TusPark，From v1.0 to v 3.0

清华科技园的1.0、2.0、3.0版

Creating the Largest Clustering Innovation Network in the World with Multidimensional Triple Helix Model

——立体三螺旋模式构建全球最大集群式创新网络

Author: TusHoldings-Innovation Research Institute – The Think Tank of TusHoldings (1)

作者：启迪创新研究院——启迪智库

 

　　IV.TusPark 3.0, inheriting innovation, creating the world's largest clustering innovation network by the Multidimensional Triple Helix Model  
 

　　As mentioned in the beginning of the article, as TusPark was growing from initial construction to maturity, its operator TusHoldings also saw profound changes in corporate governance, strategic positioning and development model. The ownership structure of TusHoldings has changed from 100% ownership by Tsinghua University to a state-controlling mixed ownership structure with social capital. In particular, after new strategic partners were introduced in 2012, under the guidance of the policy on reform of state-owned enterprises, TusHoldings actively explored new development ideas, new models and new mechanisms centering on the national innovation-oriented development strategy. TusHoldings significantly upgraded its strategic positioning, committed to becoming a S&T service provider with comprehensive service capability in planning, construction, operation and management of science parks with the aim of becoming a leader in China and a global model in the S&T service industry. In terms of business layout, based on the Multidimensional Triple Helix Model, TusHoldings has constructed a “Science park, S&T industry, and S&T finance” three-in-one pattern. All those changes of TusHoldings as an operation and management company have directly prompted the transformation of TusPark from a single science park to a park network and clustering innovation ecosystem.
 

 

 

　　Therefore, to analyze the development and changes of TusPark 3.0, we need a deep understanding of the exploration and reform of TusHoldings in its systems and mechanism and the theoretical innovation and practice that TusHoldings has made in establishing an innovation and entrepreneurship ecosystem in a wider area.
 

　　(I) TusHoldings implements people-oriented business partnership systems to inspire team potential
 

　　“Law is the very foundation of governance”. Good management is not just institutionalized management but also people-oriented management. Only when people-oriented management and institutionalized management are combined can the transformation from traditional management to modern management be effectively realized.
 

　　To ensure the success of TusPark 3.0, TusHoldings has redesigned its governance structure and management system to give play to the clustering collaboration effect as a holding company. Since 2012, TusHoldings has launched a business partnership system and an internal control system that features “effective supervision, full authorization and sunshine incentive” based on corporate culture and development strategy, and implemented them in the whole science park management system and business branches. The institutional model that combines “effective supervision, full authorization and sunshine incentive” is to give full authorization and sunshine incentive on the premise of effective supervision. The three are integral and work together to constitute the cornerstone of TusHoldings’ management system. In actual operation, by building the three-power (“legal person power”, “financial power” and “management power”) separated control model, TusHoldings has created a board secretary system and vertical financial management system to exercise the legal person power, thus realizing effective supervision; meanwhile, TusHoldings has completely delegated management power, realizing the full authorization of the operational team and has adopted a business partnership system, realizing the positive incentive.
 

　　The premise of complete management power is effective supervision, mainly realized through the board secretary system and vertical financial management system. In the board secretary system of TusHoldings, the board secretaries of all subsidiaries (regardless of level) are appointed by the headquarters and report to the secretary of the board of directors of TusHoldings. The level of the board secretary shall not be lower than that of assistant to the general manager and he or she must participate in the major events of the company and all senior management meetings. The board secretary shall be responsible for the management of the company’s contract seal, official seal and other important seals and supervise the execution of management and decision-making powers of the management through authorization granted by the board of shareholders, the board of directors and the supervisory board. Meanwhile, TusHoldings has implemented vertical management of finance. The CFOs of all subsidiaries (regardless of level) must be audited, determined and assigned by the headquarters and shall report to the CFO of the headquarters. The CFO of each company shall be responsible for the management of financial seals and capital management of the company and monitor the operation of the company from the perspective of financial operation. Under the effective supervision of the board secretary and CFO, each subsidiary makes its own business plan in principle and when it needs resource support from the headquarters, headquarters decides whether to participate in decision making.
 

　　The core of TusHoldings’ business partnership system is people oriented. All business partners closely identify with the values of TusHoldings and promise to diligently practice the objectives and principles of TusHoldings to create, share and work with TusHoldings with one mind. The subsidiaries of TusHoldings are business partners of TusHoldings. In the business partnership system, TusHoldings gives shares to the teams of subsidiaries mainly through equity; if that cannot be realized, the board of shareholders offers a “10% net profit” incentive policy to subsidiaries and specifies that the bonuses to the number one man of each subsidiary shall be no less than half of the total dividend. TusHoldings’ science parks, science towns and incubators across the country, and the industrial companies, adhere to the management philosophy and model. By focusing on the people in corporate management, TusHoldings has built an excellent entrepreneurial team that shares and bears with TusHoldings, jointly supports strategic transformation and implementation and highly identifies with and promotes the corporate culture of TusHoldings. The management team is motivated, giving new power to the development force and potential, enhancing their sense of accomplishment and sense of gain and guaranteeing the future-based core ability of TusHoldings. With the business partnership system as the key, TusHoldings has made continuous breakthroughs in organizational structure, management system and development force.
 

　　Another important role of the business partnership system is reflected in gathering Tsinghua University alumni and facilitating Tsinghua University to serve society. TusHoldings’ talent team includes a large proportion of Tsinghua University alumni; according to incomplete statistics, there are at least 400 Tsinghua University alumni. Through its regional park network, TusHoldings has assisted the General Association of Tsinghua Alumni in setting up a widespread alumni base group. Currently, nearly 50 alumni centers have been established; in consequence, through the alumni bases, local business clusters for innovation and entrepreneurship of alumni have been built. Meanwhile, the persons in charge of the bases are all Tsinghua University alumni who often take key posts in the local alumni association. For example, Wu WANG, Senior Vice President of TusHoldings and Chairman of Shaanxi TusHoldings, is the President of Xi’an Tsinghua Alumni Association; Fei ZHA, Senior Vice President of TusHoldings and General Manager of Anhui TusHoldings, is the President of Anhui Tsinghua Alumni Association, and so on. They have assisted Tsinghua University in serving society more effectively and carrying on the Tsinghua culture.
 

　　By conforming to the development requirements of the knowledge-based economy and information era and implementing the business partnership system and sunshine incentive, TusHoldings has truly inspired creativity. The mechanism is not just a material incentive mechanism but more importantly gives the team a higher sense of accomplishment, belonging and greater happiness, and this is fully reflected in TusHoldings’ respect and value of talents.
 

　　(II) Create “Multidimensional Triple Helix” model to improve development ability and core competitiveness of science parks

　　The concept of the triple helix first appeared in the field of biology in the early 1950s. Richard Lewontin, the American genetics researcher, first used the triple helix model to describe the relationship among genes, tissues and the environment. In the mid-1990s, Henry Etzkowitz, a sociologist at the State University of New York and Professor Loet Leydesdorff of the Amsterdam Institute of Technology proposed the innovative triple helix model theory of “Government-Industry-University” (based on the triple helix concept of biology) to describe the new interactive relationships among government, industry and universities in the knowledge economy era.
 

　　Along with the constant development of innovation practices, the Triple Helix is endowed with more prolific meanings. The relationships among university, industry and government can be analyzed and deconstructed and then re-combined to derive more new helixes with different dimensions. Based on many years of practice in the field of scientific and technological services, TusHoldings has developed a “Multidimensional Triple Helix” model, integrating the interaction of three Triple Helix theories: “Science Park + Industry + Finance” – “Technology + Capital + Industry” – “Government + Enterprise + University”, with innovation as the base to promote the development of industries. The model is an important upgrade and development of the original triple helix model theory of “Government-Industry-University” proposed by foreign scholars. It has advanced the former unidimensional triple helix model to the multidimensional triple helix system, becoming a “Multidimensional Triple Helix” that drives innovation and industry development.
 

▲ Schematic Diagram of Multidimensional Triple Helix
 

　　Promote the construction of a local ecological environment with TusHoldings characteristics through the triple helix model of “Science Parks + S&T Industry + S&T Finance”. The traditional thinking of “technology industry + land development = science park” is static and outdated; through the Multidimensional Triple Helix model to fully mobilize and activate and organically integrate the park, industry, finance and other stock resources, an effective and dynamic innovation and entrepreneurship ecosystem can be truly created. Based on the triple helix model of “Science Parks (Nest) + S&T Industry (Phoenix) + S&T Finance (Food)”, TusHoldings realized the approach of “nesting to attract the dragon with food and phoenix ”, TusHoldings built the science park and science cities as “nesting”. “Phoenix” refers to the science and technology enterprises of TusHoldings engaged in many fields, such as health, new energy, the Internet of Things and digital technology. “Food” refers to the financial instruments, such as angel investment, VC, PE, M&A, FOF and other funds in the whole industrial chain. With “phoenix”, “food” and “nest”, the “dragon” will be attracted in the future. “Dragon” refers to those potential and high-quality enterprises that promote local economic development. Obviously, the approach of “nesting to attract the dragon with food and phoenix” is better than “nesting to attract the phoenix” in nature.  To sum up, a science park of TusHoldings controls leading enterprises through direct investment, enriches the park space by investing in or incubating high-tech enterprises and strategic emerging industries, establishes a vertical incubation system to solve the financial requirements of investment and incubation by setting up a range of funding and financial service platforms.
 

　　Promote the transformation and upgrade of traditional industries and the development of emerging industries through the triple helix model of “Technology + Capital + Industry”. The traditional thinking of “Technology + Capital =Industry” is static and outdated. The concept of the triple helix is the simultaneous mobilization of stock capital and stock industries through core technologies to achieve a spiral surge of all the three factors. TusHoldings actively plans for strategic emerging industries and owns 72 world-class or China-leading S&T projects, which are mainly distributed in the fields of clean energy utilization, robot and intelligent manufacturing, environmental protection, new materials, digital technology and intelligent healthcare, to rapidly promote the transformation of scientific and technological achievements as well as emerging technologies application and industrial upgrading through the triple-helix mode of “Technology + Capital + Industry”. 
 

　　The science parks of TusHoldings are required to determine the leading industry sector at their inception. These leading industry sectors are generally strategic emerging industries and are closely combined with local characteristics based on local development conditions and development requirements. In addition, all the industries involved must take technology innovation as core competitiveness. Through the integration and mastery of the core technologies, the science park can establish an emerging industry comprehensively or upgrade the traditional industry with the help of capital. In this process, TusHoldings has combined the model with two other triple helix models, these are, ‘Government + Enterprise + University’ and ‘Park + Industry + Finance’. For example, through cooperation with domestic and overseas universities, TusHoldings has launched the “Four ‘1+1’” model for cooperation with universities both at home and abroad. The first “1+1” is to cooperate with universities to build 1 incubator; the second “1+1”, is to build 1 science park together; The third “1+1” is to establish 1 educating course system, including special training classes, entrepreneurship-cultivating course instructors, and the introduction of x-lab and fund system; the fourth “1+1” is to take the advantage of the research capability of the local university to jointly cultivate 1 strategic emerging industry. For the science and technology companies in science parks of TusHoldings, if they need capital, they can get financial support from TusHoldings’ funds and other financial instruments; if they need government support, TusHoldings can cooperate with the government; if they need cross-border technology collaboration, university scientific research institutes introduced by TusHoldings can provide core technologies. That is the ecosystem of the Multidimensional Triple Helix Model.
 

　　Drive optimization of the innovation system and mechanisms of the ecosystem through the “Government + Enterprise + University” Triple Helix model. The “Government + Enterprise + University” Triple Helix model practiced by TusHoldings started with the cooperation of Tsinghua University, TusHoldings and local governments, now TusHoldings also extends each element on this same basis in which each element forms a new helix. First of all, the helix of government where, apart from cooperating with a single local government, TusHoldings has also established many high-level government circles at home and abroad; second, the helix of enterprises, the enterprises here refer not only to TusHoldings, but also include a large group of enterprises controlled and cored by TusHoldings; and then the university helix, in addition to Tsinghua University, TusHoldings also cooperates with many other universities, research institutes and institutions at home and abroad. TusHoldings and the companies under its control have established close cooperation relations with multiple schools, departments and academicians of Tsinghua University, including Department of Energy and Power Engineering, Institute of Microelectronics, School of Architecture, Department of Electrical Engineering, School of Economics and Management and School of Materials Science and Engineering. TusHoldings has nearly 100 cooperation programs with those departments and platforms are set up for the transformation of cutting-edge scientific and technological achievements. Besides Tsinghua University, TusHoldings has developed various forms of cooperation with some 40 universities and scientific research institutes in China and over 20 world-leading universities including Harvard University, University of Cambridge and University of Michigan, currently operating 65 cooperation programs, including building joint laboratories, jointly building academician workstations, jointly establishing platforms for the industrialization of scientific and technological achievements, jointly establishing colleges and research institutes, jointly participating in technology research and development and jointly building innovation bases and incubation platforms. It is the equivalent of establishing a broad cooperation friend circle of universities at home and abroad for joint collaboration and participation in TusHoldings’ Multidimensional Triple Helix.
 

　　Above all, the three triple helixes promote each other and the effect of each triple helix is amplified and increased, thus enhancing the development ability of TusHoldings’ science parks. Each science park of TusHoldings is built and developed in this way and utilizes the triple helix that is suitable for its characteristics. Thus, the collaboration and interaction among science parks naturally form a multidimensional triple helix.
 

　　The functional positioning of TusPark at its inception was “ a base to transform university scientific achievements, to incubate technology start-ups and to cultivate innovative talents”. Now, the Multidimensional Triple Helix Model of TusHoldings still centers on this three main functional positioning. Science parks of TusHoldings also take “transforming scientific university achievements, incubating startups and cultivating innovative talents” as their most important objective and mission, making contributions to driving local industrial upgrading and regional economic development and building an innovation and entrepreneurship ecosystem through the flexible application of the Multidimensional Triple Helix Model.
 

　　To combine the Multidimensional Triple Helix Model with the huge innovative platform network of TusHoldings, the advanced system and the corporate culture of building a happy enterprise, is the “clustering innovation” theory created and practiced by TusHoldings. Clustering innovation connects each sub-group of TusHoldings, relying on their regional advantages and resources, to form a regional innovation network that includes suppliers, competitors, universities, research institutions, investors and government departments. At the same time, it also incorporates “Internet Plus” and big data cloud computing technology. Through the interaction between clusters, it breaks geographical boundaries and promotes innovation resources and information sharing on a far greater scale, initiating further formation of industrial and innovation chains in an ever wide context. Each party in the innovation chain uses resource sharing to form a long-term, stable, mutually beneficial relationship with each other through formal contractual relationships or informal information exchanges, together finally forming a “clustered clustering”, an innovation network of many clusters that is interdependent and develops together. 
 

　　(III) Build a global innovation network to promote the development of TusPark from quantitative change to qualitative change

　　Since 2012, based on the brand effect and influence of TusPark accumulated over two decades and conforming to the requirements of the national “Mass Innovation and Entrepreneurship” and the “Belt and Road” Initiative, TusHoldings has focused on establishing a “Science park, S&T industry, and S&T finance” three-in-one business pattern. With incubators, science parks and science cities as the carrier, strategic emerging industries as the core and financial capital as the link, TusHoldings has promoted clustering innovation through the Multidimensional Triple Helix Model and created an all-round innovation and entrepreneurship service ecosystem to drive TusPark onto the fast development track. TusHoldings has realized a qualitative leap in park scale, development results and social influence.
 

　　First, in terms of science parks, TusHoldings has expanded the previous two forms of ‘incubator and science park’ to three forms ‘incubator, science park and science city’, to better match the variety demands of innovation and entrepreneurship services in different locations; the number of parks has increased to nearly 300 from less than 20 before 2012, forming a clustering innovation service network. Moreover, TusHoldings has set up innovation bases in the United States, Hong Kong, South Korea, Russia, Israel, and other countries and regions.
 

　　There are currently 120 TusStar incubator bases and 7 overseas bases, covering 60 cities at home and abroad. The incubators have a space area of over 300,000 square meters and over 3,000 incubated start-ups, making TusHoldings the startup incubator with widest offline coverage in China. TusHoldings has seen a continuous increase in investment return and operating income,  directly manages 8 funds and has shares in 15 funds. TusHoldings has an asset base of over 2 billion yuan and has invested in over 110 projects while constantly improving its service structure. On the basis of improving spatial management, TusHoldings is committed to further improving its venture investment and innovation service. TusHoldings has made deeper exploration into the incubation model, by implementing the “Incubation service + Entrepreneurship training + Angel investment + Open platform” four-in-one incubation model and building the seven-step incubation chain of “Dream Class – Practice-Lab - Growth Plan - TusStar Camp - Diamond Plan – Go IPO - Global Network” through which TusHoldings has incubated over 5,000 start-ups, 35 enterprises of which have been listed, including Sumavision, Highlander, ChineseAll, GigaDevice and Know-How. Under the Multidimensional Triple Helix and clustering innovation development model, the resource gathering advantage of the TusStar incubation network has been further highlighted.
 

▲ 2013-2017 business condition of TusHoldings incubators  

　　Second, in terms of S&T industry, with core technology as the base, serving national innovation strategies as the mission, carrying forward the craftsmanship spirit of Tsinghua University as the responsibility and cultivating high-tech industries and strategic emerging industries as the goal, TusHoldings has continued to adopt such approaches as innovation incubation, investment and M&A and has formed ten high-tech sectors and whole chain technology platforms including energy conservation and environmental protection, cleaner energy, new materials, greater health, unmanned aerial vehicle, digital economy and new energy automobile. TusHoldings controls or holds shares in 12 listed companies, including Tus-Guhan, Tus-Sound, 21vianet, Tu-International, Suzhou Design, ChineseAll, Beijing Enterprises Clean Energy, Hanbang Gaoke, GigaDevice, CICTEC, TusPark Tuewei and Canada BIOREM. The industry clustering has provided better support for scientific and technological innovation, improved the scientific and technological content of industries and promoted quality and efficient development of local economies.
 

　　Third, in terms of S&T finance, TusHoldings has formed whole industry chain finance services including seed fund, angel fund, VC/PE fund, industry fund, M&A fund and fund of funds, to meet the financing demands of enterprises at different stages of their lifecycles. TusHoldings has jointly established strategic emerging industry funds with governments at different levels to constantly improve its S&T finance strength. At the end of 2017, TusHoldings had set up a total of 60 funds, with a scale of over 60 billion yuan, which mainly involve strategic emerging industries such as digital economy, environmental protection, new energy, cyber security and big health.
 

▲ TusPark 1.0, an individual park (1994-2005), the largest individual university science park in the world  
 

▲ TusPark 2.0 main park and branches (Jiangxi, Kunshan, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shaanxi, etc.) (2006-2011)  

 

 

▲ TusPark 3.0, a global innovation service network with nearly 300 incubators, science parks and science towns as the carriers (2012 to today)  
 

　　At the Boao Forum for Asia 2018, Qiu Yong, President of Tsinghua University, taking TusPark as an example, talked about the reasons why TusPark connects universities with society. He said that on the one hand the innovation and science park attached to a university can get help from the local government, on the other hand the university can provide technical support and make contributions to social development.
 

　　For over two decades, TusHoldings, developed from TusPark Development Center, has persevered in actively exploring scientific and technological innovation and development laws, attaching importance to gathering all kinds of scientific and technological innovation resources, focusing on the establishment of an innovation and entrepreneurship ecosystem network and constantly improving scientific and technological innovation service abilities, while serving national innovation and development strategies as the guide and serving Tsinghua University and local economic development as the mission. TusHoldings has successfully upgraded TusPark and its branches at home and abroad to version 3.0, built itself into the world’s largest innovation base network that is directly established and managed by a business enterprise, the world’s strongest vertical incubation system and the combination of the best innovative talents in China, to become a world-leading “Engine for Strategic Emerging Industries”. In the current situation in China that some science parks are still in their version 1.0 and some science parks are just entering their version 2.0, TusHoldings has made important contributions in promoting the role of science parks in serving local and national scientific and technological innovation, industry upgrading and economic development.
 

　　In the future, TusHoldings will continue to promote clustering innovation through the Multidimensional Triple Helix Model, attach more importance to utilization of the advantages in resources clustering, benefit-sharing, win-win relationship and enhanced collaboration of TusHoldings innovation and entrepreneurship ecosystem, and make greater contributions to creating an innovation and entrepreneurship ecosystem with Chinese characteristics and the construction of an innovation-oriented country.　

　　Appendix 

　　(I)About TusHoldings

　　Tus-Holdings Co., Ltd. (Tus-Holdings), was founded in July 24, 2000 and is the former Tsinghua University Science Park (TusPark) Development Center founded in August 1994. Tus-Holdings is a large and fully integrated enterprise established with reliance on Tsinghua University. It takes full responsibility for developing, constructing, operating and managing TusPark, and it is one of the first National Demonstration Enterprises in the modern service industry. It is the shareholder, or controlling shareholder, of over 800 listed & non-listed enterprises, and the total assets under its management exceed RMB 200 billion. 
 

　　As the flagship product of Tus-Holdings, TusPark (Beijing) is currently the largest single university science park in the world, with a building area of 770,000 square meters, and more than 1500 enterprises settled in the park over time. TusPark has become a home of multi-national corporation R&D headquarters, Chinese technology enterprise headquarters and innovation enterprises. It has become an important platform of Tsinghua University to serve society and promote regional innovation; it is a famous brand in the science park industry both at home and abroad. 
 

　　With more than two decades of development, Tus-Holdings has accumulated a wealth of experience in the development and operation of university science parks and established a high-caliber management team, actively promoting the organic interaction between innovative resources and the regional economy and successfully building a nationwide innovation system with more than 300 incubators, science parks and science cities as the carrier. The network of Tus-Holdings covers more than 50 cities and regions including Hong Kong, Macau, the USA, the UK, Italy, Russia, Australia, Switzerland, Holland, Sweden, South Korea, Pakistan, Thailand, Egypt, Brazil, etc., taking its place as a new force of China’s innovation system.