Investigation of the Innovation Infrastructure Functioning Results: National and Foreign Experience
The countries, regions and enterprises focusing on the increasing use of high technologies and achieving leadership in the "technology race" results in the necessity to stimulate the innovation activities. The latter depends on the functioning of the innovation infrastructure and its components. In this regard, there is an increasing necessity to study the domestic and foreign experience of the innovation infrastructures operating to identify the advantages and disadvantages of this process.The objective of the work was achieved due to the cross country and interregional comparisons of quantitative and qualitative characteristics of the innovation infrastructures functioning using the criteria method. Two groups of indicators were used for this investigation. The qualitative indicators include the components of the innovation infrastructure, the subjects interested in the innovation infrastructure development, the level of management, and others. The quantitative indicators include the number of the organizations with the innovation infrastructure, the amount of R & D financing by the state and the private sector, innovation activities and the contribution of the innovation enterprises to the country's GDP, etc.The investigation of the innovation infrastructure functioning, which is a complex of interconnected organizations, associations that perform the functions of promoting, servicing and maintaining the innovation processes, while creating, developing, introducing and disseminating the scientific andtechnological innovations, due to which the innovation activities are implemented, was carried out using a systematic approach. This approach considers the main organizational and managerial aspects (functions, tasks, goals, etc.), as well as the components of the system itself (innovation infrastructure).The work states the conclusions obtained during studying some regions and cities of the Federal significance in the Russian Federation (Saint Petersburg; Moscow; Tomsk, Novosibirsk, Vologda regions), as well as some countries (Russia; USA; Germany; Japan; China). The article describes the history of the innovation infrastructure formation as a system, its organizational structure, the role ofeducational institutions in the innovation infrastructure functioning, differences in the innovation activities financing and shows different entities (both enterprises and the government) involving, aswell as the factors affecting the innovation infrastructure functioning.