Mapping the potentials of regions in Europe to contribute to new knowledge production in Industry 4.0 technologies

This paper aims to identify the future Industry 4.0 technology (I4T) centres of knowledge production in Europe. We expect I4Ts to thrive in regions where they can draw on local capabilities in I4T-related technologies. We use patent data to identify I4T-related technologies and find that I4Ts are positioned in the periphery of the knowledge space. The study shows that European regions with a high potential in terms of I4T-related technologies are more likely to diversify successfully in new I4Ts. We find huge differences across regions: some show high, but most regions show weak I4T potential.