News 

October 2008

-2-3 October, Stockholm, Sweden.
Christian Ketels will participate in the "InterReg Forum 08", a conference on EU regional development issues and inter-regional programmes organised by NUTEK, the Ministry of Enterprise, Energy and Communications, Sida, Boverket (The National Board of Housing, Building and Planning), and Sveriges Kommuner och Landsting (The Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions).

July 2008

-7-8 July, Visby, Gotland, Sweden.
Christian Ketels will do a seminar on Baltic Sea strategy at the international workshop on "The Future Baltic Sea Region" organised  on 7-8 July by The Baltic Sea Unit (Östersjöenheten) of the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida) and
Baltic Development Forum, in cooperation
with the Centre for Baltic and East European
Studies (CBEES), Södertörn University
College. The workshop aims to present and discuss visions of the future of the Baltic Sea region as well as
the challenges that need to be overcome to reach the goal of a well integrated and prosperous region. The
programme will bring together key politicians,
civil servants, practitioners and high-level academic expertise in the areas of discussion.


June 2008

-4 June, Karlstad, Sweden.
Örjan Sölvell gave a seminar for The Paper Province cluster in Karlstad, Värmland, Sweden. The Paper Province is a cluster that has achieved global recognition, containing all markers that define a successful cluster according to Professor Sölvell. See the article here in .pdf (in Swedish) or as a link (in Swedish) to the web version of NWT.

The European International Business Academy (EIBA), a professional society for academics and practitioners in the field of International Business, has appointed Örjan Sölvell an EIBA Fellow, in recognition of his outstanding achievements in research and education in International Business. Professor Sölvell joins an exclusive group of 20 EIBA Fellows worldwide. http://www.eiba-online.org


May 2008

-20-23 May, Mölle, Sweden.
Örjan Sölvell  presented the paper co-authored with Göran Lindqvist and Christian Ketels, "EU vs US--A Comparative Analysis of Geographic Concentration Patterns of Employment across Cluster Categories", and Robin Teigland presented the paper "The Impact of EU Framework Projects on Competitiveness" co-authored with Andrew Schenkel, at the SNEE (Swedish Network for European Studies in Economics and Business) conference in Mölle. 


April 2008

-8-9 April, Riksgränsen, Sweden.
Christian Ketels participated at the first Nordic Globalisation Forum hosted by Swedish prime minister Fredrik Reinfeldt in Riksgränsen, Sweden. The forum gathered the prime ministers from all five Nordic countries, as well as representatives from business, media, academia, and various organisations, to discuss Scandinavian competitiveness in a globalised world. Ketels presented the Nordic Globalization Barometer 2008 in his talk during the plenary session. 


_{©Johannes Jansson/
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See the Swedish government's press release here (in Swedish), and download the Nordic Globalization Barometer 2008 here. See also the FT.com article on the forum here.


-7 April, Copenhagen.
Christian Ketels will give a speech on cluster policy for the Danish Growth Council in Copenhagen. See link if you wish to attend the seminar.


March 2008

-3 March, Stockholm.
CSC signed an agreement with the Polish Agency for Enterprise Development – PAED (http://www.parp.gov.pl/) to translate the Cluster Initiative Greenbook, co-authored by Örjan Sölvell, Christian Ketels and Göran Lindqvist, into Polish. The Greenbook will be published both in printed and electronic versions, and the printed version will also contain the report “Cluster Initiatives in Developing and Transition Economies”.

Christian Ketels was appointed to the Advisory Board of the Baltic Development Forum, bdforum.org


January 2008

-22-23 January, Stockholm.
Örjan Sölvell, Christian Ketels, Göran Lindqvist, Sergiy Protsiv and Marie Tsujita Stephenson attended the European Presidency Conference on Innovation and Clusters, held under the chairmanship of the Slovenian European Presidency and the Swedish Government in Stockholm. This conference showcased the results of the cluster mapping project which CSC has been running together with its consortium partners The Cluster Competitiveness Group, Fondation Sophia Antipolis, and Oxford Research. Örjan Sölvell presented the results of the cluster mapping project to the 380 cluster experts, practitioners, academics, and policy makers assembled at the conference (read and listen to the presentation here).
Keynote speakers Mr Esko Aho, director of SITRA and former prime minister of Finland, provided his views as a former politician on the role of clusters for the future of Europe (see his speech here), and
Professor Michael E. Porter of the Institute for Strategy and Competitiveness at Harvard Business School gave an update on the status of Europe viz. clusters and clustering efforts (read and listen to his presentation here).

-17 January, Stockholm.
Christian Ketels moderated a panel discussion at the seminar on "The Baltic Sea Region in Europe-Regional Cooperation for Continued Success" hosted by the Embassy of Latvia in Sweden, the Council of the Baltic Sea States, the Stockholm Institute of Transition Economics (SITE), and the Center for Strategy and Competitiveness, at the Stockholm School of Economics.

December 2007

-18 December, Borlänge, Sweden.
Örjan Sölvell gave a presentation on clusters to the Triple Steelix organisation with members from the steel industry.

-13-15 December, Catania, Sicily, Italy.
Örjan Sölvell attended the EIBA Conference and also presented the 10th Gunnar Hedlund Award for the best PhD dissertation published in the field of business studies.

-13 December, Amman, Jordan.
Christian Ketels gave a lecture on at the University of Jordan on the competitiveness of the Jordanian economy while visiting the university with a delegation from the Institute for Strategy and Competitiveness at Harvard Business School.

The German Ministry of Education and Research has appointed Christian Ketels to the selection committee awarding funding to leading German clusters for projects to upgrade their innovative capacity. More information (in German). Ketels also chairs the selection committee for a regional cluster program in the German state of Nordrhein-Westfalen.


November 2007

-4-6 November, Tallinn, Estonia.
Christian Ketels attended the Baltic Development Forum meeting in Tallinn, Estonia and gave a presentation to launch the State of the Region Report 2007. A video interview is available here.

October 2007

Global Competitiveness Report 2007--Sweden results
-31 October
Click here to see Christian Ketels' presentation of the results for Sweden from the Global Competitiveness Report 2007. Check also Swedish press articles (DI, DN and SvD).

Invitation to submit papers, EGOS 2008

The Center for Strategy and Competitiveness (CSC), as a co-convenor of the EGOS 2008 conference in Amsterdam, invites you to submit papers to the EGOS 2008 sub-theme 48: A Knowledge Perspective on Emerging Clusters and the Role of Creative Entrepreneurs. Click here for more information or contact Robin Teigland.


-15 October, Stanford University, California.
On the invitation from Professor Woody Powell, Örjan Sölvell and Göran Lindqvist from CSC & IIB held a seminar at Stanford (Scancor) on the topic "Why is EU Competitiveness Lagging? Comparing Geographical Specialization Patterns of Industrial Activity Across Cluster Categories". See slides.

-8-12 October, Portland, Oregon.
Örjan Sölvell, Christian Ketels and Göran Lindqvist attended The Competitiveness Institute (TCI) Global Competitiveness Conference held in Portland, Oregon, USA.

-2 October, Stockholm.
Robin Teigland at CSC has been awarded research funds from the European Commission for the project "Structuring Effects of Community Research: The Impact of the Framework Programme on Research and Technology Development (RTD) Network Formation". The project partners are the Stockholm School of Economics, Leiden University, AVEDAS, and FAS.Research.


September 2007

-24-25 September, Sophia Antipolis, France.
Örjan Sölvell, Christian Ketels, and Marie Tsujita Stephenson attended the Europe INNOVA Cluster Mapping Project Advisory Group Meeting held at Sophia Antipolis, France.

-17-19 September, Cape Town, South Africa.
Örjan Sölvell of CSC spoke at the Pan-African Innovation and Cluster Competitiveness Symposium, held as part of the celebration of Carl Linnaeus 300th Anniversary. The symposium was jointly organised by the Swedish Embassy, Linnaeus 2007, Swedish Trade Council, The Competitiveness Institute, Vinnova, Sida, and the Western Cape Region.

-1 September, Stockholm.
As of 1 September 2007, CSC is joined by two  PhD students, Sergiy Protsiv and Sergey Morgulis-Yakushev. Both graduate students are affiliated also with the Institute of International Business (IIB) at the Stockholm School of Economics, and Sergiy has a third affiliation, with the Department of Economic Statistics.


August 2007

-31 August
Uppsala University, Sweden.
Örjan Sölvell lectured in the National PhD Course "Research Frontiers in Contemporary Economic Geography" at Uppsala University, with a presentation entitled "Four Dimensions of Clusters & Cluster Policy". See his presentation here.


July 2007

-12 July
PRO INNO website launches open consultation on the European Cluster Memorandum.

A first version of the European Cluster Memorandum, prepared as part of the Europe INNOVA Cluster Mapping project by an expert team led by Christian Ketels and Örjan Sölvell, has been launched on the PRO INNO website as a basis for opening discussions with relevant stakeholders across Europe.

Public institutions at regional and national levels have been invited to comment on the draft Memorandum on the website before 21 September 2007.

The European Cluster Memorandum is addressed to institutions such as Ministries, Regional Development Agencies and Innovation Agencies, and invites them to agree on the scope and a number of common principles for future cooperation in supporting cluster development in Europe.

The European Cluster Memorandum will be open for signature as of October 2007 onwards. The results will be presented at a European Cluster Conference that will be organised on 22-23 January 2008 by the Swedish Government and the Slovenian Presidency.

For more information, see
the PRO INNO website.


June 2007

-29 June, Stockholm, Sweden.
CSC launched The European Cluster Observatory database website today. The database, which is one of the goals of the Europe INNOVA Cluster Mapping consortium project supported by the European Commission's DG Enterprise & Industry, provides information on regional clusters, cluster organisations, and national and regional cluster policies and programmes in Europe. The consortium partners consist of CSC, The Cluster Competitiveness Group, Fondation Sophia Antipolis, and Oxford Research.

-28 June, Visby, Sweden.
Christian Ketels gave a presentation on "Economy in the Baltic Sea Region," at the Baltic Sea Convention, held in Visby, Gotland, Sweden. See http://www.balticseaconvention.eu

-25 June - 6 July, Barcelona Graduate School of Economics, Spain.
Christian Ketels will be teaching a course on "Clusters and the Role of Location for Company Strategy" during 2-6 July at the Barcelona Clusters Summer School, held by the Barcelona Graduate School of Economics. For more information see the attached presentation.

-13 June, Riga, Latvia.
Christian Ketels gave a seminar on "“Latvian Competitiveness: Preparing for the next stage” in Riga, Latvia at the invitation of FICIL, the Foreign Investors Council in Latvia. He also had private meetings with Latvian Prime Minister Aigars Kalvitis and the Governor of the Latvian Central Bank Ilmars Rimsevics. See article in Diena and his presentation.


-12 June, Brussels, Belgium.
Christian Ketels and Marie Tsujita Stephenson attended the second Advisory Group meeting for the Europe INNOVA Cluster Mapping project, held at the Directorate-General for Enterprise and Industry of the European Commission.


May 2007

-23 May, Copenhagen, Denmark
Christian Ketels, Göran Lindqvist and Sergiy Protsiv attended the Copenhagen FORA workshop.

-6 - 8 May, London, UK.
Örjan Sölvell attended the Sumantra Ghoshal Conference held at the London Business School.


April 2007

-24 April, Tartu, Estonia.
Örjan Sölvell was the keynote speaker at the conference on "Clusters Linked over Europe--Regional Innovation Strategies for Cluster Internationalisation and Competitiveness" held in Tartu, Estonia. He spoke on "Clusters and international competitiveness."


March 2007

-15 March, Globen, Stockholm, Sweden.
Örjan Sölvell was a keynote speaker at the Swedbank conference held at Globen, Stockholm, on "Sveriges ekonomiska läge 2007" [Sweden's economic situation 2007]and spoke on "Regionerna och globaliseringen." See the powerpoint presentation here.

- March, Stockholm School of Economics, Sweden.
Örjan Sölvell presented "Forskningsklustret Stockholm-Uppsala i ett europeiskt perspektiv" (co-authored with Göran Lindqvist and Sergiy Protsiv) for the Stockholm Uppsala University Network (SUUN) meeting at the Stockholm School of Economics. See the presentation here.


February 2007

-22 February, Leipzig, Germany.
Christian Ketels spoke at the Handelshochschule Leipzig about Regional Competitiveness, see the press release here (in German) and the video of his presentation (in German).

-16 February, Rejkjavik, Iceland.
Christian Ketels spoke at a conference at the University of Iceland, see the programme here (in Icelandic).

-15 February.
Abstract deadline, Call for papers. Academic Summit of The Competitiveness Institute (TCI) Annual Conference, Portland, Oregon, 
9 October 2007.

The Competitiveness Institute (TCI), a global network of professionals and researchers active in the field of clusters and competitiveness, will have its annual conference in Portland, Oregon, on 10-12 October 2007. An Academic Summit will take place the day before the conference, on 9 October 2007, giving researchers a chance to present papers; Christian Ketels is the Scientific Chair of the Academic Summit. A focus topic this year is sustainability. Abstracts are due by 15 February 2007, see the Call for Papers for the Academic Summit.


January 2007

-27 January, Davos, Switzerland.
Christian Ketels participated at the World Economic Forum meeting in Davos in a session on competitiveness on 27 January.

-25 January, Tallinn, Estonia.
Örjan Sölvell attended and made a presentation  at the BSR InnoNet pre-conference workshop held in Tallinn, Estonia.

-11-12 January, Paris, France.
Örjan Sölvell, Christian Ketels and Marie Tsujita Stephenson attended the first meeting of the Advisory Board of the Europe INNOVA Cluster Mapping Project, held at the French Senate in Paris.


December 2006

-18 December, Espoo, Finland.
Christian Ketels made a presentation at the seminar on "Mutual and Common Identity in the Central Baltic Region", hosted by the Governor of the County of Stockholm Mr Mats Hellström and the Finnish Speaker of Parliament Mr Paavo Lipponen at Hanaholmen, the Swedish-Finnish Cultural Centre.

-7-8 December, Fribourg, Switzerland.
Örjan Sölvell, Christian Ketels, and Göran Lindqvist attended the EIBA conference. See the presentations by Örjan, Christian and Göran.


November 2006

-27-28 November, Valencia, Spain.
Örjan Sölvell and Christian Ketels made presentations at The Competitiveness Institute (TCI)'s Annual Conference in Valencia.
See Örjan's presentation, and Christian's presentation.


October 2006

- 29-31 October, Helsinki, Finland. Christian Ketels attended the 8th Annual Baltic Development Forum and presented the 2006 State of the Region Report, co-authored with Örjan Sölvell. Download the report here, and see an interview here.

- 16 October, Brussels, Belgium. Örjan Sölvell and Marie Tsujita Stephenson attended the kick-off meeting for the consortium for the Europe INNOVA Cluster Mapping project at the European Commission. CSC is the coordinator for the two-year project; other members of the consortium are The Cluster Competitiveness Group, S.A., Fondation Sophia Antipolis, and Oxford Research AS.

- 9-13 October, Lyon, France. Örjan Sölvell and Christian Ketels made presentations  at the 9th Annual Global Conference of The Competitiveness Institute. Clusters 2006 is one of the biggest cluster conferences in Europe, attended by cluster organisations, policymakers, and researchers.

- 5 October. Christian Ketels' article "Michael Porter’s Competitiveness Framework—Recent Learnings and New Research Priorities", published in Journal of Industry, Competition and Trade, vol. 6, no. 2, June 2006, is now available online. 


September 2006

- 27 September, Stockholm, Sweden. Örjan Sölvell and Christian Ketels presented the Swedish results from The Global Competitiveness Report in a joint seminar with SSE Corporate and Alumni Relations. Ketels said Swedish competitiveness is first class, third overall out of 125 countries, but that improvements are needed for the country to continue being top-ranked. Notable Swedish weaknesses are its public schools with bad results in mathematics and the sciences, the low government efficiency, and the quality of its infrastructure. See the SvD article here (in Swedish), also see the results of The Global Competitiveness Report 2006-2007 here.

- 1 September, Stockholm, Sweden. Marie Tsujita Stephenson joins CSC as administrator to assist Örjan Sölvell and  Christian Ketels on their EU project on the identification and analysis of clusters and innovation policy in Europe. Marie will also manage the CSC office.


August 2006

A new study entitled Clusters in the EU-10 New Member Countries by Christian Ketels and Örjan Sölvell suggests that weaker cluster portfolios in the new member countries, and "the lack of regional specialisation might be an important factor [in] explaining the European competitiveness gap with leading global peers". See two links, Cordis and Euractiv, and download the report here.


July 2006

- 12 July, Talinn, Estonia. Christian Ketels advocates effective government regulations for the Baltic region to prevent economic turmoil. See the Baltic Times article here.


May 2006

- Release of the report Cluster Initiatives in Developing and Transition Economies by Christian Ketels, Göran Lindqvist and Örjan Sölvell. The report draws on a recent survey (GCIS 2005) to provide a basis for improving cluster initiatives as a tool for economic development. Download here.


March 2006

- 17 March, Brussels, Belgium: Lunch debate on European innovation clusters at the 4th European Business Forum, Christian Ketels participating in the panel discussion.
Link to the EBF 

- 23 March, Stockholm, Sweden: Launch of the OECD Territorial Review for Stockholm; Christian Ketels discussing the region’s economic competitiveness.
Link to the OECD 

February 2006

- Opinion Editorial by Örjan Sölvell in Dagens Industri (in Swedish).
Download here

- The Cluster Initiative Greenbook by Örjan Sölvell, Göran Lindqvist and Christian Ketels is downloaded in more than 10,000 copies. The Greenbook is now available in the Czech language. Download here

January 2006

- Professor Örjan Sölvell made a presentation on "Multinational Corporations and Clusters"
to an international audience at the conference "Challenges to National Innovation Systems in a Globalizing World", organized by Vinnova and the four Innovation Research Centers in Stockholm (Cesis), Gothenburg (Ride), Lund (Circle) and Uppsala (CiND).
Download the presentation here


October 17, 2006

- Launch of the 2005 State of the Region Report at the Baltic Development Forum.
Download the report here.

September 28, 2006

- Launch of the Global Competitiveness Report 2005. Find a  short summary of the implications for Sweden here

Download the CSC Global Competitiveness Report presentation here

See Dr Christian Ketels present the Global Competitiveness Report at Swedish TV4 here