There are a handful of sources that provide an overview of the current state of Australia’s innovation system. One that provides a comprehensive and easy to understand overview is Innovation and Science Australia’s 2016 Performance Review of the Australian Innovation, Science and Research System.

The review joins other pieces that form a view on Australia’s innovation performance, including: the StartupAus Crossroads report, the federal 10-year Innovation Systems reports, the OECD body of work on innovation, the national Global Entrepreneurship Monitor survey, the digital data portal Australian Innovation Monitor, and other related indexes and reports.

The report is worth a read to gain an understanding of the current situation. Highlights are summarised below as a point of reference.

The review provides an analysis of Australia’s innovation system using a framework of three activities: Knowledge creation, Knowledge transfer, and Knowledge application.

These activities produce Outputs (eg., new and improved products and processes) and Outcomes (eg., improved productivity, an improved innovation system, etc.). There are then six categories of enablers that facilitate innovation activities: policy; money; infrastructure; skills; networks; and culture.

Combined , these provide a scorecard of Australia’s innovation position:

The report provides detail in each area. The end summaries of strengths and weaknesses for each element are below:

Policy

Money

Infrastructure

Skills

Networks

Culture

Outputs

Outcomes

The information is then summarised by activity

Knowledge creation

Knowledge transfer

Knowledge application

System-wide

And into a key findings cheat sheet:

Key findings

The Performance Review of the Australian Innovation, Science and Research System provides a good framework and a large amount of content including definitions, current state and federal policies, and program overviews.