Trained as an innovation scientist, Matthijs investigates innovation policy and strategy. As tenured assistant professor at the Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development, Matthijs mainly focuses at industrial policy, transitions, mission-oriented innovation policy, and novel forms of smart specialization. These lines of research follow on Matthijs’ PhD-thesis on ‘service innovation in an evolutionary perspective’ (runner-up for the ISPIM Innovation Management Dissertation Award 2016) from Eindhoven University of Technology, and his post-doc position at the Center for International Development - Harvard Kennedy School of Government.

Matthijs' current work mainly focuses on assessing the governance and impact of ‘transformative’ innovation policies targeted at specific sectors, knowledge domains or societal challenges. Matthijs is coordinator of Utrecht University’s ‘Mission-oriented Innovation Policy Observatory’; see: https://mipo.sites.uu.nl.

Over the past few years Matthijs has published in journals like Science and Public Policy, Research Evaluation, Environmental Innovation and Societal Transitions, Cambridge Journal of Regions Economy and Society, Industry & Innovation, Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Journal of Product Innovation Management, R&D Management, as well as in various innovation handbooks. He also contributes regularly to Dutch policy-oriented platforms like ESB and Me Judice. Matthijs frequently sits in expert committees concerned with innovation policy and evaluation.

Matthijs also holds a position as Principal Scientist at Dialogic Innovation & Interaction. Often acting as project leader, he has (co-)authored about 85 studies for clients like the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate Policy, Ministry of Education Culture and Science, Ministry of Infrastructure and Watermanagement, Ministry of Finance, Rijkswaterstaat, the European Commission and the OECD.