The conference was held under the main theme of 'Industrialisation, socio-economic transformation and Institutions', inspired by the historical legacy of the Industrial Revolution that has made Manchester a pre-eminent industrial metropolis of the world. 

Mahmood Shubbak presented a research paper entitled "Technological Knowledge Networks in China: The Case of Photovoltaics Technology", which is a joint work with Iciar Dominguez Lacasa. The paper discusses the accumulation processes of indigenous technological capabilities in the solar photovoltaic technologies in China following a social network analysis methodology.