A Bibliometric Perspective on Technology-Driven Innovation in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) Countries in Relation to Its Transformative Impact on International Business

Introduction

Technology-driven innovations and scientific research play an important role in the economic growth of a country by producing the cost effective solutions and quality improvement of their products. Thus, it is impossible for countries and societies to develop sustainable economies without taking initiatives towards the enhancement of technology-driven innovation and scientific research (Hassan, Sarwar, & Muazzam, 2016). Modern economies are established on the bases of technology-driven innovation and scientific research and it has been the key focus of modern nations. Thus, the socio-economic and environmental conditions of these modern nations have been improved. The policymakers and the governments of these nations have adopted countless approaches to upsurge the technology-driven innovations (Sarwar & Hassan, 2015).

The Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) nations proposed a vision of transforming their petrochemical economies to sustainable and diversified economies with the help of technology-driven innovations and scientific research. GCC nations have significantly invested in fostering the scientific research and technology-driven innovations as these are two most effective factors that help to transform a country’s economy into a knowledge-based economy. Specifically, GCC nations have established state-of-the-art research centers, universities, and knowledge parks. Besides that, GCC nations have established the campuses of prestigious international universities to bridge the gap (Wiseman & Anderson, 2012). Some of the initiates taken by GCC nations are illustrated in the following paragraphs of this section.

Arab Science and Technology Foundation (ASTF) was established by 2000 in Sharjah City and it is a non-profit, non-governmental and civil organization aims to support technology-driven innovation and scientific research to transform United Arab Emirate’s economy into a knowledge-based economy. This organization has supported more than 700 researchers working in more than 140 different projects and it has established 30 companies focused on R&D (cf.: http://www.astf.net).

In 2007, the government of United Arab Emirates (UAE) established the worlds’ largest Higher Education Free Zone known as Dubai International Academic City (DIAC). DIAC education zone also aims at transforming the UAE economy into a knowledge-based economy by 2021. Currently, DIAC is hosting a community of 24,000 students from 145 nationalities. These students have access to over 400 different higher education programs. The government of UAE also proposed a vision 2021 which aims at enlarging the socio-economic developments. Specifically, it seeks to transform the UAE petrochemical economy into a knowledge-based economy. To fulfill the objectives of the vision 2021, the government of UAE has increased the Research and Development budget. Recently the government of UAE has announced $82 billion funding to facilitate the vision 2021. Besides that, several research centers have been established in the country, such as, Science & Innovation Park was established by United Arab Emirates University and the Khalifa Innovation Centre was established by Khalifa University of Science & Technology. In addition to this, Abu Dhabi, the capital state of UAE is capitalizing on its energy resources to transform its economy to a sustainable economy. The Masdar Institute is at the core of this planning which is attracting powerful partner enterprises like Siemens and Credit Suisse and plans to attract 50, 000 peoples. In Abu Dhabi, the plan is to reduce the long-term dependency on hydrocarbons and maintain status in the energy sector (Adams et al. 2011).