The knowledge society is characterized by knowledge becoming a kind of commodity that can be traded and priced. Knowledge-intensive business services (KIBS) are representative for such a knowledge-based economy, since their main input and output factor is directly related to knowledge itself....

During the last 20 years, R&D and innovation activities in the service sector have clearly increased. Especially business services are believed to be one of the main drivers of technical changes and economic progress. Looking at the labour indices calculated over the period from 1982 to 1996 one...

Research on processes of innovation has emphasised the role of (publicly funded) research institutions (RTOs) as well as the embeddedness of innovation procedures in a systemic context. This paper deals with the changing contribution of RTOs to innovation systems due to the emergence of a highly...