Management Perspectives

In today’s knowledge-based economy, wherein intangible assets created from human intelligence and ingenuity are at the forefront, companies can no longer solely depend on their production capital. They must look beyond the boundaries of their organisation for such intangible assets, and incorporate fresh ideas and innovation, combining external and internal sources (Chesbrough, 2003). Companies are provided with this intellectual capital from academic institutions nurturing the knowledge of the future workforce, creating a scenario where academia can no longer exist in isolation from the needs of the industry.

Hence, university-industry relationships are increasing in importance in today’s product development, where the intellectual capital is sourced from cutting-edge university knowledge and the companies support this through the integration of their intellectual and production capital (Fain et al., 2010). But such relationships can only be fostered by the support and policy framing of government, which forms the third and final aspect for the facilitation of a knowledge-based economy.

The Government must acknowledge the need to support such university-industry collaborations, as they also build and grow national economies and are thus in need of developing policies and support mechanisms that build on integrating knowledge between a variety of partners in product development.

These three branches of the knowledge economy are the components of the Triple Helix Model, propounded by Etzkowitz and Leydesdorff (1995) which postulates that in a knowledge-based society the boundaries between public and private sector, science and technology, and university and industry are increasingly fading, giving rise to a system of overlapping interactions: (a) industry operates as the centre of production; (b) government acts as the source of contractual relations that guarantee stable interaction and exchange; and (c) universities are the source of new knowledge and technology. Moreover, each sphere, while retaining its primary role and identity takes the role of the other. For example, universities take the role of industry in supporting start-up creation in incubator and accelerator projects.

The Triple Helix Model treats each component as equals, contradicting the traditional concept of universities only acting as mere supporters and facilitators to the industry, and academia emerges as an influential actor and equal partner. However, it does not exclude other actors, such as intermediaries, legal firms and nongovernmental agencies, but considers them secondary players (Cai & Etzkowitz, 2020).

The Triple Helix is effective in understanding the dynamics of innovation at the regional, national, or international level, as it provides a well-elaborated framework for insights into central inquiries in innovation processes. In the light of the National Education Policy proposed by the Ministry of Education, India in 2020, we can see an effort to innovate education by the government through policy framing, and to consequently rejuvenate the industry. The very purpose of the policy is to elevate India as a leading knowledge-based economy by integrating different streams of education, allowing the freedom of choice to encourage interdisciplinary innovation, and infusing technology in the educational system, to create skilled and holistically educated individuals who will contribute to the human intellectual capital highly needed by the industry. Therefore, the government, academic institutions, and industry must work in tandem to promote a robust knowledge-based economy, and must also have three-way communication, by the way of the government and the industry taking academic research and suggestions into account, for academia in return understand the requirements of the industry, and for the government to introduce policies to expedite and ease the process of creation of human intellectual assets. Hence, these three primary cogs of a knowledge-based economy together can unlock the potential of India as a leader in innovation and technology.