On 17 July, I presented the main results of GII 2013 at a regional event hosted by Huawei on their Shenzhen campus in China. The high tech surroundings, and the high pulse environment offered by the city of Shenzhen were a very fitting showcase for the Asia/Pacific launch of the report.
The meeting gathered over 50 representatives from the press and media of the region, both local and international. Presentations were provided on the strategic importance of innovation and its metrics, both from a governmental point of view and from the vantage points of business.
Speakers included Li Ganming, Deputy Secretary General of Shenzhen Municipal People's Government, Ken Hu, Rotating CEO and Deputy Chairman, Huawei Technologies, Wang Binying, Deputy Director General, World Intellectual Property Organization, Lu Jian, Director General of Science, Technology & Innovation Commission of Shenzhen. Professor Dongmin Chen, Dean, School of Innovation and Entrepreneurship, and Director, Office of Business Development for Science and Technology, Peking University, and member of GII’s Advisory Board, was also present.
I participated in a lively panel with Ken Hu and Mrs Wang, during which a number of questions were raised by the press and media about the future of innovation in China, differences between the innovation paths followed by India and China respectively, or the reasons why Hong Kong was more successful than China as a whole, when it came to GII rankings. Participants underlined the importance of developing a global environment that should be supportive of open innovation, i.e. combining open trade with a deep respect for (and protection of) intellectual property.
Among the many insightful press articles published on GII in the Asia Pacific region over the last few days, the following show how reporters and academics are contributing to the innovation debate by ‘doing their homework’, i.e. by having an in-depth and critical reading of GII.
Playing a trump card in global business, by Meng Jing (China Daily)
At the bottom of the top, Australia and the 2013 Global Innovation Index, by Tim Mazzarol, Winthrop Professor, Entrepreneurship, Innovation, Marketing and Strategy at University of Western Australia (The conversation)
Download the slides prepared for Shenzhen here.
Bruno Lanvin, Executive Director, INSEAD European Competitiveness Initiative