Strategy for success

Policy:Be careful what you wish for when it comes to success. You might get what you ask for and it might not suit. Such is the disarmingly simple message from Prof Danny Breznitz, an academic hardly known here but someone who has become an expert on Ireland's research and innovation policy.

Breznitz is based in the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, and has a new research publication that has much to say about how to turn research into commerce. Innovation and the State: Political Choice and Strategies for Growth in Israel, Taiwan and Ireland will be out later this month from Yale University Press.

In it, he compares the rapid economic growth enjoyed by all three countries as they reaped the benefits of high-tech industrial development over the past few decades. "What was interesting was these three countries did it at the same time," he says, with similar policies, the same customer base and often with the same products.

It asks why with such a shared experience, they ended up with very different results. All three economies are dependent on the high-tech sector, but there are significant differences in how this has played out.

"My main concern in the book was the role of the state in innovation," states Israeli-born Breznitz. One of his conclusions is that there are choices to be made and consequences for the ones we pursue. "The way in which you choose to succeed is really significant," he says. "You have choices and these choices really matter."

The book, which he expects to make available next month for free online, required a great deal of research here.

He returned to Ireland last week as a guest of the State. He met staff from bodies concerned with research policy and innovation, including Forfás, the IDA, Enterprise Ireland, Science Foundation Ireland and the Office for Science and Technology within the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Employment. He also met the Government's chief science adviser, Prof Patrick Cunningham. He discussed how innovation policy can affect industry on a national basis and society as a whole.

"All countries should be concerned about their innovation policy because it is connected to economic growth," he states. It leads to new companies that produce jobs and wealth, but it should also have a wider impact. "It is at least as important that through the diffusion of technology you have a rise in productivity in all sectors [of the economy]." But it is never clear whether you will get both on the basis of the policy choices made, he says. The net result can be surprising and Israel provides an example. It has become one of the world's most innovative countries, developing new knowledge, products and services. Yet the rapid growth of high-tech companies caused many other traditional sectors to stagnate as entrepreneurs and scientists alike followed the money. This has caused social inequalities, Breznitz believes, which in turn causes political instability that works against innovation. He suggests Ireland is now in a similar position to where Israel was in the 1970s, with good research under way and good facilities, but a lack of commercialisation and little revenue return from the intellectual property.

"What Ireland has done in creating the research infrastructure it now has is quite impressive and something that should be imitated by others," says Breznitz. He acknowledges concerns for Ireland however, largely because of past mistakes by Israel.

"First, it is all still slightly new, and second, it is very early and these things must be sustained over a long period," he says. He is also concerned about our system for turning ideas into products and his familiarity with Ireland has given him insights into why we seem slow at making research pay. "More research needs to be done, but I have two concerns. One is a lack of self-confidence."

Government's role is equally important, he says. "From a government point of view, you have to have money and the supports needed to help entrepreneurs to succeed." He avoids being prescriptive, but he wants changes in the financial system. The venture capital market is a bit too timid and needs to be willing to take more risks.

"The other thing that the State can do is take more risks, partly by lowering the risk. You give some money, you give some tax breaks, but you also encourage this kind of behaviour."