KEU Pre-survey 2007

Innovation Norway (IN) was established on 1 January 2004, and is a merger of the former Norwegian Business and Regional Development Fund (SND), the Norwegian Export Council, the Norwegian Tourist Board and the Norwegian Inventors Guidance Office. Innovation Norway offers products and services that will contribute to developing the rural areas, increase innovation in business throughout the country and profile Norwegian business and Norway as a travel destination.

Oxford Research AS carries out the customer impact surveys for Innovation Norway. The surveys include companies that have received services from Innovation Norway or SND in the years from 1994 with the exception of 1997. For each cohort, a pre-survey is carried out one year after the service was provided and a follow-up survey four years later.

The purpose of the customer impact surveys is twofold. Firstly, it is an internal purpose which is about improving and further developing Innovation Norway's operations. Secondly, there is an external purpose that answers the question "what have we got for our money?".

The customer impact survey consists of a pre-survey and a post-survey. The preliminary survey is carried out the year after the commitment from Innovation Norway is given. The follow-up survey is carried out four years later. The current survey is a preliminary survey of companies that received a service from Innovation Norway in 2007.

A total of 21 services are included in the customer impact survey for 2007. These can be divided into four main groups:

· Subsidized service
· Loan service
· Program
· Scholarship service

Previous customer impact surveys have been very comprehensive both for the companies that were supposed to respond and for those who read the reports. It is also the case that the answers vary relatively little over time. Prior to the survey of the 2006 cohort, a module-based survey was therefore prepared. The idea behind this is that some key questions are asked of the companies every year, while other questions are asked less frequently, following a form of "rolling". This gives the opportunity to develop own modules linked to particularly relevant topics.

For the 2007 cohort, such a module-based system was used, and the companies were only asked about the most central questions in a "basic module". This makes the survey shorter and more focused, but naturally also reduces certain analysis possibilities. At the same time, the approach will in the long term be able to free up resources for exploratory analyses, and thus contribute to increased benefits for Innovation Norway.