Dr Tzameret Rubin

The Advanced Producer Services (APS) sector, long considered to be the vanguard of the knowledge economy and world-city formation, is undergoing a digital transformation. Digital transformation entails an increased engagement with digital technologies in the operation, product offerings and strategies of APS firms, with potentially transformative implications. Such digitization processes are well-established in the morphing of finance into FinTech, with the other APS sub-sectors now allegedly catching-up as evidenced by the arrival of LegalTech, AccountTech, RegTech, PropTech, and AdTech. Moreover, the digital transformation could imply that Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) services are again becoming central to the APS complex after two decades of being largely omitted from world city research. Adopting an evolutionary economic geography perspective, we introduce a new approach that utilizes near real-time data sources to compare local technology spaces with the global picture of digital transformation in world cities. Building a dataset containing information from 40,754 APS start-ups and scale-ups derived from Dealroom.co, this paper explores the geographically uneven digital transformation of the APS sector across European and North American world cities. This allows gauging the extent of digital transformation within APS sectors for each selected city, develop new understandings of the division of labour between world cities, and highlight where sector coalescence between APS sectors is occurring and is more likely to occur. In the process we develop new technological indicators of world-cityness that can be used alongside the classic world city connectivity indicators.

Customers’ data points sources are growing, through the Internet of Things (IoT), telematics and interfacing with third parties’ platforms. Third parties provide either by-product data about their clients, or data that are generated for the specific task of a more accurate measurement of behaviour. One of the core building blocks in insurance is understanding risk – therefore, innovation around data points (sources and analytics) to proxy risk is the engine behind its digital transformation. While the value of data points is clear for the providers of insurance products and services, the customers have not only less control over their data, but also hardly benefit from the creation of those data points. In this paper we provide a case study from the British car insurance industry, about a data-driven product that pivoted into a re-designed personal data right architecture, which included transparency, traceability and usability of customers’ digital traces, and enabled customers’ ownership rights over their data.

The world is in the midst of a digital transformation. An intensified prevalence and use of digital technologies is fundamentally changing organizations and economies. However, the notion of 'digital transformation' is both theoretically and empirically underspecified. This paper rethinks the digital transformation narrative theoretically by embedding the concept in concurrent debates about technological revolutions and neo-Schumpeterian innovation theory. Empirically, the paper specifies the digital transformation by analysing the technological composition of key start-up and scale-up companies in the knowledge-intensive services sector. Undertaking a technology space analysis of 40,754 start-up and scale-up companies derived from the near real-time Dealroom.co database, we analyse which technologies and application domains are currently converging, distilling of key elements of the digital transformation. The paper concludes that the transmission of digital technologies is often indirect through ‘key enabling technology clusters’ that connect the technological vanguard to application domains.

The study examines the Israeli Government Loans for SMEs in 2015. Our findings are based on three surveys. A business survey of 384 businesses that were granted a Government loan, a business survey of 99 businesses that were granted loans but decided not to take them and a survey of 50 loan consultants who advised those businesses about their eligibility and the Terms and Conditions of the loans. We tested Loan Adjusted Additionality and Loan Baseline Additionality and found that 53% of loans taken from the Government Loans Foundation (GLF) are additional loans. SMEs would not have taken a loan, or any part of one, if not for the Government Loans Foundation Scheme. Our contribution to the literature is by including Indirect Additionality, demonstrating the importance of the GLF Scheme, not only by assisting SMEs in their financial planning and growth but also, by signalling early stage business resilience, reducing the risks for commercial banks through regulated, financial due diligence. This outcome expands the pool of SMEs which have access to free market loans and has the potential to improve their survival rate, thus fostering economic growth.

Advanced robotics is a disruptive technology that has the potential to create massive economic impact. According to a McKinsey Global Institute study in 2013, advanced robotics were identified as one of twelve disruptive technologies to have an economic impact, with an estimated potential to affect $6.3 trillion in labour costs globally (McKinsey, 2013).

One application of advanced robotics is the automation of cargo ports, with the intention of increasing profitability for cargo terminals by reducing costs and increasing container handling productivity. They comprise autonomous guided vehicle (AGV) robots equipped with radar and laser guidance technology to navigate and position containers in the optimum and most efficient manner, by minimising space allocation time and providing significant safety improvements.

The need to increase cargo capacity to support economic growth is a global trend, which is echoed by Australian reports that acknowledge the urgent need for freight capacity increase. Unless Australian ports are able to expand their capacity by improving their productivity, the growing technology along the cargo supply chain will create a bottleneck in Australian ports that could hamper its economic growth. According to the Bureau of Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Economics (BITRE) data, in the year 2029-30, across Australia, ports will handle almost twice as much capacity as they do today. This capacity increase would require a significant improvement in using the nation’s resources, through optimisation of space and transportation capabilities (BITRE, 2010).

The most significant contribution to Australian ports would result from a fully automated system that connects the terminal operating system (TOS) and equipment that would integrate and interface with the terminal logistic system (TLS). This report focuses on advanced robotics able to handle the cargo in Australia's ports, and provides an economic benefit analysis and forecast of moving towards automated autonomous straddle carriers across Australia. Currently Brisbane port operates a fully autonomous straddle carrier terminal, with another due to become operational in Botany Bay, Sydney in 2014. In January 2015 Kalmar announced that it has been awarded a contract to provide an integrated automation system to handle operations at Victoria International Container Terminal Ltd's (VICT) new terminal in Melbourne, Australia (Kalmar, 2015). Autonomous straddle carrier technology can not only significantly improve freight capacity but can also enhance the safety of operations, reducing the potential for manual errors by isolating the workforce from heavy machinery. Patrick – one of Australia leading company for containers stevedoring services reports that in the first year of straddle automation at Brisbane terminal they achieved a 75% reduction in safety incidents that increased with a reduction of 90% in following years (Patrick, 2012) .

Findings suggest a net present value (NPV) of autonomous straddle carrier technology in direct impact worth for NSW of around $9.42 to $10 billion between the years 2014 and 2030. Nationally, the estimated NPV revenue gain ranges between around $32.1 billion and $34.1 billion. This study solely focuses on a specific automation technology - straddle carrier technology. A fully automated cargo port has the potential for increased economic impact. Therefore, a broader analysis of a fully automated system and its potential productivity increase should be considered.

A cost benefit analysis was not undertaken in this report as innovation studies show that any innovation outcome cannot capture the full benefit to the economy, therefore the costs are normally high and in most cases create no tangible benefit but creates intangibles like knowledge is not easy to be quantified. In this report we present only the final application of a long term process of university R&D effort. Similarly, the safety benefits due to the introduction of this technology were addressed but they were not quantified.  

The purpose of this work is to provide economic evaluation of a transformative innovation in the open cut mining industry in Australia. The innovative technology reviewed in this case study is mostly focused on Autonomous Guided Vehicles (AGVs) that, according to experts, can provide the most significant contribution to productivity improvement (Durrant-Whyte et.al, 2007). This study looks at automation of the full supply chain, which has the potential to improve the whole planning process of handling minerals, from the drilling stage through haulage by automated trucks, to the loading and transfer of minerals at ports. Although the contribution of each operation in the supply chain involving automated mining was analysed separately, this document provides evidence that having a full end-to-end automated mine can significantly reduce production costs and increase productivity, even allowing for a relatively slow adoption rate over a 20-year timeframe by the mining industry in Australia. The mining industry has an important role in Australian economic growth. According to the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA), in 2011 the value of resource exports rose by 16%, accounting for 2 percentage points of the 5.5% growth in nominal GDP over the year to December (RBA, 2012). While the volume of export capacity did not change significantly (only increasing by 1%), the prices of minerals have steadily increased in the last 30 years. This gap between the value and volume of export growth can be addressed by technological solutions to increase productivity. Any technological solution that can increase mining production volume would yield a significant increase in value, which in turn would increase Australia’s GDP. This study found that four major minerals account for 98.9% of Australia’s export capacity: coal, iron ore, bauxite and copper ore.

Our findings suggest that in 2013, if 3% of Australian mines had started the process of fully automating their mines, over the next 20 years, on average, every year mining revenues would increase by nearly AUD$436 million for coal, AUD$724 million for iron ore, AUD$291 million for bauxite and AUD$105 million for copper. Due to a different distribution of mines between the states, the main beneficiaries of automated coal mines would be NSW and Queensland, while WA would be the main beneficiary for automated iron ore and bauxite mines. The net present value of automating production in Australia for all four minerals over 20 years of deployment of the technology by around half of the total mines is estimated to be more than AUD$31 billion, while iron ore accounts for 47%, coal 28%, bauxite 19% and copper ore 7%. Coal mines are expected to yield a very high return on investment. In NSW coal production is expected to increase by additional 4,354 thousand tonnes in year 2032, while Queensland mines will increase their coal production by 5,844 thousand tonnes in that year. Similarly, iron ore mines in WA would increase their production by additional 11.8 megatons in 3032. This significant production increase has a very high impact on total mines revenue in the specified States above.

The study of the contribution of incubators to economic growth started to gain momentum in the 1980s, following the growth of the incubation phenomenon. While acknowledging the challenge of evaluating incubators׳ outcomes, we shift the focus from incubators׳ performance to their internal processes, in particular, the interrelationships through which the incubator stakeholders share knowledge. The literature suggests that small new ventures tend to fail because they lack managerial experience and ability to raise capital in an early stage. Incubators are expected to overcome these obstacles by offering experienced monitoring skills and by enhancing access to capital at a firm׳s early stage. However, empirical results of incubators׳ ability to perform their role are often contradictory, making policy makers question their effectiveness. We provide evidence from Australian and Israeli incubators. Our findings suggest that collaborations between incubatees, graduated incubatees, and incubator management increase the incubatees׳ knowledge of technology and market in both countries. Collaboration between incubatees and incubator management also increase incubatees׳ financial knowledge and their likelihood of raising capital. We also found that universities played a modest role as a source of new ideas for incubatees, but a more important role in later stages of incubatees׳ new product development processes.

Scientific research in universities is a critical and powerful component of knowledge creation for any society. However, for a country like Israel, one with no resources but its human capital - and that faces constant regional instability - scientific research is crucial for its existence. Historically, there was a fundamental understanding that in such a small country only universities can ensure viable, profound and high-caliber research, by critical mass of human capital and by optimising its resources. In this study, we look at the role of Israeli research universities in the National R&D System, why Israel is unique in its R&D structure, and how that structure is related to the universities' roles. We found that, despite Israel's outstanding ranking, in comparison to other OECD countries, for its R&D inputs and outputs, the Israeli universities' R&D output - measured in patents - is highly volatile and mostly affected by the country's strong business sector. This finding has implications regarding the strengthening of specific fields of research and the discussion about the role of universities in conducting applied vs basic research.

Studying the roles of governments in adopting green innovations is significant for analysing the transition to a more sustainable energy system. This article presents a comparative study of policies for popularizing domestic solar water heaters in three countries: China, Israel and Australia. Expanding the analysis beyond the economics of innovation, it demonstrates the institutional dimension of green technology deployment in these three countries. By examining the diverging roles of governments in facilitating green technology adoption in existing social routines and practices, it finds that governments' motivations, support and implementation mechanisms are remarkably different in these three countries. In particular, the paper argues that solar water heater popularization has been distinguished as a business opportunity in China, energy security in Israel and environmental responsibility in Australia. In addition, the institutional settings have a real impact on governments' roles in adopting green innovations, in terms of the policy instruments chosen and implementation mechanisms.