The role of creative industries in industrial innovation
Kathrin Müller
Centre for European Economic Research (ZEW), Department of Industrial Economics and International Management, Mannheim, Germany
Christian Rammer
Centre for European Economic Research (ZEW), Department of Industrial Economics and International Management, Mannheim, Germany
Johannes Trüby
Centre for European Economic Research (ZEW), Department of Industrial Economics and International Management, Mannheim, Germany
PP: 148 - 168
Abstract
This paper analyses the role of creative industries in affecting an economy's innovation performance.
Conducting a survey of more than 2,000 creative industry enterprises, we show that creative industries are among the most innovative sectors in the economy. They support innovation in a variety of other sectors through creative inputs, such as ideas for new products, supplementary products and services or marketing support for product innovations. They are also an important user of new technology and demand innovations from technology producers, particularly information and communication technologies. Own innovative activities are a key driver for supporting innovation.
Creative industries are no homogenous sector, however. While software and advertising show the strongest links to industrial innovation, architecture and content providers contribute rather little.[1]
[1] This paper has originated from a broader study on the role of creative industries as part of an innovation system which was funded by the initiative 'creative industries Austria' within the Austrian Chamber of Commerce. The full report is available in German language (see Georgieff et al. 2008).
Keywords
creative industries, innovation, R&D, inter-sector interaction, innovation policy
Article Text
The Creative Industries have attracted an increasing number of researchers in the field of economics. Responding to the fast growth of the industry over the past two decades, many studies dealt with the contribution of Creative Industries to the economy, particularly in terms of employment, regional development and urban dynamics (see Andari et al. 2007; Cooke & Schwartz 2007; OECD 2006). Very recently, the role of innovation in the creative industries was studied in more detail. One group of studies focuses on innovation activities in enterprises that belong to the Creative Industries (see Miles & Green 2008; Wilkinson 2007; Stoneman 2007; Handke 2004, 2006; Galenson 2006; Green et al. 2007) while some other studies are concerned with the role of Creative Industries in contributing to innovation in the wider economy, particularly with regard to inputs from the creative industries that may be used in innovation processes in other industries (see Bakhshi et al. 2008).
Our paper is related to both strands of research on innovation in the Creative Industries. Its main aim is to enlarge our understanding of how the creative industries affects an economy's innovation activities, both by their own activities and by triggering and supporting innovation in other sectors. We distinguish three roles of Creative Industries as being part of a (national) innovation system: First, producing ideas is a key characteristic of Creative Industries, and these ideas will most likely contribute - directly or indirectly - to an economy's innovative potential and the generation of new products and services. Secondly, Creative Industries offer services which may be inputs to innovative activities of other enterprises and organisations within and outside the creative industries. Thirdly, Creative Industries are intensive users of technology and often demand adaptations and new developments of technology, providing innovation impulses to technology producers.
Our study is closely linked to the empirical literature on Creative Industries though it deviates from some of the standard concepts. First, we focus only on commercial for-profit activities, ie omitting public organisations and private non-profit organisations. Secondly, we define Creative Industries by a two-stage approach. In a first step, we identify a list of creative industry sectors that is strongly in line with the UK's Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS, 1998) list, extended by two sectors (consulting/training and engineering services). In a second step, enterprises are classified according to the creative nature of the way they produce and deliver their services. Enterprises that belong to a creative industry sector and offer services based on creative activities are called 'creative enterprises' and are the focus of this study.
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