“Mozart 4.0” Program Seeks A Global IP And Innovation Culture

Cultural mindset plays a key role in determining how entrepreneurial a region will be and how effectively its intellectual property will be used, Ludovit Garzik, managing director of the Austrian Council for Research and Technology Development and Innovation Orbit said at an 11 May Oxfirst webinar. The goal is for different cultures to understand how each innovates, leading to global IP, Garzik said.

Garzik analysed the knowledge, innovativeness and consensus (the legal and institutional framework and the ability of the institutions involved to communicate with each other) of the city of Salzburg, but said that “triple helix” approach can be used anywhere with appropriate tweaks. The “Mozart 4.0” analysis considered such factors as R&D expenditures, the rate of self-employment, and how Salzburg compared to other areas in the number of patents filed in-country and at the European Patent Office, he said.

It also looked at the innovation culture of the city. For example, if a teacher is likely to patent or innovate, so will her students, he said. Conversely, if the management of an institution isn’t thinking entrepreneurially, neither will the institution. The analysis also looked at the political side of innovativeness, such as government awareness of tax benefits and support for patenting.

One quarter of all Austrian cultural sciences are handled in Salzburg, meaning that that human capital isn’t available for other innovation, Garzik said. He also surveyed people in Salzburg’s research community and others with varying education levels, and found that while 30 percent of both groups were interested in entrepreneurship, many hesitated to innovate because of their cultural background, risk aversion or parental advice.

Mozart 4.0 found that while creative potential exists in Salzburg, it’s not currently used for innovative activities or new ventures, Garzik said. The potential for future entrepreneurship could be ignited, however, if the cultural challenges were met, he said.

Nor is Salzburg’s political energy aligned with innovation, said Garzik. The community and institutions in a region are incorporated into its cultural framework, which sets out the area’s expectations about the appropriate measures needed for the future development, he emailed later. If governments later invest more energy in different objectives, “most of the energy could be wasted because the community will not tow into the same direction.”

Most political strategies are “based on symptoms and not on the real causes,” Garzik told Intellectual Property Watch. The cultural framework generally doesn’t enter into the discussion, he said.

Changing IP Means Facing Reality

The triple helix model can be used in any country as long as the appropriate cultural framework conditions are applied, Garzik said. There are indices – such as the uncertainty avoidance index and the power distance index, described in Geert Hofstede’s “Culture’s Consequences” – that are useful, he said.

“But there is one important point if policymakers want to change IP. First they have to face reality, this is the precondition for any successful change process.” Studies commissioned by government bodies often reveal a “fuzzy” reality, he said.

Understanding how other regions innovate can lead to global IP, said Garzik. He pointed to an “ecosystem of entrepreneurship” in Silicon Valley in which knowledge and background aren’t as important as founding companies and finding venture capital. In Europe, the focus is on “engineering up to perfection without market and sales awareness,” while in China the goal is not to become an innovation leader “but to take the biggest share of the market.”

Garzik’s team has developed an executive education program to help different societies understand each other’s innovation mindset. “There are high class lecturers to do that but the most important point is that the participants discuss and travel with classmates of the other cultures,” he told IP-Watch.