An Innovation Broker as defined “coordinates and facilitates partnerships and linkages between the stakeholders involved in the innovation system through bridging, bonding, and linking social capital”. Olintshi is targeting the support gap which exists currently especially in implementing Localisation and Industrialisation. From an economic perspective, innovation brokers create multi-sided markets by delivering value to several agents on a matching market, create the market and manage the matching process.
As Robert Atkinson succinctly put it (albeit for an American context): “And, just as innovation is more than science and technology, an innovation system is more than those elements directly related to the promotion of science and technology. Rather, it includes all economic, political, and social factors affecting innovation including: the financial system; organization of private firms; the elementary, secondary and university educational systems; labour markets; culture; regulatory policies and the strength of innovation institutions.”
At its core, an innovation system is the nexus of 3 environments: business environment; trade, tax and regulatory environment and the innovation policy environment.
Innovation brokering institutions are needed to bring the 3 together in such a way that they are able to reach their respective objectives while contributing to the overall system objectives of driving competitiveness and economic growth through innovation. These institutions are missing in South Africa and on the continent and a much larger effort must be made to increase their presence if the divide between policy and implementation will be bridged. The 2019 NACI Science, technology and Innovation Indicators report highlighted some of the concerns about South African Innovation progress including:
• South Africa having lost its competitive advantage in terms of medium-technology exports when compared to the average of other upper middle-income countries.
• South Africa dropped from 44th to 67th position on the Global Competitiveness Index between 2007 and 2017,
• South Africa dropped from 38th to 58th position on the Global Innovation Index between 2007 and 2017.
• South Africa ranks low in several indicators on social progress and human development indices, like: o life expectancy (161st of 189 countries), o personal safety (135th), o health and wellness (102th) and o nutrition and basic medical care (100th).
This poor showing comes despite South Africa having a higher average number of publications that the global average and having the highest world share of scientific publication in artificial intelligence and the Internet of Things (NACI, 2019).
Clearly, Innovation is more than just the scientific/academic angle and as such funding for successful innovation must extend to supporting the creation of institutions which complete the innovation triangle which is currently dominated by the institutions of academia and less so institutions that will bridge the divide between science and commercialisation. Institutions to bridge the divide are in short supply and when they do exist, they tend to focus on a particular niche area. South Africa needs institutions of the type that Olintshi Innovation Brokers intends to be. The focus is on the entire system and supporting in particular emerging entrepreneurs to be able to access the opportunities which arise from a robust innovation system. South Africa is particularly strong on all 3 legs of the triangle as a consequence of legacy systems. The introduction of innovation systems to bridge inequality and the imbalances in the economy have not reached the levels that are required to bring about the structural transformation of the South African economy.
