Regional studies and frugal innovation: a missing link?

Innovation has been a key topic of interest for the regional studies community. In particular, the regional characteristics and impacts of innovation have been a popular theme of enquiry and theorisation, and the community has been at the forefront of discussions around regional innovation systems, in particular. However, we see a large gap in the current state of the art around frugal innovation. The focus of this paper is to place this topic at the heart of our discussions of regional innovation. This is done by providing a case study of frugal innovations in Kashmir over the period of the COVID-19 pandemic, illustrating the urgency and relevance of exploring frugal innovation at the regional level, especially as a rapid place-based crisis response, specifically in a developing nation.