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001			pwiiw7542
003			OSt
005			20260518120040.0
008			260322t2026 au ||||| |||| 00| ||eng d
040			_cOSt
041			_aeng
084			_aL26 _aO30 _aO52 _aR11 _aR58 _aG24 _2jelc
100	1		_aBykova, Alexandra
245	1	0	_aScaling CESEE innovation: Ecosystem dynamics and strategic relocation opportunities
260			_aWien : _bWiener Institut für Internationale Wirtschaftsvergleiche (wiiw), _c2026.
300			_a39 S., _b6 Tables and 11 Figures, _c30cm.
490	1		_awiiw Policy Notes and Reports _v105
520			_aEurope’s innovation bottleneck increasingly manifests in the difficulty of scaling promising startups into globally competitive firms. Central, East and Southeast Europe (CESEE) is particularly exposed to this due to limited finance and local acquirers, which lead to serious risks of relocation particularly beyond the EU’s borders. This policy note documents the sectoral structure and dynamics of CESEE small enterprises (10-49 employees) across six broadly defined macro-sectors: Digital Economy, Life Sciences, Media, Creative Economy, Production, and Neighbourhood Economy. It uses Eurostat’s Structural Business Statistics and patent data from the OECD Patent Database. An analysis of the most influential rankings of innovative clusters and related outcome indicators complements the descriptive analysis. The note finds that Production and the Neighbourhood Economy represent the lion’s share of the region’s small enterprises, while Digital Economy is the clear growth champion. Creative Economy activities show solid, if uneven, expansion. And while the Media macro-sector stagnates, Life Sciences exhibits highly concentrated but distinctive niche specialisations, especially in smaller economies. Ecosystem rankings and unicorn outcomes reveal an intensely urban, highly heterogeneous innovation landscape. Some small CESEE states, such as Estonia, Lithuania, and Croatia, achieve exceptional unicorn densities, yet many of these firms relocate their headquarters to the US or the UK to access deeper capital markets. The paper posits that strategic intra-EU relocation and dual-hub models – particularly leveraging, for instance, Vienna’s role as a proximate, research-intensive hub – can help to keep CESEE firms and value creation within the European innovation system while Capital Markets Union reforms remain incomplete.
650			_aCESEE
650			_aStartups
650			_aScaleups
650			_aUnicorns
650			_aInnovation
650			_aSectoral specialisation
650			_aPatents
650			_aUrban hubs
650			_aCapital markets
651			_aAustria
651			_aCEE
651			_aSEE
690			_aSectoral studies
700	1		_aGuadagno, Francesca
700	1		_aGutzianas, Ioannis
700	1		_aHolzner, Mario
830		0	_v105 _wWIIW0000092 _twiiw Policy Notes and Reports
856	4	0	_uhttps://wiiw.ac.at/p-7542.html
942			_cP
999			_c9162 _d9162