers. There is a huge
market of designers offering specialised services for any design application, and there are plenty
of market research companies helping to test the impact of designs on users’ buying decisions.”
 Although promoting design at EU level might offer great potential for Europe to remain
competitive in world markets, at present, to some extent, the concepts of design, style, creativity
and the like, are more closely linked to specific member states or regions than to Europe as a
single entity. Countries, regions and cities throughout Europe have started to assess their creative
potential and are developing their own strategies to build a sustainable local economy. However,
given the importance of design and creativity in driving innovation, the EU has an important role
here.
 The relevance of European level action could be for setting a common framework for European
Member States that commits a level of investment and support in design for innovation. Initiatives
at EU level could include the provision for design measures in FP, CIP Programmes. However,
national intervention is recommended where context-specific issues become relevant especially in
small countries e.g. uptake of design measures by SME communities; country specific design
measures related to building and construction, etc.
 This is a difficult question; in the Netherlands support for design is mostly a regional affair,
focused on design-as-a-sector (and on interactions between the creative sector and other
sectors), rather than on design-as-part-of-the-product-innovation-cycle. For this reason, there
does not immediately appear to be a good rationale and added value for European action.
 Looking at the challenges raised by China, and more generally by Eastern Asia, on Europe’s
competitiveness, it can be argued that creativity is a Chinese weakness [although the Chinese
responses do not seem to support this argument]. Therefore, it might be wise for Europe to bet on
creativity and to develop creativity and design to withstand competition from China. There are
good reasons for Europe to support design as a tool for innovation (and competitiveness). In a
World where intangibles, and particularly tacit knowledge, are increasingly relevant, this is an
area where Europe might profit from its ‘historical heritage’. It is curious to note that a decade and
half ago, the director of the former FAST programme, Riccardo Petrella, argued that the
‘industries of the Beautiful’ should be a major target for Europe. As to the value added of
European action, this might be found in the leveraging of national initiatives. Such leveraging may
be envisaged from two perspectives: (1) financial leveraging, encouraging the achievement of a
European critical mass; and (2) promoting interchange and cross-fertilisation. Being a tacit
capability, creativity does not happen in isolation. It very much stems from exchange, from
contacts with others, from ‘intelligent upgrading’, and even from reactions to others proposals.
 This is a rather speculative question. It can again be argued that design is a matter of culture, and
related to history and type of social habits of a country/region. Why should European institutions
intervene in these areas? It probably is better to leave it to the evolution of culture and society in
each country/region.

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6 Conclusions and recommendations

It is clear from the responses elicited in this study that design, creativity and user-driven innovation
represent potentially strong issues in support of innovation and have already generated significant
policy debate on how they might be effectively harnessed in support of competitiveness at the
national, regional and local (particularly the municipal) levels. Thus, it follows that they may also have
major implications for competitiveness at the European level, implications that clearly necessitate a
range of policy responses from the European Commission.

6.1 Overall conclusions

The first interesting point to emerge from the responses was that the concepts of design and creativity
tend to be used interchangeably or in close association. Thus, several initiatives that address the
issue of design also touch upon the stimulation of or reward for creativity. Similarly, design is seen as
a particularly important element (perhaps synonymous with innovation) within certain sectors such as
the creative industries (encompassing film and entertainment, multi-media, software and games,
fashion, furniture, etc.). Likewise, creativity is also viewed as an extension, or prerequisite, of the
process of innovation.

For these reasons, the responses set out in Sections 2 and 3 often overlap to some extent, and, due
to the inclusion of creativity and design considerations into the broader definition of innovation, include
references to more ‘traditional’ forms of innovation support.

Focusing on the policies and initiatives that support design as an activity or as a sector, it is clear that
some countries have a long-established presence and activity in this area, although this has not
always been explicitly connected to innovation issues. ‘Design’ as an issue for industry (or, more
specifically, as a tool for economic growth) seems to predate that of innovation, having its roots in
developments that started in the 1940s and 1950s in some countries (see, for example, the responses
for Finland and the UK, in Section 2.1).

Overall, the responses indicate that design has been supported by a number of dedicated activities
and a clear focus in Austria, Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain and Sweden, with the UK, Italy
Denmark and Finland being particularly key actors. As noted above, some of these countries have
had a particularly long history in design-related activities. Relatively high levels of activity were also
reported from the Czech Republic, Estonia, France, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Latvia, Malta, Poland
and Portugal, with more limited activities noted in Bulgaria and Slovenia (the latter having some
nascent developments).

Outside the EU Member States, notable activity was reported by Croatia, Iceland and, in particular,
Norway, while the topic is beginning to attract attention in Turkey. Further afield, Brazil and India are
rapidly developing their activities in the area, while Japan has a longer tradition of design-oriented
policies. Chinese activities appear to be limited to awards and prizes for design, while, at the national
level, the United States seems to focus more on broader framework policies that support design as an
activity, with state and municipal-level activities being more diverse in their forms of support.

The responses noted a range of examples of policy documents focusing specifically on the issue of
design. Many of these are linked to action plans and strategies designed to harness the creative
potential of design as a tool for national competiveness – sometimes linked to the notion of ‘national
branding’, others as efforts to promote the wider use of design in manufacturing and services. In
addition, the topic has been the focus of numerous think tanks and fora.

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The specific types of policy activities reported exhibit a large degree of variability, ranging from
awareness promoting measures (such as design awards and prizes, exhibitions and similar events,
industry networks and design associations, ‘design councils’), through support measures for design
activities (e.g. grants for companies to buy-in design services), to support via innovation programmes
targeting the creative sector, or other industry sectors which rely on design to a significant extent (e.g.
consumer electronics) and framework support measures (such as support for design education and
training, implementation of IPR regimes favourable to the protection of designs, etc.).

With regards to the issue of policies and initiatives for the support of creativity (specifically as a
source of innovation) and user-driven innovation, it should be noted that, as for Section 2, the
concepts of design and creativity tend to be used almost interchangeably in policy debate and are
closely related. Likewise, creativity, as a somewhat ‘fuzzy’ concept, is generally regarded as an
inherent factor in the processes of both research and development and of innovation. It therefore
receives attention in many innovation policy documents due to its perceived potential role in
enhancing competiveness. In addition, a significant amount of the discussion on creativity is devoted
to the role of the creative industries, within which the concept of design is, obviously, also important.
The notion of user-driven innovation also receives significant policy attention, frequently in
combination with discussions on ways to promote and capitalise on the creativity of users, customers
or employees. The issue also arises in the context of the public procurement of technologies and
services for security, health and education.

Thus, there are three main areas of policy debate and support: broader innovation support, in which
creativity is linked to innovation in a broad sense, support specifically for the creative industries and
support for the promotion or harnessing of innovation from a user, customer or employee perspective.

It is also worth noting that many of the measures in place tend to operate at the regional or municipal
level, including the development of ‘creative zones’, ‘poles of creativity’ or ‘creativity and innovation
hubs’. Here, the influence of the work of Richard Florida is cited in a number of responses.

The stimulation of creativity is, in some countries, a central part of the mission of those departments,
agencies and other bodies that are responsible for innovation. The notion is often also linked to the
issue of entrepreneurship (including activities such as entrepreneurial education and training) and the
creation of start-ups. As in the case of design, IPR regulation and frameworks are also an important
issue, alongside complementary initiatives targeting copyright and design piracy, etc. There are
several examples of public and industry-led initiatives for the promotion of the awareness of the
benefits of creativity benefits. These include rewards for employee creativity (either public or industry
awards, for example), and the use of so-called ‘Living Labs’ to develop the idea of user-driven
innovation.

Many of the examples have a particular focus on the creative industries and the cultural sector.
Examples here include the promotion of start-ups, incubators, education and training (including the
use of internships, etc.), sector-specific awards, awareness campaigns, networking activities, the
creation and support of intermediary organisations, tax exemptions, and cluster programmes.

Those countries reporting significant levels of activity include Austria, Belgium, Finland, Germany,
Italy, the United Kingdom and, outside the EU, Norway. All of these provide some very interesting
examples of policy debate and activity. Other examples can be found in France, Estonia, Greece,
Latvia, Malta, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden and, outside the EU, in China, India, Japan and the
United States.

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Overall, there was limited evidence regarding the success or failure of existing policies and initiatives
in support of design, creativity and user-driven innovation. Many countries noted that initiatives (where
they existed) were too young to be able to assess their results. However, some examples were
reported. More specifically, some positive indications were available for a number of programmes in
Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, and Latvia, while the Chinese example
provided strong performance indicators on the growth of the country’s creative industries.

Finally, a large number of suggestions were generated for potential action at the European level for
the support of design as a tool for innovation.

Broadly, these included:

 The general promotion of the benefits of creativity and entrepreneurship especially among the
young;
 Promotion of awareness of the benefits of design to firms and to competitiveness more
widely;
 Initiatives to facilitate policy learning on design issues;
 Good practice dissemination (e.g. Design platforms, Good Design Practice programmes,
support for networking at a variety of levels, design awards (especially for SMEs);
 Establishment of a European centre of excellence for design or a pan-European network of
design centres;
 The formulation of favourable financial schemes for investments and innovation initiatives
related to design (e.g. voucher schemes, thematic priorities in the CIP workplan, launch of
support actions on the theme of design, favourable regulation for design/model protection);
 Creation of a ‘Made in Europe’ brand;
 Promotion of training initiatives on design issues;
 Development of improved R&D and innovation metrics that include design;
 Support for research into the effects of design and the effectiveness of design policy. This
would include the collection of evidence on the impact of design on innovation and firm
performance across Europe or further afield;
 Development of a better-coordinated EU strategy for design, and the establishment of a
clearly defined locus for design issues within the Commission.

With regards to the rationale and added-value for European level intervention, arguments were
proposed, both for and against. On the one hand, there was a general feeling that creativity was
closely linked to culture and that, consequently, national, regional and local diversity and strengths
were powerful factors that militated against European level action, particularly within the context of the
subsidiarity principle. However, a number of responses counter-balanced this view with strong support
for higher-level action in order to mobilise and enhance Europe’s existing strengths in these areas.

6.2 Recommendations
A number of the actions suggested above provide suitable specific recommendations for future
Community level action on the part of the Commission. However, it is clear from the results presented
in this limited study that further evidence in support of future European policies on design, creativity
and user-driven innovation is required through a more extensive study into each of the issues. With
this aim in mind, some broad level recommendations are:

 Given the evident rapid development of policy interest in these issues in countries outside of
the EU, there is an urgent need to explore more extensively design, creativity and user-driven
innovation within the EU context. One objective would be to better categorise types of policy
support that are in place and to undertake impact and benchmarking exercises to support
policy learning.

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 Undertake efforts to define and identify good practice, and based on these, promote
awareness both among users (as all the topics have a strong bottom-up relevance) and also
among policy makers regarding the potential of design, creativity and user-driven awareness
to competitiveness.
 Investigate further avenues to stimulate design and creativity at the EU level and also to
spread these practices, at a range of levels, by showcasing leading initiatives from across
Europe.

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