Creating more Belonging: Strengthening US Innovation & Creative Economies

B Global x Design thinks of the creative economy as the intersection of innovation, creativity, design, stakeholder engagement, and markets. Strengthening creative industries generates economic resilience, social cohesion, cultural vitality, and supports individual and community well-being.

A key model for this strengthening is the Penta-Helix (or Quintuple Helix) framework. This model expands on the Triple Helix concept developed by Henry Etzkowitz and Loet Leydesdorff, which emphasized collaboration among the public sector, private sector, and academia to build competitive industry clusters and innovation ecosystems. The Penta-Helix model adds civil society (including communities, nonprofits, and social stakeholders) and media, creating a more holistic framework for innovation and creative economy development.

Penta-Helix Model - CDI Hubs

The Penta-Helix framework focuses on embedding local knowledge and creative efforts into social, business, and civic institutions. In this model, media plays a crucial role in shaping a community or region’s identity—helping establish a cohesive "brand" that can attract residents, investment, and tourism. By bringing together these five diverse stakeholder groups for sustained collaboration, the model helps improve resilience, foster innovation, and enhance satisfaction and opportunity for individuals, businesses, and communities alike. For our purposes, we will call the group at the center of the peta-helix model “creative, design, and innovation (CDI) hub”. This hub is a dedicated group of stakeholders from the five sectors who, together, create and implement strategies to shape industry, culture, social connection, and public policy.

Why do creative and innovative economies matter? Persistent stagnation, inequality, political fragmentation, and systemic challenges such as intellectual property theft and global supply chain disruptions often stem from fragmented efforts and a lack of long-term commitment. A CDI hub can unite actors for collective action by offering a structured yet flexible approach to overcome these hurdles. Additionally, creative and innovative economies sit at the powerful intersection of innovation, design, entrepreneurship, stakeholder collaboration, and market development. When we strengthen creative industries, we don’t just boost GDP—we generate economic resilience, social cohesion, cultural vitality, and individual well-being.

A CDI-hub can shape everything from vibrant food cultures and social spaces to packaging design and regional manufacturing strategies. Its greatest strength lies in aligning diverse actors toward inclusive, sustainable innovation. Consider:

Academia-Industry Synergy: Leading universities like MIT and Stanford have long been catalysts for tech spin-offs. But models like Indonesia’s Bandung Creative Villages show how universities can also incubate fashion-tech startups and regional design industries. Detroit’s College for Creative Studies followed suit by developing an industry-partnered fashion hub within its academic ecosystem.

Civil Society as Co-Creators: Grassroots initiatives can reshape local economies. The Embros Theatre in Athens—once abandoned—was occupied, reimagined, and revived by immigrant artists and activists, transforming it into a site for cultural production, social dialogue, and urban regeneration.

Collaboration Hubs as Growth Drivers: The Founder’s Lab in Gävle, Sweden functions as a cross-sector integrator, channeling insights to advance ecosystem-wide innovation. Meanwhile, CalSTRS (California State Teachers’ Retirement System) in Mexico applies ESG metrics to guide investment with social and financial returns, exceeding benchmarks with a 7.7% net return in 2024.

U.S. Opportunities

1. Strengthen Commitments to Partnerships for Innovation

• Challenge: The U.S. risks losing global leadership in innovation as federal R&D investment lags. Other nations are doubling down on integrated innovation strategies that include the creative sector.

• Opportunity: The U.S. can modernize its approach by adopting a Penta-Helix model of innovation. A National Innovation Office could coordinate Research, Design, and Innovation (RD&I) across sectors—streamlining permitting, incentivizing cross-sector partnerships, and hosting public design competitions. Similar to South Korea’s KIST, but with a uniquely American approach that integrates storytellers, artists, and designers from the outset.

• Example: Ellen Loots and Walter Van Andel’s typology, Artists as Change Agents in Cross-Sector Partnerships, identifies four key forms of collaboration:

  • Transactional commissions

  • Coordinated public co-production

  • Goal-directed partnerships

  • Transformational co-creation

By embedding creatives into national innovation strategies, the U.S. can design systems that are technically sophisticated, human-centered, and globally competitive.

2. Pilot Creative Economy Roadmaps through Regional Penta Helix Labs

• Challenge: The creative sector contributes over $150 billion annually and supports 2.6 million jobs, but many communities lack access to investment or infrastructure.

• Opportunity: Launch regional Penta Helix Labs that convene local stakeholders to co-design creative economy strategies. These labs could drive inclusive workforce development, support cultural entrepreneurship, and catalyze new regional markets.

• Example: In Northwest Arkansas, coordinated investment and strategic arts planning helped grow the local creative economy by 77% between 2015 and 2022, reaching $232.7 million. (Axios)

3. Foster STEM + Creative Workforce Pipelines

• Challenge: Emerging creative fields—digital fashion, AI-assisted design, immersive media—straddle the line between arts and STEM, often missing out on traditional funding and talent development pipelines.

• Opportunity: Encourage Congress to advance the Promoting Local Arts and Creative Economy (PLACE) Act (H.R. 6569) to fund hybrid apprenticeships in design, media, and maker trades aligned with high-growth tech sectors.

• Example: Newlab in Brooklyn houses startups, technologists, and creatives co-developing solutions in mobility, sustainable materials, and more. Similar innovation sandboxes are emerging in Detroit (TechTown), Ann Arbor (SPARK), Tulsa, and Oakland.

4. Create a National Creativity & Innovation Atlas

• Challenge: The Arts & Economic Prosperity 6 (AEP6) report states that the arts and culture industry generated $151.7 billion of economic activity in 2022—$73.3 billion in spending by arts and culture organizations, plus $78.4 billion in event-related expenditures by their audiences. This supported 2.6 million jobs, provided $101 billion in personal income to US residents, and generated $29.1 billion in tax revenue to local, state, and federal governments. Despite these significant contributions, there are few ways to compare communities on creativity and innovation, share best practices, or make a cohesive argument for investment (public or private) in creative or innovation economies as a system-level investment.

• Opportunity: Build a National Creativity & Innovation Atlas—an interactive tool combining open data, storytelling, and geographic mapping to track and amplify creative contributions by region, discipline, and impact. Modeled on Thailand’s CEA Dashboard and aligned with U.S. tools like the ACPSA and America for the Arts’ Arts and Economic Prosperity report, this atlas would:

  • Visualize creative contributions by place and sector

  • Track innovation across cultural production, IP generation, and maker economies

  • Feature creators via video, digital showcases, and community stories

  • Guide investment by governments, investors, and philanthropies

  • Create an creative and innovative economy roadmap

  • incentivize financial and policy investments by measuring what works and what doesn’t, comparing one region to another

• Public-Private Engagement: Collaborate with TikTok, LinkedIn, PBS, and NPR to tell the stories behind the data. Where public funding is threatened or shrinking, impact investors and nonprofits can sustain and expand this work.

• Example: Detroit—the first U.S. city named a UNESCO City of Design—has used the designation to launch a decade-long, equity-focused design strategy led by Design Core Detroit. The strategy includes asset mapping, workforce development, and branding Detroit as a global design leader.

By building regionally grounded, nationally networked CDI hubs—and connecting them through tools like a National Atlas—we don’t just support creative economies. We build resilient, identity-rich, innovation-ready communities. Let’s make that future by design.