Comparing regional innovative capacities of PR China based on data analysis of the national patents

The significant inequality of innovative capacities amongst regions will be a hindrance to the harmonious development of the overall national science and technology (S&T) and economy of PR China. A key purpose of this article is to explore and reveal these inequalities, based on data analysis of the national patent counts. We examine the relationship between national patenting and the variables associated with the regional innovative capacity. The results indicate that the R&D activities of scientists and engineers in enterprises, the governmental R&D funds for enterprises, bank R&D loans and enterprises funds for research institutes and universities, are all inefficient to different degrees in the regional innovation systems of PR China. On the contrary, firms' spontaneous R&D investment on their own contributes substantially to their regional innovative capacities. The results suggest that the methodology is a useful and relatively reliable way of measuring regional innovative capacities for specifically Chinese conditions.

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