Department of Industrial Economics, TIEK

The research in Industrial Economics and Management at BTH focuses on the interplay between technology, innovation and industrial dynamics. Key issues concern the preconditions for as well as consequences of new technologies and their implementation in businesses. This spans technology-based business and entrepreneurship, strategy and innovation in established as well as new and emerging industries and businesses. The research is organized in two themes:

Management of innovation and technology
This line of research has the firm, project or project organization as its natural unit of analysis. The focus is on analyses of resource bases, strategy, competence and capabilities, and how these interplay with technology and innovation. The research span business models, strategy, investment risks and competence and capability development.

Industrial dynamics and technological change　
The research in this theme is focused on analyses of market, industry and business dynamics, and the role of policy. It comprises studies of entrepreneurship, development of new industries and businesses, diffusion of innovations and new technologies. It also comprises analyses of economy-wide change processes that span businesses across time and space, for example initiated by general purpose technologies like ICT.

Working paper series
S-WoPec – Working Paper Series

Ongoing projects

Entrepreneurship and Crime

Multiple treatments

Participants: Torbjörn Danell (Tillväxtsanalys) & Jonas Månsson (BTH). Impact of multiple support

Normally when evaluating policy, treatment is considered to be binary in the respect that some firms are treated (e.g. get support) and some are not (control group). However, this do not have to be the case. For example, when evaluating the European regional development fund (Andersson et al., 2023) we identified firms that some firms; a) had several treatments from several support givers, b) had several treatments from the same support giver and c) had several supports from several support givers and several supports from the same support giver. In Andersson et al. (2023) all firms that had received multiple support was eliminated from the evaluation with the argument that we could not, in a ‘normal’ way, identify impacts. This has also been the predominant strategies in all recent policy evaluations concerning firms support. In an ongoing study we explore the possibilities to include these firms using a generalisation(s) of methods used for binary treatment on the ERUF 2014-2020 data. We focus firms that got one, two and more support within the same priority and thus by the same support provider (ERUF). In the study we also make a deep descriptive dive into the characteristics of firms that receive multiple support. The report is to be finalised winter 2024.

Participant: Jonas Månsson, Impact of direct support to Swedish farms – a dose-response analysis

Some policies are by construction such that if a firms fulfil certain criteriums they are entitled to support. Other supports are so general that all who applies get funding. In both these situations traditional policy evaluation approaches will not work. In one recent study (Freight transport subsidy) and one ongoing project (direct support to farms) we are using variation in treatment intensity to shed some light on possible impacts. In the literature this approach goes by the name ‘dose-response’ analysis. Even though it lately caught some attention in the industrial policy literature it is far from new. The method is standard in e.g. clinical test of new pharmacies. In the recently finished study concerning freight transport subsidies we showed that, in general, more treatment did not result in “more” impacts on turnover or profits. When value added was used as outcome the results was that intense treatment (85% of maximum support) resulted in small statistically significant results, however, these small statistically significant impacts was too small to motivate an economic significant contribution of the freight transport subsidy.

Conceptualising Cross-Border Regions in the European Union’s Legal Order: From Covidfencing to Constitutionalisation

Participants:Marja-Liisa Öberg (Lund), Rhiannon Pugh (Lund), Jasna Pocek (BTH), Jacob Öberg (Örebro University and University of Southern Denmark)

The COVID-19 pandemic has brought to limelight the special role of cross-border regions (CBRs) in the European Union (EU). CBRs connect various regions at state borders and foster intensive social and economic relationships which are vital for the livelihoods of millions of people. However, national crisis response measures including border closures (‘covidfencing’) have caused serious disruptions to the CBRs’ functioning, revealing a conundrum in EU integration whereby the effective functioning of CBRs, which embody the successes of a borderless area is severely impaired in crises by a lack of explicit recognition in EU law.

The project intends to illuminate the necessity to regulate CBRs in EU law and to analyse critically whether this would be a suitable means for ensuring their effective functioning and resilience in future crises. In a unique multi-disciplinary study combining law and regional economic geography perspectives, the project, first, questions the particular role of CBRs in EU integration and whether their status in the EU’s legal framework corresponds to their economic and societal relevance. Second, the study seeks to elucidate the effects of the predominantly national crisis measures during the COVID-19 pandemic on CBRs, and assess whether regional, national and EU-level coordination efforts have been adequate to ensure their proper functioning. Third, the study endeavours to clarify whether the role of CBRs warrants an enhanced status under EU law.