Stefan Rehak (p), Miroslav Spurek, Balazs Lengyel

Yvonne Von Friedrichs

This paper examines the evolution of the urban scaling law in the production of patents and scientific papers across European cities from 1980 to 2010. Research and innovation are complex processes that benefit from local interactions, institutional presence, and human capital concentration. Prior studies show that large cities tend to exhibit superlinear scaling in scientific and innovative output, meaning they produce disproportionately more knowledge relative to their size. However, while patent literature has been much in the spotlight in recent years, urban scaling in scientific literature is still relatively under-explored, particularly in Europe. Using geocoded data on patents together with scientific papers of all European universities from Scopus, we analyze 631 cities across 31 European countries. We define cities as functional urban areas (FUA), capturing integrated labor markets. Our findings reveal a divergence between scientific and innovation output. The scaling exponent for academic publications started at 1.21 in 1980, peaked at 1.34 in 2000, and declined to 1.28 in 2010. In contrast, the scaling exponent for patents grew significantly, from 1.01 in 1980 to 1.42 in 2010, indicating an increasing concentration of innovation in large cities. We propose several explanations for these trends. The rising concentration of patents in large cities may result from stronger innovation ecosystems, increased collaboration between firms, universities, and research centers, and the agglomeration of human capital, investors, and support institutions. Meanwhile, the more even distribution of scientific output may be driven by expanded research funding beyond major academic centers, EU cohesion policies, and the rise of digital collaboration tools that enable research across distances.

Yvonne Von Friedrichs (p), Cecilia Dalborg (p)

Dimitrios Ierapetritis

Knowledge is a key factor for economic growth and regional development. The demand and competition for educated people is therefore high. Brain drain occurs when highly educated people leave their university regions with no intention of returning. This often causes many problems, which in the long run also develop into a negative spiral of lack of knowledge in regions that inhibits economic growth as well as a lack of skills in important sectors. Entrepreneurship has long been seen as a driver of regional development and plays an important role in societies with its economic efficiency, as a job creator and with transfer of innovation. Previous research has highlighted the role of entrepreneurial training and education as a strategic tool for regional development, and further underpinned the importance of academia, government and business to cooperate to enhance the entrepreneurial intention in regions. Hence, entrepreneurship in Higher Education Institutions (HEI) can contribute to regional growth and economic development. As HEIs prepare students for different careers that are related to the requirements of the labour market, the HEIs can contribute to increase student employability but also enhance their entrepreneurial skills. The purpose of this paper is to increase the knowledge about European students' attitudes to their study region and to explore if promoting entrepreneurial skills could be a way to avoid regional brain drain. The following RQs are raised:1. To what extent do European students intend to remain in their university region?2. What is the main reason why the students choose to stay or leave their university region? 3. What attitude and experience do students have towards entrepreneurship? A web-based survey was conducted in 2024 to university students in Austria, Germany, Greece, Latvia, Poland and Sweden. The survey was distributed by the partners in the ENDORSE project in various universities.The results shows that 1) good job opportunities are the most important reason for staying or leaving the study region, 2) that there is lack of knowledge among the students whether entrepreneurship is a good choice in the region or not, 3) that students consider that universities can increase students’ intention to start a business by facilitate networking with important actors and provide suitable courses in entrepreneurship. The findings offer important insights into how to tackle brain drain in European regions suffering from brain drain due to that well-educated young people are leaving the university region after graduation.

Dimitrios Ierapetritis (p), Thomas Georgiadis, Yannis Psycharis

Thomas Georgiadis

Brain drain has become a key topic in public discourse and a focal point for political actions at the European national and regional levels. It describes the emigration of highly skilled and educated persons that have left their countries and regions to study abroad and do not return after their graduation, often in pursuit of better job career opportunities and improved living standards. Concurrently, the receiving countries and regions benefit significantly from the use of these skilled human resources, leading to a "brain gain" phenomenon, as a result of highly skilled migration. The present article examines the factors that influence the decision of graduates and their willingness to stay or leave the region of graduation, based on the results of field research of 260 University students conducted in Greek University cities. Methodologically, the field research focusing on two groups of Greek regions, those known as brain drain regions and those that manage to maintain their status as brain gainers, it investigates first, the willingness of students to stay or leave their region of study. Second, it examines the relative importance of economic, social and political factors that influence students to stay or leave their region of study. Third, it explores students' entrepreneurial intentions and examines how these aspirations influence their decision to remain in their study region to establish a business.