Dynamics or Dilemma: Assessing the Innovation Systems of Three Satellite Platform Regions (Singapore, Dublin and Penang)

This study attempts to put forward a quantitative assessment via patent-based indexes to frame the innovation dynamics of three highly acknowledged Satellite Platform regions – Singapore, Dublin and Penang. A Satellite Platform is generally viewed as a comparatively less sticky region hosting the operations of many different uncooperative multinationals. They faced a common dilemma, namely non-committal of MNCs in defining a local structure to generate knowledge and innovation. Nonetheless, we observed diverse intervention from different local governments to pivot away from the dilemma and compensate for the lack of patient capital from multinational firms. Divergent paths in terms of inventiveness were observed. Singapore stands out as a region obtaining indigenous patenting capabilities – achieving higher localization, de-concentration, diversification and university-industry linkage indexes. On the other hand, Dublin emerged to derive an exploitative patenting route – witnessing higher science-based linkage indexes. Meanwhile, Penang – as a region that has been focusing on upskilling its blue-collar population – is relatively behind in performance for almost all patenting indexes compared to the other two. The framing and findings of this paper are found instrumental in theorizing the divergence of interventions for knowledge-based economic development.