As a journalist at Computerworld Australia:
It's not exactly a snail's pace, but Australia isn't really keeping up with global innovation either. Recent evaluation of 26 OECD nations has revealed that although Australia naturally lends itself to technological innovation, there is yet a way to go before the country's economy can fully capitalize on that potential.
The study was conducted by U.S.-based Forrester research and aimed to demonstrate how governments can improve their innovative strategies, and hence their economies and geopolitical statuses, by building on their comparative strengths in the global arena.
Instead of operating as single research and development entities, nations could more effectively use existing inventions, skills and services by collaborating to form multi-country innovation networks, researchers say.
Within such networks, individual countries would be required to specialize in only one or two of four roles: Inventors, who formulate new ideas; Transformers, who develop those ideas into marketable products or services; Financiers, who fund the activities of inventors and transformers; and Brokers, who bring the network together by forging relationships among partner nations.
"Essentially, not being good in one of the roles doesn't mean that you're a bad innovator," explained Navi Radjou, Vice President of Forrester Research. "You can be an innovator in different ways; in order to be a good innovator all you have to do is partner with other nations or with universities to take some great ideas or inventions to market."
Sadly, when its current situation was evaluated against other OECD nations, Australia was revealed to be somewhat of a non-performer in all four roles, oscillating between Forrester's bottom two labels: 'Contender' and 'Risky Bet'. Australia ranked 10th in the Broker category, 15th as a Financier, 17th as an Inventor, and 23rd as a Transformer.
It was a poor result for a nation that Radjou acknowledged to have excellent institutions and good government-funded research and development (R&D) agencies, as well as being well-positioned as a society with a West European-style culture that is also in close geographic proximity to Asia.
"The brain power is there, but just the raw brain power isn't enough," he said. "Where we can find limitations is [how Australia is] taking inventions and bringing them to market."
While the study found Australia lacking in hi-tech R&D areas such as space exploration and nanotechnology, it found strength in more traditional areas of science and engineering like mining and raw material extraction.
Radjou said it was important for the country to recognize and play to its strengths, leveraging them for both domestic and global markets.
"If you look at what role Australia needs to emphasize more in the future, I would say the Broker role is more important," Radjou said. "The goal of the government should not be just in funding more R&D, but building bridges with other countries."
Australia should take advantage of its geographic position in becoming a gateway to Asia for Western countries, Radjou said. This would require research organizations, trade associations, and the government to invest in more trade missions to attract partner companies and nations.
Researchers and universities are already acting very aggressively in promoting Australia as an innovation gateway, he said, but these informal relationships should be backed by the government for good international networks to form.
"Companies can do their best, but there are a lot of things that the government has to do as well to take it to the next level," he said. "I think without some sort of formal support from the government, these informal networks can really not take off."
Radjou raised the example of Ireland, a leader in the Transformer role whose government-funded Ireland Development Agency conducts trade missions all over the world to help build R&D partnerships in Europe and Japan. The Australian Government could think about formalizing network links with the rest of the world in the same way, he said, starting with Asia.
Australia's diverse population can also lend itself to the Broker role as long as the nation and its companies can capitalize on multinational backgrounds and start producing more people who are multilingual.
"Not only do you have very creative people, but you also have very diverse people," he said. "You are [Australia is] a bit like the U.S. in that you are an immigrant country, which is a great asset, but the asset has to be exploited. You have to figure out a way to take advantage of that diversity, versus just being aware of the diversity."
