Scenario planning of regional innovation in Tabriz metropolis with a future research approach

By entering the 21st century and the rapid process of globalization and changing the role of cities and turning them into centers for attracting capital, goods, information, knowledge, and innovation, we are witnessing the increasing participation of cities in the global economy. An economy that changed from traditional in the last two to three decades today is based on knowledge. Following these changes, the cities of the future must become innovative and competitive to compete, maintain and improve their position in the global arena and respond to the diverse needs of customers. In this regard, when the competition among cities was raised, the urban planning and management system to compete in the international arena and gain this competitive advantage, by changing its attitude from environmental resources to human resources, trying to preserve its limited natural resources and potentials. To base the development of the city on the resources and potentials that are produced and reproduced. Because these resources and forces are human potentials and creative and innovative forces, they seek to upgrade their infrastructure to encourage innovation and include different national, regional, technological, and sector levels. Given that national economic performance is strongly linked to regional economic performance, a regional approach is the most appropriate method to formulate and implement national innovation systems.On the other hand, due to the need for the necessary infrastructure to create innovation in the cities of developing countries, including Iran, and the uncertainty caused by the environmental complexity, the future forecast for the development of innovation has become difficult, so that with the increase of changes and transformations, reliance on planning methods Based on forecasting, it does not meet the needs of the macro management of the country, and the heavy shadow of uncertainties and the emergence of discontinuous and surprising events changed the situation in such a way that predicting the future seems difficult for planners. For this reason, researchers take advantage of the capabilities of the emerging knowledge of futurism and introduce foresight into the planning and forecasting activities, one of which is scenario planning, and its purpose is to expand thinking about the future and widen the range of alternatives. which can be desired, in this regard, the metropolis of Tabriz has advantages such as a dense industrial economic environment as one of the main industrial hubs of the country, the existence of various industrial support institutions, a significant concentration of higher education centers and research centers such as Tabriz University, parks Science and growth centers, strong communication network and ease of communication with other places and markets inside and outside the border have been chosen to plan the development of regional innovation in the metropolis of Tabriz based on the future research approach.

Double-click for synonyms and definitions (all sites) ✕ Copy text Current research is applied in terms of purpose and narrative analysis in terms of nature. To gather the required information, two library and field methods were employed. In the library method, using the environmental scanning method, the theoretical foundations, background of the subject, and the collection of effective dimensions and indicators in the field of regional innovation were investigated, and in the field method, the required information was completed in several stages by using semi-structured questionnaires. The statistical population of the research also includes 32 qualified people in the industry, university, and government sectors, who were selected by purposeful sampling. To analyze the data, Mic Mac, Scenario Wizard and SWAT software were used, along with the inductive method.

In this research, to obtain the key factors affecting regional innovation in the metropolis of Tabriz, the Delphi method and environmental survey have been used, and finally, 71 variables have been collected in 5 dimensions; After identifying the required variables and extracting the key factors, Mic Mac software was used. The results of Mic Mac software show that among the 71 factors affecting regional innovation in the Tabriz metropolis, 13 factors including the appropriate culture of productivity, Laws, and regulations, the existence of a teamwork culture between activists and established industrial units, information and communication technology infrastructure, sufficient funding for university research infrastructure, higher education, patent programs, higher education policy, performance evaluation and reward system, financial support, tax system Special and flexible for research and development, the existence of joint research centers between university and industry and the level of interaction and cooperation between university and industry play a key role and each of them somehow causes or accelerates the innovation process of the region at the level of Tabriz metropolis. In this regard, possible scenarios have been designed for each of the key factors, and these scenarios have been analyzed after scoring by Delphi panel experts using the Scenario Wizard software; The results of the analysis of the scenario wizard software show that 3 strong scenarios, 12 believable scenarios, and 8462 weak scenarios are facing regional innovation in Tabriz metropolis.

The results of the research show that among the three strong, weak, and believable scenarios, the believable scenario was chosen as the basis of analysis because it was intermediate between the other two scenarios and had the necessary favorability. Interest induction was said to be and the results of the inductive method include three categories: gold scenario, alert scenario, and disaster scenario. Finally, the validity of the scenarios was used to determine the level of implementation of the golden scenarios, disasters and warnings. According to the opinions of the experts, reaching the disaster scenario seems very pessimistic due to the critical conditions in all factors, and the warning scenario does not follow the continuation of the existing situation and the lack of change in the conditions and the improvement of regional innovation. For this reason, the opinions of the experts indicate their consensus on the golden scenarios, which are based on favorable situations in both environmental and organizational dimensions. Because by implementing this scenario and focusing on each of the key drivers, we will see an increase in the level of regional innovation over the given horizon.