ERSA mourns the loss of Prof. Franz Tödtling, Vienna University of Economics and Business in Vienna Austria, who died unexpectedly on October 6^th. He was a very active member of the ERSA community and of Gesellschaft für Regionalforschung, the German Speaking section of ERSA.

Franz Tödtling dedicated his academic career to questions of regional development and regional policy. His particular focus was on innovation and technological and institutional change, on regional innovation systems, on headquarter-branch plant networks across regional boundaries and on related policies. He authored and edited nine books and published 250 articles, most of them in respected international journals. His work is highly cited. His article “One size fits all?: Towards a differentiated regional innovation policy approach”, coauthored with Michaela Trippl and published 2005 in Research Policy accumulated more than 1700 citations over the years. Around the turn of the century, his two-volume textbook “Regional- und Stadtökonomik”, coauthored with Gunther Maier and Michaela Trippl, was a standard item on the reading list of regional science courses in German speaking countries. A Slovak translation of the textbook that was provided by Prof. Milan Bucek, also exposed students at universities in Slovakia to basic regional science concepts.

Since the early 1980s, Franz Tödtling was an active and regular participant at ERSA’s annual conferences and at the Winter seminars of Gesellschaft für Regionalforschung (GfR). He maintained an extensive network of research collaborations throughout Europe and beyond. It is documented in the many coauthored works that he published. On the other hand, Franz Tödtling often worked with young colleagues, introduced them to international conferences and networks and published with them. Several of them followed his direction and developed their own research career.

Participants at the GfR Winter seminars also experienced the sporty side of Franz Tödtling. Whenever there was time for skiing, he usually tried to catch the first bus to the slopes. Bad weather was no valid excuse. And those who went skiing with him usually spent a day struggling to catch up with him.

Franz Tödtling will be missed by the ERSA and GfR communities. We will remember him as a valued colleague and scholar whose work provided important impetus to regional research. He was a dear friend and a great help to the younger members of our communities on their academic journeys.

Our deepest sympathies go to his family and all who were close to him.