Resumen de Geospatial social network lnnovation assessment of the spanish higher education
The current context is one of crisis in the European area, especially in the southern countries. To put an end to the crisis, the European Union elaborated the Horizon 2020 strategy focusing on innovation to tackle the socio-economic challenges.
Innovation has an impact on society and, as a result on the territory inhabited by the people forming such society. Employing a geospatial perspective allows performing a type of analysis that is seldom approached by higher education experts, who tend to focus on purely statistical methodologies.
The main goal of this dissertation is the development of a model that uses GIS for innovation assessment from the perspective of universities and the territory. Then, through application of the model for the case of the assessment of innovation produced by the Spanish universities listed in CRUE in the year 2015, the secondary goal is to identify patterns that may unearth new significant information.
The results show spatial patterns and the potential of improving the current methods of assessing innovation. The model presented in this thesis does provide an innovative solution to better understand innovation networks and their effect on the territory.
In the specific case studied, the assessment provides an easy-to-understand solution for decision makers in the different provinces. The decision makers can then identify what type of institutions are driving innovation and where they are located, what connections they have and how to improve their innovation results through the identification of significant partners. Furthermore, the funding for research and innovation could be better directed towards those institutions with the higher potential.
