Policy for innovation capacity building in Sweden and beyond

Research in porous materials science conducted by Russell Morris has resulted in him being chosen to evaluate a porous materials innovation centre, the XSELENT Berzelii Centre, by the Swedish governmental innovation department, Vinnova.

Subsequent to this specialist evaluation, Russell Morris was invited to become a member of a generalist panel of five internationally renowned scientists who evaluate all the Berzelii and VINN Excellence Centres. These centres involve an almost 4 billion SEK (€400 million) investment into the innovation landscape in Sweden.

A major part of the international committee’s remit is to provide recommendations on how Vinnova (and so Swedish Government) policy can be formulated to benefit Swedish industry and the economy as a whole and to develop policy on how the individual centres can maximise their own impact.

Beyond the impact to Sweden, there has also been a significant impact on UK and international companies. Of the 190 companies impacted, the majority are based outside Sweden and cover the whole globe. Examples of global companies that have been significantly impacted include ExxonMobil and Chevron in the USA plus many of the major players in Europe. Companies in the UK that have been impacted include pharmaceutical giants such as GSK.