Keith Pavitt (January 13, 1937, in

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

– December 20, 2002, in

Lewes Lewes () is the county town of East Sussex, England. The town is the administrative centre of the wider Lewes (district), district of the same name. It lies on the River Ouse, Sussex, River Ouse at the point where the river cuts through the Sou ...

East Sussex East Sussex is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Kent to the north-east, West Sussex to the west, Surrey to the north-west, and the English Channel to the south. The largest settlement ...

) was an English scholar in the field of Science and Technology Policy and Innovation Management. He was professor of Science and Technology Policy at the Science Policy Research Unit ( SPRU) of the

University of Sussex The University of Sussex is a public university, public research university, research university located in Falmer, East Sussex, England. It lies mostly within the city boundaries of Brighton and Hove. Its large campus site is surrounded by the ...

from 1984 to his death.

Biography

Keith Pavitt grew up in Hackney, London. In 1948 he graduated to Hackney Downs School (formerly The Grocers' Company's School). He won an Open Exhibition for Mathematics at

Trinity College, Cambridge Trinity College is a Colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any ...

in the Autumn of 1954. During

National Service National service is a system of compulsory or voluntary government service, usually military service. Conscription is mandatory national service. The term ''national service'' comes from the United Kingdom's National Service (Armed Forces) Act ...

, he qualified as an RAF pilot. At

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a List of cities in the United Kingdom, city and non-metropolitan district in the county of Cambridgeshire, England. It is the county town of Cambridgeshire and is located on the River Cam, north of London. As of the 2021 Unit ...

he obtained a First in Engineering in 1959 and was Senior Scholar at Trinity College. He won a fellowship in economics and

public policy Public policy is an institutionalized proposal or a Group decision-making, decided set of elements like laws, regulations, guidelines, and actions to Problem solving, solve or address relevant and problematic social issues, guided by a conceptio ...

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

in 1960-1961. After leaving Harvard, Pavitt began research at the

OECD The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD; , OCDE) is an international organization, intergovernmental organization with 38 member countries, founded in 1961 to stimulate economic progress and international trade, wor ...

on science and engineering-related public policy. After a year at

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial ...

, Pavitt moved to Sussex University in 1971, becoming the Reginald Phillips Professor of Science and Technology Policy in 1984. He received a Laurea Honoris Causa from the

Universidad Complutense de Madrid The Complutense University of Madrid (, UCM; ) is a public research university located in Madrid. Founded in Alcalá in 1293 (before relocating to Madrid in 1836), it is one of the oldest operating universities in the world, and one of Spain's ...

Contributions to science and technology policy

Keith Pavitt pioneered new methods to measure innovation and technical change. Together wit
Pari Patel
and Luc Soete, he developed the use of

patents A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an sufficiency of disclosure, enabling discl ...

as a science and technology

indicator Indicator may refer to: Biology * Environmental indicator of environmental health (pressures, conditions and responses) * Ecological indicator of ecosystem health (ecological processes) * Health indicator, which is used to describe the health o ...

. In the early 1980s, he also developed, together with Joe Townsend and other colleagues, a comprehensive database of innovations introduced in the UK since the end of the war. This

database In computing, a database is an organized collection of data or a type of data store based on the use of a database management system (DBMS), the software that interacts with end users, applications, and the database itself to capture and a ...

was used by several scholars and it is still a milestone in innovation measurement. Together with Roy Rothwell, he also developed the theory and practice of innovation management. As co-editor of

academic journal An academic journal (or scholarly journal or scientific journal) is a periodical publication in which Scholarly method, scholarship relating to a particular academic discipline is published. They serve as permanent and transparent forums for the ...

'' Research Policy''. He contributed to enhance its reputation to become the most influential publication in the field.

Pavitt's taxonomy

The single most important contribution provided by Pavitt to the economics of innovation is his

taxonomy image:Hierarchical clustering diagram.png, 280px, Generalized scheme of taxonomy Taxonomy is a practice and science concerned with classification or categorization. Typically, there are two parts to it: the development of an underlying scheme o ...

of innovating firms. Pavitt argued that the sources and purposes of innovation are sector-specific. On the ground of an impressive knowledge of industrial

innovation Innovation is the practical implementation of ideas that result in the introduction of new goods or service (economics), services or improvement in offering goods or services. ISO TC 279 in the standard ISO 56000:2020 defines innovation as "a n ...

Pavitt's Taxonomy Pavitt's Taxonomy categorizes mostly large industrial firms along trajectories of technological change according to sources of technology, requirements of the users, and appropriability regime (Pavitt 1984). The taxonomy aims to classify innovation ...

suggests that firms can be divided into four broad categories: supplier dominated firms, i.e. those firms that acquire their technical expertise from their suppliers, specialised suppliers, especially in the field of

equipment Equipment most commonly refers to a set of tool A tool is an Physical object, object that can extend an individual's ability to modify features of the surrounding environment or help them accomplish a particular task. Although many Tool use by ...

and

capital goods In economics, capital goods or capital are "those durable produced goods that are in turn used as productive inputs for further production" of goods and services. A typical example is the machinery used in a factory. At the macroeconomic level, ...

, which provide the innovations to other firms, scale intensive firms, where the innovation is associated to scale, and science-based firms, which innovate through their internal R&D laboratories. In subsequent versions of his taxonomy, Pavitt added up also the category of information intensive firms, where the most important source to innovate is the use of data. These firms included firms in the software as well as in advanced services such as banking and retailing.

has been widely applied in

industrial economics In economics, industrial organization is a field that builds on the theory of the firm by examining the structure of (and, therefore, the boundaries between) firms and markets. Industrial organization adds real-world complications to the perfe ...

and

science policy Science policy is concerned with the allocation of resources for the conduct of science towards the goal of best serving the public interest. Topics include the funding of science, the careers of scientists, and the translation of scientific disc ...

and it is also used for industrial statistics. Originally developed for the manufacturing sector, is now increasingly applied also to the

service economy Service economy can refer to one or both of two recent economic developments: * The increased importance of the service sector in industrialized economies. The current list of Fortune 500 companies contains more service companies and fewer m ...

Legacy

Keith Pavitt was a crucial figure, together with his mentor Chris Freeman, to make SPRU a centre of international excellence in the field of

studies, with close collaboration with colleagues from all continents. He collaborated closely with Belgian economist Luc Soete, with Italian social scientist Giovanni Dosi, and he kept a strong intellectual link with the American economist Richard R. Nelson. A large number of papers were co-authored with the Indian economis
Pari Patel
He also supervised and worked with several economists of innovation and

scholars, including Giorgio Sirilli
Ben MartinMike HobdayIan MilesJosé Molero Zayas
,

Daniele Archibugi Daniele Archibugi (born 17 July 1958 in Rome, Italy) is an Italian economic and political theorist. He works on the economics and policy of innovation and technological change, on the political theory of international relations and on political ...

, Jan Fagerberg, an
Diana Hicks
For his retirement, his colleagues organised a major Conference in honour of Keith Pavitt "What do we know about innovation?". Unexpectedly, Pavitt died several months before the Conference was held. The Conference became a major tribute to his life and works. The most important scholars in the field of science and technology policy attended it at SPRU,

, on 12–15 November 2003, The Library of the

Science Policy Research Unit The Science Policy Research Unit (SPRU) is a research centre based at the University of Sussex in Falmer, near Brighton, United Kingdom. Its research focuses on science policy and innovation. SPRU offers MSc courses and PhD research degrees. ...

and the Laboratorio di Economia dell'Innovazione of the

University of Florence The University of Florence ( Italian: ''Università degli Studi di Firenze'') (in acronym UNIFI) is an Italian public research university located in Florence, Italy. It comprises 12 schools and has around 50,000 students enrolled. History The f ...

Laboratorio di Economia dell'Innovazione of the University of Florenc

. are named after him.

Works by Keith Pavitt

*Joe Tidd, John Bessant and Keith Pavitt, ''Managing Innovation: Integrating Technological, Market and Organizational Change'', 3rd Edition, John Wiley, Hoboken, NJ, 2005, *Keith Pavitt
''Technology, Management and Systems of Innovation''
Edward Elgar, Cheltenham, 1999 (a collection of the most influential papers). * Giovanni Dosi, Keith Pavitt, Luc Soete, ''The Economics of Technical Change and International Trade'', New York University Press, New York, 1991, . *Keith Pavitt, ''Sectoral patterns of technical change: Towards a taxonomy and a theory'', " Research Policy", Volume 13, Issue 6, December 1984, Pages 343–373 .

Works on Keith Pavitt

,
Pavitt's Taxonomy Sixteen Years on: A Review Article
, ''Economics of Innovation and New Technology'', vol. 3 (2001), pp. 415–425. * Chris Freeman, Pari Patel and Ben Martin
Keith Pavitt. Pioneer in science policy research. Obituary''
the Independent, 31 January 2003. *Martin Meyer, Tiago Santos Pereirac, Olle Persson and Ove Granstrand, "The Scientometric World of Keith Pavitt: A Tribute to his contributions to Research Policy and Patent Analysis”, '' Research Policy,'' Vol. 33, no. 9 (2004), pages 1405–1417. *Bart Verspagen and Claudia Werker, "Keith Pavitt and the Invisible College of the Economics of Technology and Innovation", '' Research Policy.'' Vol. 33, no. 9 (2004), pages: 1419–1431

References

External links

List of works of Keith Pavitt listed on Google Scholar
* http://www.inovasyon.org/pdf/Keith_Pavitt.pdf {{DEFAULTSORT:Pavitt, Keith Innovation economists Alumni of the Science Policy Research Unit 1937 births People educated at Hackney Downs School English economists Academics of the University of Sussex Harvard Fellows 2002 deaths