Theoretical framework

One of the priorities in the European political trends of innovation focuses on cooperation that must be established between higher education institutions and research centres with companies. At the same time, tries to give and innovative impulse to the European SMEs (Small and Medium Enterprises). This approach appears the some documents and agreements of the Commission of the European Communities of last years as well as in other publications and reports.

In fact,.the European Innovation Scoreboard 2008 Comparative analysis of innovation performance, based on their innovation performance across 29 indicators, classified EU Member States fall into the following four country groups: innovation leaders, innovation followers, moderate innovators and catching-up countries. In all groups, the strongest drivers of growth are the Trough puts (EPO Patens, Community Trademarks, …); Finance and support (Public R&D expenditures, Venture capital…) and finally, Human resources dimensions (S&E and SSH Graduates, S&E and SSH doctorate graduates, Tertiary Education…) (pp. 7-12). Much of the literature on innovation has been narrowly concerned with these three areas: Throughputs, Finance and Support and Human resources.

Other studies emphasize the importance of the innovation in the universities and business and his influence in the economy, such as: Firstfindings from the UK innovation survey 2007; and A more research-intensive and integrated European Research Area, report 2008/2009.

This abstract presents some results about the perception of the groups' managers of research of the university and the managers of companies about some indicators of innovation in both sectors. The study takes place in Galicia, a region to the northwest of Spain.

[1] This research is financed by Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia, reference: SEJ2007-67795/EDUC.

[2]  Contact address: jose.cajide@usc.es; beatriz.garcia.antelo@usc.es

[3] Are members of this research group and has been participated in this research: Porto Castro, A; Abeal Pereira, C; Barreiro Fernández , F; Zamora Rodríguez, E; Mosteiro García, J.

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