South African ICT Sector Development Framework

Chapter 7
ICT Innovation

Goal 4: World-Class Culture of ICT Innovation

The intent of Goal 4 is to build an exceptional culture of innovation and entrepreneurship in South Africa – to create the mechanisms within industry, academia, government, labour and , civil society for fostering, encouraging and supporting innovative and entrepreneurial behaviour.

Developing a strong culture of innovation and entrepreneurship will be essential to the growth and success of the sector. Innovation in this context can apply to the development of innovative approaches to developing the products and services that the sector will require, and to the development of new and innovative ICT applications in enabled sectors. Thus it is necessary to foster, encourage and support innovative behaviour.

As a result of globalisation and rapid technological change, markets are placing a growing premium on innovation, entrepreneurship, risk taking, marketing prowess and commercialisation. By and large, however, these characteristics are hard to come by. Many people see themselves, as being more concerned with fairness and equity than competitiveness and wealth creation. Many in South Africa view these value sets as mutually exclusive. To prosper in the knowledge-based economy, it is necessary to recognise that "being successful" and "being fair" are not incompatible. There is a need to take charge and change this thinking about risk and innovation in order to create wealth and protect the values that South Africans hold dear.

This strategy takes a comprehensive view of innovation and is built around the innovation framework articulated in the following Figure 7.1.

In the first instance, the ICT innovation chain is considered in terms of basic R&D, pre-competitive R&D, applied R&D and commercialization commercialisation (including market intelligence, and marketing). South Africa is currently engaged in all aspects of this innovation chain and specific objectives and strategies are articulated for stimulating increased activity in each of these areas, as well as for encouraging technology transfer across the innovation chain.

A second key aspect is stimulating increased collaboration between organisations engaged in ICT innovation within South Africa, as well as with their international counterparts. To this end, strengthened linkages are a central theme of the approach to addressing this goal.

Finally, a strong public policy framework is considered an essential ingredient to stimulating increased ICT innovation and specific objectives and strategies address the policy environment. In this regard, South Africa’s intellectual property with respect to ICT is considered an important source of competitive advantage. Particular emphasis is placed on protecting intellectual property.

The four objectives supporting this goal are presented in Figure 7.2 below.

Each of these objectives areis described below, and contain the strategies and associated actions needed to achieve the objectives.

Objective 4.1: Establish an ICT Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Risk Management Culture Throughout South Africa

Companies are increasingly recognising that conducting ICT R&D is essential to survival, often spending significant percentages of annual revenues on their R&D activities. Many governments have also recognised that it is in the public interest to devote substantial funds to R&D in support of their industries, providing program support for R&D, or sharing the risks and rewards of investing in R&D. To develop a strong culture of innovation and entrepreneurship, it is necessary to foster, encourage and support innovative behaviour.

This objective seeks to stimulate ICT innovation by significantly increasing the awareness of ICT Innovation activities taking place in South Africa, provide increased intelligence on ICT Innovations occurring elsewhere in the world and encourage collaborative ICT Innovation activities in South Africa.

Strategy 4.1.1: Create ICT Innovation Awareness

Creating the mind-sets required to investigate and build the future technologies that South Africa needs in order to remain competitive begins with becoming aware of what is possible with ICTs, and in particular what is happening elsewhere in South Africa. Thus this strategy deals with generating ICT innovation awareness within South Africa.

The actions required to support this strategy are summarised in Figure 7.3 below.

Figure 7.3: Actions related to Creating ICT Innovation Awareness

Action(s):

• Develop, and deliver, an ICT innovation awareness program. The program will point out that successful organisations are typically rich in ideas, embody a culture where innovation is a core capability, and embrace new and unusual ways of fostering innovation. In such companies, innovation is not simply in products and services, but in every aspect of the company and practiced by its entire staff. Practical approaches to encouraging such an innovation culture will be included.
• Establish awards and success stories for innovators and entrepreneurs. Potentially, these awards set the stage for the last mile from research to competitive product and lead new products to the market place.
• Celebrate the achievements of risk-takers, innovators and entrepreneurs in order to establish a greater range of role models for South Africa.

Strategy 4.1.2: Create ICT Innovation Listening Posts

Part of innovation awareness is knowing what is happening with respect to ICT innovations elsewhere in the world. This strategy sets out to establish mechanisms for identifying and disseminating information on international ICT innovation activities.

The actions required to support this strategy are summarised in Figure 7.4 below.

Figure 7.4: Actions related to Creating ICT Innovation Listening Posts

Build on the capabilities of CSIR and other key R&D partners to gather and disseminate global/local ICT innovation intelligence throughout South Africa. This intelligence would then be useful to South African ICT organiszations in formulating their innovation plans.

Strategy 4.1.3: Forge Linkages with Other Innovation Initiatives

Technological innovations from the ICT Sector can be a main driver of change. The innovative initiatives necessary to drive this change will be secured by collaborative efforts from South Africa’s lead role players and economic engines.

The actions required to support this strategy are summarised in Figure 7.5 below.

Figure 7.5: Actions related to Forging Linkages with Other Innovation Initiatives

• Build on the National Research and Technology Foresight project and other initiatives to focus ICT innovation in priority areas. Particular emphasis can be placed on the initiatives that fall within the common strengths and capacity within South Africa to become the Global leader of, in the priority areas.
• Expand the DACST Innovation Fund and other initiatives to support the development of new ICT products, services and applications.
• Create linkages between academia, industry, public and private sectors to support ICT R&D researchers.
• Encourage development of inter-departmental governmental linkages, and a greater degree of co-ordination, with respect to initiatives involving ICT innovation in order to achieve more effective innovation outcomes.
• Encourage international innovation linkages (link South Africa’s ICT R&D institutions, universities and companies with advanced ICT R&D activities worldwide through strategic alliances, joint research projects, researcher and student exchanges, partnerships, etc.) to develop innovative solutions to ICT challenges.

Objective 4.2: Stimulate ICT Research and Development of World-Class Products, Services and Applications for Local and Global Markets

The South African ICT Sector is in a unique position to grow its expertise base as a provider of ICT based solutions. The first and third world environments that exist in South Africa provide a ready made arena for the research and development of ICT based products and services that directly address the needs of the developed world as well as those that address the digital gaps between these two worlds.

Strategy 4.2.1: Develop an ICT R&D Strategy

In general terms, there is a need to articulate a national vision that demonstrates the compatibility of risk, wealth creation and competitiveness with the values of fairness and equity and alternative innovation strategies for the African environment.

The DACST Foresight Study sets out possible technology futures for the country and provides a good foundation for such a vision. This strategy sets out to determine and prioritise plausible areas for further investigation and investment for ICT R&D into the future.

The actions required to support this strategy are summarised in Figure 7.6 below.

Figure 7.6: Actions related to Developing an ICT R&D Strategy

Action(s):

• Develop an ICT R&D strategy for the country focusing on: high value added products and services for the local and export markets; the ICT infrastructure required to meet the evolving needs of South Africa; applications for enabled sectors; and leading-edge ICT tools (e.g. speech processing and translation). The DACST road-mapping exercise will be a key input to this activity.
• Develop program support for specific initiatives identified in the R&D strategy.

Strategy 4.2.2: Support ICT R&D in Universities and Research Laboratories

Universities and research laboratories are the power sources for new developments. The growth of new knowledge arising from new developments is the catalyst for higher levels of social and economic development. This strategy sets out to expand on mechanisms for supporting R&D in Universities universities and Research research laboratories.

The actions required to support this strategy are summarised in Figure 7.7 below.

Figure 7.7: Actions related to Supporting ICT R&D in Universities and Research Laboratories

Action(s):

• Raise the profile of CSIR and other publicly funded research institutions, former military research establishments, and universities to stimulate intellectual capacity for new, innovative products and services.
• Provide reward systems for public researchers that raise the research arena to a role model status.
• Establish chairs in universities in specific technical areas funded on a 50-50 basis with the private sector, effectively stimulating collaboration for the development of products and services for the local and global markets.

Strategy 4.2.3: Harness R&D Capabilities through ICT Centres of Excellence

Centres of Excellence have been successful vehicles for breaking down barriers between individual organizations organisations engaged in pre-competitive research in particular areas and encouraging collaboration between such organizations. This strategy will seek to harness ICT R&D activities through centres of excellence focused on specific areas of ICT innovation.

The actions required to support this strategy are summarised in Figure 7.8 below.