Mapping innovation in the European transport sector

This report provides an overview of the innovation capacity of the European transport sectors. The analysis addresses transport-related innovation from three different angles. It identifies drivers and barriers to innovation in transport; it assesses the levels of transport-related R&D investments of the main industrial R&D investors and public funders; and it maps the key actors for transport research and knowledge flows between them. The analysis finds that the transport industry strongly invests in R&D, in particular the manufacturers of passenger cars and airplanes. At the same time, transport service provides and companies involved in the construction of transport infrastructure have low incentives to invest in research. Despite the significant on-going research efforts in transport the potential for systemic innovations that go beyond modal boundaries and leave the currently pre-dominant design are under-exploited due to prominent lock-in effects caused by infrastructure and the institutional set-up of the innovation systems.