Creating Knowledge Networks: Higher Education, Industry and Innovation in South Africa

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Creating Knowledge Networks : Higher Education, Industry and
Innovation in South Africa
Science Technology Society 2006 11: 319
DOI: 10.1177/097172180601100203

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CREATING KNOWLEDGE NETWORKS 319

Creating Knowledge Networks:
Higher Education, Industry
and Innovation in South Africa*

GLENDA KRUSS

This article focuses on a new organisational form that is emerging in the South African
context—knowledge networks of higher education, industry and intermediary partners.
The article focuses on seven case studies in two high-technology fields and their related
industrial sectors—biotechnology, being relatively new, and new materials development,
being relatively mature in South Africa. It shows the complex nature of the research partners
at each node of a network, and of the structure and dynamics of the interaction that
results. The study suggests that we need to open up the ideal enshrined in South African
policy, of the desirability of research partnerships, to more informed analysis of the
complexity of creating networks, in specific industrial sub-sectors, knowledge fields and
institutional contexts. The major insight offered for developing countries like South Africa
is the value of a contextualised analysis for informing cross-sectoral coordination of inter-
ventions within a national system of innovation.

Introduction: The Partnership Imperative
in South African Higher Education

OVER THE PAST decade higher education institutions in South Africa, like
their global counterparts in both developed and developing worlds, are

* This article was first presented at the Globelics Africa 2005 conference, held at Tshwane
University of Technology, South Africa, 1–4 November 2005. The contribution of Gilton
Klerck and Shane Godfrey to the initial analysis of the cases, and of Wendy Annecke, Michael
Cosser, Carel Garisch, Candice Harrison, Gilton Klerck and Rachmat Omar, who conducted
the empirical case studies, is gratefully acknowledged.

Glenda Kruss is Chief Research Specialist, Education, Science and Skills, Development
Research Programme, Human Sciences Research Council, Private Bag X 9182, Cape
Town 8001, South Africa. E-mail: gkruss@hsrc.ac.za.
Science, Technology & Society 11:2 (2006)
SAGE PUBLICATIONS NEW DELHI/THOUSAND OAKS/LONDON
DOI: 10.1177/097172180601100203


320 Glenda Kruss

increasingly under pressure to become more responsive to economic and
social development needs. Higher education policy goals in South Africa
are underpinned by a dual commitment to contribute to addressing the
challenge of competitive integration into the global ‘knowledge econ-
omy’ and, simultaneously, to contribute to equitable national economic
and social development. Since the advent of a democratic government
in 1994, there is increasing pressure on higher education to engage in re-
search that is more ‘relevant’, applied and strategic, in partnership with
industry or science councils, and that can contribute to a national system
of innovation (DACST 1996, 2002a). A growing emphasis for those in
science and technology fields is to enhance research utilisation and
improve mechanisms of technology transfer to industry, the public sector
or impoverished communities. The challenges raised for academics, re-
search managers, institutional leaders and policy makers across the sector
are thus multifaceted and intense.
This article focuses on one response to the challenges on new organisa-
tional forms that are emerging in this context—knowledge networks of
higher education, industry and intermediary partners that can lead to
innovation. It explores the ways in which knowledge networks are being
formed, their benefits and outcomes, and their future possibilities and
limitations. The first section will describe the contextualised approach
of the study on which the article is based, elaborating a model of the
forms of partnership evident in South African higher education. The next
two sections provide case studies of four networks in the field of biotech-
nology and three in the field of new materials development, while the
final section will consider general implications of these specific cases.
Understanding how these networks are created can identify critical issues
for policy makers, higher education institutional managers and academic
researchers to engage with, in light of the challenges facing higher educa-
tion. Institutions in similar late developing country contexts may draw
implications for their own national systems from the contextualised ap-
proach adopted here.

Researching Knowledge Networks

Research on Partnership in South Africa

Knowledge networks are evidence of the emergence of important and
interesting innovative capabilities across the South African higher edu-
cation system. The article is based on a research project conducted by



the Human Sciences Research Council between 2001 and 2004. Research
focused on three cutting-edge high-technology bands identified in na-
tional Foresight Studies as priorities for developing a national system of
innovation, enhancing global competitiveness and economic growth,
namely, ICT, biotechnology and new materials development (DACST
1999). One component of the study attempted to illuminate the govern-
ment’s role in promoting research partnership by conducting an audit of
the contribution and products of two key vehicles for incentivisation,
the Innovation Fund, and the Technology and Human Resources for In-
dustry Programme (THRIP) (HSRC 2003).
A second component investigated the scale and forms of research part-
nership currently evident across the higher education landscape in high-
technology fields (Kruss 2005). This study argued that South African
forms of partnership are shaped differentially by the intersecting financial
and intellectual imperatives driving both industry and higher education.
A complex combination of old and new forms of partnership may coexist
in any higher education institution, in a department and, indeed, even
within a single research entity to meet a variety of purposes (ibid.). These
will be briefly described here to explain the current focus on the specific
form of knowledge networks.
There are traditional forms of partnership between industry and higher
education that have long existed and continue to be found on a small
scale at present in South Africa such as donations, philanthropy on the
part of industry or sponsorship, with postgraduate student research fund-
ing a core focus. In these forms of partnership the relationship is primarily
limited to a financial one, and higher education is left free to continue
with its intellectual projects, with few conditions imposed by its industry
partners.
Numerically, old forms of partnership are newly dominant across the
system. Consultancies and contracts have long existed, but over the last
decade have increased across the higher education system on a signifi-
cantly larger scale than before. In consultancies typically an individual
researcher in higher education acts in an advisory capacity to address
the immediate knowledge or technology problems of an industry, usually
in exchange for individual financial benefit. Contracts may be linked to
solving potentially interesting scientific problems or, more probable, like-
wise to addressing a specific immediate industry problem. They are pri-
marily shaped by the need to attract funding for research on the part of
higher education, and by a specific product or process problem that the
industry partner wishes to have resolved. Design solutions are a related


322 Glenda Kruss

form of partnership that has emerged where technikons (recently
redesignated as universities of technology) with appropriate technological
expertise have set up centres for prototyping and testing, which offer
design solutions to industry. These forms of partnership place potentially
severe restrictions on the intellectual project of researchers, placing
embargoes on the traditional academic products of peer-reviewed articles
and postgraduate theses, for varying periods of time, in order to protect
the proprietary interests of industry. They, thus, have potentially severe
negative implications for the core research and knowledge-generation
function of higher education.
There is small but growing evidence of the emergence of new entrepre-
neurial forms of partnership such as commercialisation in which higher
education researchers take on a strongly entrepreneurial role, attempting
to commercialise prior intellectual work in the form of a spin-off company
or in collaboration with an existing company willing to exploit intellectual
property in the form of royalties, licences or patents, or through venture
capital.
Other new forms of partnership that have emerged include incentivised
partnerships, with a weak form of intellectual collaboration, stimulated
by government funding aimed at developing research and development,
and innovative capacity in South Africa, by encouraging technology trans-
fer between higher education and industry. Collaboration partnerships
have a knowledge-based linkage in which all partners make an intellectual
contribution, but there may not be a financial relationship involved.
Finally, there is evidence of a very small number of new network forms
of partnership existing in a minority of institutions. Under new global
economic conditions, Castells (1996) proposes, networking becomes
the fundamental form of competitive strategy—embodied in the form of
the ‘network enterprise’. This is defined as ‘the specific form of enterprise
whose system of means is constituted by the intersection of segments of
autonomous systems of goals’ (ibid.: 171). The component parts of a
network are both autonomous of and dependent on the network, and
may be part of other networks, and aimed at other goals simultaneously.
In South African higher education there are a small number of these
complex knowledge-intensive forms of partnership, which are primarily
shaped by the intellectual imperatives of both industry and higher edu-
cation partners. In such strategic partnerships the research concerns of
higher education and industry partners coincide more strongly, there is
more likely to be intellectual collaboration around the research, and there
is a stronger focus on innovation of product or process.1 Such partnerships



typically take the form of networks of multiple higher education, industry,
science council and funding organisations, with distinct roles and con-
tributions, that benefit mutually but in different ways. The evidence sug-
gests that in South Africa such research networks can best facilitate the
innovation process in that they are most able to harness new knowledge
generated in multiple fields of application to produce new products and
solutions (Kruss 2005). Understanding how these knowledge networks
are created, their outcomes and future prospects forms the focus of the
article.

Uneven Research Capacity, Different Higher Education Legacies

For comparative purposes it is useful to begin with a snapshot of contribu-
tion of the South African higher education sector to research and innovation.
In 2003–4 gross domestic expenditure on R&D in South Africa was
R 10,082.6 million, representing 0.81 per cente of GDP (DST 2005: 7).
The higher education sector accounted for 20.5 per cent of the national
R&D expenditure, with the business sector contributing the lion’s share
at 55.5 per cent and the government sector (including science councils)
21.9 per cent (ibid.: 21). Table 1 illustrates trends in the higher educa-
tion sector since the advent of a democratic government, highlighting
the multiple challenges institutions and researchers face. While the total
permanent academic staff complement has remained constant, the total
headcount of student enrolment has grown significantly, particularly the
total postgraduate enrolment. In 2003 the total enrolment across the higher
education system was 717,793 students, which represents a gross parti-
cipation rate of 16.3 per cent of the 20- to 24-year age group (Steyn and
De Villiers 2006). However, the doctoral enrolment critical to renewal
of the academic labour force has grown more slowly, and does not repre-
sent a large pool of potential academics.
An increasing proportion of higher education research expenditure
comes from contract income, that is, largely through contract and consul-
tancy forms of partnership with industry (and government). In this con-
text, concern has been expressed that accredited publication rates have
remained fairly static, and that accredited publications tend to be produced
by an ageing, white male academic population (COHORT 2004). Between
2003 and 2005 the twenty-one universities and fourteen technikons were
merged and restructured to create twenty-two new institutions that are
proposed to be more appropriate to addressing higher education transfor-
mation goals,2 creating new opportunities and challenges.


TABLE 1
Trends in South African Higher Education and Innovation

1995 2000/2001 2003
Number of higher education institutions 21 universities 21 universities Plan to restructure system by 2005:
15 technikons 14 technikons 11 universities 5 universities of technologyi
6 comprehensive institutions
Government appropriation R 4,072,100,000 R 7,072,100,000 R 8,926,100,000
Permanent academic staff 14,065 14,789 14,534
Postgraduate headcount enrolment 21,908 masters 29,753 masters 39,839 masters
at universities 5,095 Ph.D.s 5,871 Ph.D.s 8,112 Ph.D.s
Total enrolment 537,541 579,254 717,793
324

% national R&D expenditureii Not available 25% (2001) 20.5%
Contract R&D income within higher R 288.1m 54% of R 637.4m 58% of Not available
education sectoriii higher education higher education
R&D expenditure R&D expenditure
R&D output: publicationsiv 5,499.79 accredited 5,513 accredited 5,639.50 accredited
publication units publication units publication units
Glenda Kruss

Source: Compiled from Department of Education (2005) and research output data supplied to author. (Note that some institutions have not yet
submitted data for 2003; hence, data for 2002 was used as an indication of their productivity).
Notes: i Technikons were redesignated universities of technology in October 2003. Comprehensive institutions are a new form of higher education
that combines both university and technikon programmes and roles.
ii
This data is derived from the National Survey of Research and Experimental Development conducted in the 2001–2 and 2003–4 fiscal

years. The previous survey with comparable methodology and data was conducted in 1991–92. See also Kahn (2006).
iii
This data is derived from a survey of higher education institutions conducted by the Centre for Research on Science and Technology at the
University of Stellenbosch.
iv
Data for 1995 and 2000 derived from Department of Education (2005). Data for 2003 supplied to author by Department of Education.


Significantly, South Africa mirrors the global trend that a small number
of universities are responsible for the majority of high-level research
outputs (Steyn and De Villiers 2006: 133). However, in this context, un-
even capacity arises from different historical legacies and modes of oper-
ation in the apartheid era. The universities and technikons in South Africa,
thus, differ in their response to the partnership imperative, and in their
ability to harness the innovation potential of their research in the interests
of development. Table 2 groups the thirty-five higher education institutions
at the time of the empirical study in 2003 according to their institutional
response to the partnership imperative (see Kruss 2005). The categories
are based on the extent to which universities and technikons have a struc-
tured3 or unstructured institutional response to industry research partner-
ship, and whether they have a sound or an emergent or a newly developing
research capacity. The data reflects differential research and innovation
capacity, as measured in the size of enrolments, the permanent academic
staff complement, the number of accredited research outputs, and the
number of scientists rated by the National Research Foundation. It illu-
strates the small number of institutions with relatively strong research
capacity that are able to compete globally, and the small number of insti-
tutions that have actively adopted an entrepreneurial approach. What is
also notable is an emergent alternative trend on the part of a few histor-
ically black universities to harness their developing research potential
through research networks in the service of poverty alleviation and com-
munity development in the most rural and isolated areas of South Africa.
The largest group of institutions has laissez-faire approaches to partner-
ships, in that they do not have dedicated strategies, structures or support
mechanisms, but there is a significant number of institutions that aspire
to develop their research capacity and the scale of partnership with industry.
Groups of institutions share similar patterns of partnership in the high-
technology fields, with only a minority able to host or lead knowledge
networks. Understanding the differential capacity and research manage-
ment approach of universities and technikons is, thus, key to understand-
ing the ways in which knowledge networks are created.

A Contextualised Approach to Understanding Networks

Castells (1996) has defined a network in the simplest way as ‘a set of
interconnected nodes’. The higher education–industry research network
has typically been analysed in terms of three nodes of interacting partners,
each constructed with varying degrees of complexity. An influential model


TABLE 2
Indicators of Performance in South African Universities and Technikons

Permanent academic NRF rated Total research
Enrolment (2003) staff (2003) researchers (2003) output (2003)
Harnessing innovation potential
University of Pretoria 41,951 1,524 157 958.80
University of Stellenbosch 21,398 809 199 630.15
University of Cape Town 20,533 779 213 563.71
Laissez-faire traditional
Witwatersrand University 24,250 448 132 566.90
326

Natal University 31,925 1,058 130 704.13
Rand Afrikaans University 24,498 432 55 277.45
Emergent entrepreneurial
University of Free State 21,984 517 75 334.38
Potchefstroom University 27,729 531 64 209.98 (2002)
Technikon Free State 8,883 145 3 21.37
Glenda Kruss

Pretoria Technikon 41,835 550 11 69.83 (2002)
Port Elizabeth Technikon 9,842 248 9 32.22
Laissez-faire aspirational
Rhodes University 7,526 334 41 169.19
University of Western Cape 14,043 448 49 100.28

University of Port Elizabeth 14,485 267 37 123.26
Witwatersrand Technikon 15,234 383 3 15.70
Durban Institute of Technology 20,952 544 8 26.65
Cape Technikon 16,295 345 3 20.41
Vaal Triangle Technikon 15,942 308 1 4.68

Consolidating a teaching focus
University of South Africa 150,533 1,090 52 435.32
Medunsa 3,883 413 2 50.09
Vista 20,746 430 6 56.76 (2002)
Building technikon capacity
Technikon Northern Gauteng 13,024 227 0 1.00 (2002)
Technikon North West 5,093 107 0 4.75(2002)
Technikon South Africa 50,875 176 5 10.66 (2002)
Peninsula Technikon 9,793 214 3 12.40
Harnessing rural development potential
University of Durban-Westville 11,270 345 23 119.85 (2002)
Fort Hare University 6,405 190 5 74.22
Venda University 9,484 268 3 23.91
University of the North 10,774 342 7 63.35
University of North West 8,667 184 2 4.16 (2002)
University of Transkei 6,479 170 3 14.40
University of Zululand 9,178 242 5 61.02
Border Technikon 5,731 146 0 6.80
CREATING KNOWLEDGE NETWORKS

Eastern Cape Tehnikon 8,526 173 0 0.00
Mangosuthu Technikon 8,027 147 0 5.96
327

Total 717,793 14,534 1,306
Source: Compiled from Department of Education 2005 and Research Output data supplied to author (Note that some institutions have not yet

submitted data for 2003, hence, data for 2002 was used as an indication of their productivity).

328 Glenda Kruss

describing relations between government, industry and higher education
in a knowledge economy is the ‘triple-helix’ model proposed by Etkowitz
and Leydesdorff (1997, 2000). According to the traditional view, the
university has the functions of education and research, industry has the
function of production, and government has the function of regulation.
In the new global context, Etkowitz and Leydesdorff suggest that a triple-
helix model is the most appropriate for reflecting the complex relations
between the three partners. That is, each institutional sphere takes on
new roles alongside their traditional roles: universities assume a role in
economic development, translating research into economic activities;
industrial firms conduct R&D activities laterally in cooperation with a
group of firms, sharing knowledge to become more competitive; and
governments play new roles to promote innovation, in some cases adopt-
ing a more interventionist and in others a more laissez-faire mode. The
critical issue is to examine the complexity of the relations between the
three interconnected nodes, between the three strands of the triple-helix,
in distinct national contexts.
We have noted the complexity and diversity of the higher education
strand in the South African context. The work of Wickham (2002) and
Mouton et al. (2003) provide examples of the limits of the research trend
to aggregate industry perceptions of factors that inhibit or constrain re-
search collaboration with higher education. Such studies are typically
used to inform higher education partnership and network practice, but in
aggregating they tend to oversimplify the complex nature of the industry
strand. That is, innovation and knowledge production are rooted in human
learning within a firm, and, consequently, involve a multitude of deter-
minants that are difficult to quantify. Industrial sectors vary in their de-
mands for knowledge-intensive collaboration with higher education, and
in their propensity and capacity for technological innovation. Without
an explicit focus on technological and sectoral variables, we can only
understand networks and partnerships in fairly general and abstract terms.
The Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC) study thus adopted the
concept of embeddedness (Granovetter 1985), which proposes that the
institutional framework of an enterprise shapes the actions, expectations
and beliefs of the social actors entering into a strategic alliance with
higher education partners. Indeed, each of the partners participating in
the network are embedded in distinct institutional contexts (Grabher
1993). Differences in the respective structural dynamics, mode of oper-
ation and strategic objectives of the partners at each node contributes to



the complexity of the interface within the network, with the potential for
conflict, tension and power asymmetries.
Thus, analysis began from a socialised account of the partners at the
three nodes constituting the network—the enterprise/s, the research en-
tity/s based in universities or technikons, and the intermediary partners
such as science councils, funding or regulatory bodies, whether public
or private sector. Castells (1996) contributed two further useful concepts,
that a network’s performance will depend on its ‘connectedness’, on a
structure to enable communication between its component parts, and on
its ‘consistency’, a sharing of interests between the network’s goals and
the goals of its component parts. The research attempted to understand
what drives participants to pursue a network, how it is structured, how
they interact, how each benefits, and what the limitations of power asym-
metries on the network are, against an understanding of the respective
institutional contexts of the (multiple) partners at each node.
The following sections focus on cases in the biotechnology sector,
being relatively new in South Africa, and, by way of contrast, in the re-
latively mature new materials development sector. It shows the complex
nature of the partners at each node of the network, and of the structure
and dynamics of the network interaction that result.

Understanding Biotechnology Networks

The seven cases illustrate the complex ways in which the structure and
nature of networks are shaped by the ‘embedded’ nature of each partner,
of the policy, industrial and university contexts in which enterprises and
research entities collaborating in biotechnology or new materials devel-
opment research operate. In the process they highlight the richness and
variability of South African higher education responses to contemporary
challenges. Table 3 provides an overview of the focus and partners in each
case, and is intended as a useful reference point throughout.4

Multiple Layers of Determinants

Drawing from a comparative analysis of the seven cases, it appears that
the creation of knowledge networks in South Africa is strongly shaped
by the competitive dynamics of the industrial sector. The cases illustrate
that it is critical to understand the industrial sub-sector within which an


TABLE 3
A Comparative Overview of the Network Cases

Focus of Formation Partners at the Partners at the Partners at the
partnership and duration higher education node industry node intermediary node
Water membrane Commercialise an Long-term research Water Membrane Amatola Water Board Water Research
ultra-filtration record and long- Technology Group, Commission
system suited to standing collaboration Durban Institute of
developing country Technology, Institute of
market Polymer Science,
Stellenbosch University;
Pollution Research Group,
330

University of Natal
Mycorrizhal Develop process Medium term; Potchefstroom University; Amphigro CC; field Innovation Fund;
for large-scale Innovation Fund Rhodes University; test partners, e.g. Department of Agriculture/
production of project of finite Witwatersrand University; Chicory SA Ltd Water Affairs
AMF inoculants duration (2000–2003): Stellenbosch University;
Glenda Kruss

that increase shift to Pretoria Laboratory
growth, yield or commercialisation?
fitness of plants
Bioinformatics Develop Medium term: SA Bioinformatics Electric Genetics Wellcome Trust
bioinformatics research well Institute, University of
software for gene established, Western Cape; European

detection and collaboration since Bioinformatics Institute;
expression states 1997 Sanger Institute,
Wellcome Trust

Tree protection Upstream process Long-term research Forestry and Agricultural Mondi Forests; Sappi Forestry South Africa;
to improve tree record (since 1970s) Biotechnology Institute, Forests; Hans Department of Water
production by and long-standing University of Pretoria; Merenski; Global Affairs and Forestry
controlling collaboration Institute for Commercial Forestry Products;
pathogens Forestry Research, Central Timber
University of Natal Cooperative
Recovery of metals Upstream process Short-term: duration Centre for Electro- Anglo-Platinum None
to enhance of master’s study only Chemistry and Centre of
recovery of Material and Process
platinum Synthesis, Witwatersrand
University
Phenolics Downstream Medium term: Port Elizabeth Technikon Merisol; Sasol; BioChemtek, Council for
processes and recently established Catalysis Research Unit; Merichem; Scientific and Industrial
products, to grow collaboration, Catalysis Research Unit, Gradchem Solutions Research; Chemin
market for research established University of Cape Town incubator; THRIP; Dept of
beneficiation of Trade and Industry
CREATING KNOWLEDGE NETWORKS

phenolics
Starch-based Downstream Medium term: Institute of Applied African Products; Centre for Polymer
331

plastics THRIP processes and recently established Materials, University of Xyris Technology Technology, CSIR; THRIP
2002–3 products, to grow THRIP project, Pretoria; network of

market for research well European research
applications of established institutions
cornstarch

332 Glenda Kruss

enterprise operates, the dynamics of competition operating, and the cen-
trality of research and innovation to a company’s competitive strategy
or insertion in a ‘value chain’ in order to understand what drives or con-
strains individual firms to seek research networks. These dynamics differ
with the maturity of industrial sectors, of the technology fields on which
they draw, and of the supportive policy context within which they operate.
However, the conditions created by government policy steering mecha-
nisms to promote science and technology, innovation and partnership
impacts in various ways on what is possible. The extent to which the higher
education context in which a research entity is located was supportive of
partnerships—in terms of managerial, administrative, financial and intel-
lectual property frameworks—further determined which institutions were
favoured in creating networks, as did the reputation of the individual
‘academic champion’ and the research entity itself. These claims will be
substantiated later, through brief descriptions of the two sets of cases.

Four Biotechnology Cases: From Enhancing
Agricultural Products to Bioinformatics

Biotechnology in South Africa is historically well established in first-
and second-generation activities, but there is not yet significant industrial
development drawing on third-generation technology. This may change
in the light of a strong government policy commitment to build a bioeco-
nomy as part of a national strategy for enhancing global competitiveness
(see Mboniswa 2002; Walwyn 2003). For instance, the development of a
National Biotechnology Strategy (DACST 2002b) has framed the estab-
lishment of three Biotechnology Regional Innovation Centres, national
support structures such as a National Bioinformatics Network, and the
allocation of considerable funding through programmes such as THRIP
and the Innovation Fund. Such initiatives provide a substantive policy
and financial environment to support the efforts of individual institutions
and enterprises.
Here we found networks incentivised by government schemes to col-
laborate around strategic research leading to commercialisation, as well
as pre-competitive research to improve the quality of upstream products
and processes. The locus of control driving the creation of these four
networks lies more strongly in the university itself than do the networks
in new materials development. This is in the face of a small, emerging
industrial sector in South Africa, and given the nature of the bioeconomy
globally, which has its roots in technology transfer and spin-offs from



university and science council laboratories. The active role of government
intermediary agencies encouraged and facilitated research cooperation
in the public interest or with a strong development mandate. A brief de-
scription of each of the four cases will highlight these trends.

The Water Membrane Network

The water membrane network focuses on adapting an imported capillary
ultra-filtration system for potable water production to South African
conditions. A membrane filtration process was developed by researchers
based in Stellenbosch University over the past few years, funded by the
Water Research Commission (WRC), a statutorily created body that derives
its funding from levies on water use. Table 2 reflects that Stellenbosch is
a historically advantaged university with a strong research capacity that
is able to harness the potential for innovation of its knowledge base.
Based on this research, engineering researchers from the newly created
Durban Institute of Technology (DIT), based in another province, are
driving a research network on process development and automation, non-
chemical pre-treatment, defouling and flow destabilisation strategies.
The university partners conducted the fundamental research, but required
the skills of colleagues at the university of technology (based in multiple
departments) to optimise the system for large-scale application. A second
university-based research group in close proximity to the DIT is also in-
volved in a more secondary manner.
The research is facilitated by a government intermediary partner, the
WRC, which provides critical funding for the research, as well as facili-
tating collaboration between the partners through its contractual sup-
port, influence and expertise. The higher education partners interact with
enterprises—public water boards that now operate on a full-cost recovery
basis—and municipalities indirectly through the WRC. Although this
intermediary role of the WRC is not strictly part of its functions, it resolves
at least three problems faced by higher education research units in direct
contact with industry. First, it allows for more realistic timetables than
those normally demanded by industry. Second, the continuity provided
by the WRC overcomes the problems associated with staff turnover in
industry. Third, the WRC eliminates the need for multiple and complex
contractual negotiations with industry partners and has greater influence
over the water industry. The WRC funding in terms of its prioritisation
of water needs in the country means the research entity does not need to
pursue more short-term industry-defined consultancies and contracts.


334 Glenda Kruss

The enterprise partners are public water boards whose primary research
role is limited largely to field testing and fine-tuning of the system. The
first ‘client’, the Amatola Water Board, provides the necessary facilities
and assists in sorting out minor problems in the filtration system. As such,
it provides the technology with the record of accomplishment necessary
for viable commercialisation. In turn their links with higher education
partners allow for less R&D staff and encourage greater involvement in
skills transfer and socio-economic upliftment, and allows the enterprise
to evade many of the costs and risks associated with the development
of new technologies. However, it was clear that by simply outsourcing
R&D functions to the higher education sector, industry may compromise
its capacity to absorb the knowledge necessary for product and process
innovations.
A commercially viable filtration system has important social benefits
in improving access to safe, high-quality water, particularly for small
rural communities, with considerable operating benefits. The network
structure is long-standing, and part of a wider network, which has been
fluid over time, involving the partners in stronger or weaker collaboration,
depending on the specific problem being addressed. At the heart of the
dynamics of operation of the network are the strong personal ties between
the leaders of the two research entities. The meshing of skills (that is,
analytical skills from the university, applied skills from the technikons,
and technical skills from the Amatola Water Board) and associated know-
ledge transfers were regarded as vital ingredients for the success. A further
beneficial aspect as noted by these researchers is that the network has
facilitated greater interaction between historically white and black higher
education institutions, and between higher education and the community.
The primary outcomes of the network are the training and employment
of students, the registration of patents, and the development of innovative
products. The partners are currently attempting to establish the commer-
cial viability of the new technology in order to attract significant venture
capital, at which point, in terms of a memorandum of understanding,
there are plans to form a joint venture to regulate relations, while the
technology will be licensed to users through the Water Research
Commission.

The Mycorrhizal Network

The mycorrhizal network focuses on the isolation and production of
quality arbuscular mycorrhizal fungal (AMF) innoculants, and their ef-
fective application to particular plants and soil types. The benefits of



AMF are either increased growth and yield of crops, or improved fitness
to conditions (such as drought stress tolerance). The network is organised
as a consortium, driven by relatively autonomous multidisciplinary teams
primarily based in five universities around the country, at considerable
distance from one another. The focus is on the innovation of process and
techniques, and on accruing intellectual property rights for the isolation
and large-scale production of indigenous AMF inoculants for application
in a range of sectors as a basis for commercialisation. The research is
facilitated by government incentivisation funding in the form of the Innov-
ation Fund, which influences the formal, contractual structure of the net-
work. Full funding for the research was obtained for a period of three
years, ending in December 2003.
The network structure is shaped by its ‘dual status’ as intellectual pro-
perty development enterprise and Innovation Fund project administrative
vehicle, and it could be described as constituting ‘a R&D company, which
is run as a business’. However, its primary focus at this stage is research
and not profit.
The enterprise partners, agricultural concerns, have a limited role in
monitoring of field trials and collection of data, while the university-
based researchers interpret the results with a view to product validation.
These enterprises act more like prospective clients than knowledge-based
network partners, leading to greater higher education insularity in the
structure of this network. Intermediary organisations also do not influence
the nature and direction of research activities in a direct way, and in ef-
fect operate as secondary enterprise partners or prospective clients. For
example, the relationship with Agricultural Research Council research
institutes involves applied mycorrhizal research such as investigating
the application of mycorrhisa in the case of emerging farmers who cannot
afford fertilisers, as well as collaboration around field trials.
At the time of the research the network was faced with the challenge
of reconstituting itself as a fully-fledged commercial entity, a process
that has complex legal implications and far-reaching consequences for
its future. Although by all accounts very good results have been obtained,
commercialisation is still some way off because of the variable status of
field trials. The network faces critical challenges and tensions in terms
of developing a market for their product, accessing capital to move from
the R&D to the commercialisation phase, and distributing ownership of
intellectual property rights amongst the partners. Of note are difficulties
in securing bridging finance or venture capital, attributed to the fact that


336 Glenda Kruss

very little product awareness exists within the agricultural sector. Thus,
apart from the increasing number of postgraduate students entering
mycorrhizal research programmes, there are not yet tangible products
emanating from this network, which illustrates the considerable diffi-
culties of commercialisation and university-driven knowledge networks.

The Tree Protection Network

The tree protection network focuses on the pre-competitive phase of the
forestry, paper and pulp industries, in relation to preventing the spread
of tree pathogens. Initially, this was reactive, but increasingly it is pro-
active through attempts like cloning to cultivate trees that are resistant
to pests and pathogens. Based in a world-renowned research institute at
the University of Pretoria, the network includes major forestry and article
producing companies and timber cooperatives, alongside industry inter-
mediary bodies like Forestry South Africa and the government department
of Water Affairs and Forestry.
The network has its origins in an initiative begun in 1990, originally
based at the University of the Free State. Significantly, it moved in 1998
to the University of Pretoria at the initiative of the vice-chancellor, who
enticed the director with the offer of a custom-designed building, labora-
tory and apparatus. The level of support from the university was exten-
sive, so that the programme subsequently transmogrified into the Forestry
and Agricultural Biotechnology Institute (FABI), with the tree protection
network providing one-third of its focus.
Growing healthy trees that yield quality fibre or timber is the core
business of all the enterprises involved, and there is willingness to col-
laborate in a pre-competitive forum focused on technological innovation
to ensure the competitiveness of the entire industry. The network has
grown over the years, but has not shed any partners. It is structured as a
cooperative with partners joining as members, sharing concerns, while
the research institute drives knowledge generation. The network has
fostered the production of a significant number of postgraduate theses,
with thirty-five Ph.D.s in the last ten years. Industry partners—particularly
Mondi and Sappi—are major funders, and funding is leveraged from the
Innovation Fund, THRIP programme, National Research Foundation and
the university itself. Particularly pivotal to the balance between the part-
ners at the three nodes is the charismatic and highly experienced academic
director of the research institute. Strong consensus is that the network



provides a mechanism for achieving stakeholder objectives that one part-
ner could not achieve on its own.
This case illustrates that networks are not established overnight, but
take time to develop and to flourish. While the network was formalised
in 1990, the key research that underpinned its establishment had been
ongoing for at least fifteen years prior. Such biotechnology needs greater
infrastructural investment, in the form of sustainable specialist business
development, in order to take root in South Africa. There are indications
that the network is a fertile breeding ground for a body of knowledge
that, without proper nurturing, may either leave the country or mutate
into other kinds of competence—biotechnologists becoming managers
or moving sideways into other disciplines—in the absence of a vibrant
biotechnology industry in the country.

The Bioinformatics Network

The bioinformatics network is based at a historically disadvantaged uni-
versity, the University of the Western Cape (UWC). The research entity,
the South African Bioinformatics Institute (SANBI), works in collaboration
with a spin-off company, Electric Genetics, and international researchers,
facilitated by government incentivisation funding and sponsorship from
an international trust formed by a multinational pharmaceutical corpor-
ation. In 2001 there were only five bioinformatics professors in South
Africa, three of whom were at SANBI, at that time the only formal centre
of bioinformatics in South Africa. Electric Genetics was originally founded
in 1997 as a spin-off company to commercialise technologies for analysing
the human genome developed at SANBI, and is the first bioinformatics
company in South Africa. The UWC is a 1 per cent shareholder in the
company and receives royalties for products developed in partnership
between the company and the SANBI.5
The research at the heart of the network focuses on using cutting-edge
technology in bioinformatics to generate solutions to biological research
problems and to contribute to the development of software that will speed
up genetic and biotechnology research. The research institute generates
new knowledge, which is commercialised and sold by the spin-off com-
pany, largely to pharmaceutical companies to reduce the risks and costs
associated with their R&D. The two organisations have created a fast,
open source development process whereby tools are designed and rapidly
prototyped. One tangible output of the project is EnsMart, a data retrieval
tool that generates lists of biological objects (for example, genes) from


338 Glenda Kruss

data held in the Ensembl database. Another example of SANBI’s output
is the development, analysis and distribution of the database known as
STACK Human Gene Index, an index of expressed human genes de-
veloped as part of a research contract funded by the United States National
Center for Genome Resources.
The network is reportedly structured according to the ‘academic way’.
SANBI places great emphasis on peer review processes, particularly in
the form of academic publications and presentations in academic sem-
inars and conferences, in order to raise its research profile and establish
its credibility in the scientific community nationally and globally. It also
grows out of the commitment to open source arrangements that will serve
as a basis for research and discvery, and ultimately a wide range of prac-
tical applications.
SANBI is involved in a range of capacity-building and academic teach-
ing programmes, including training of postgraduate students, through a
master’s course in bioinformatics that started in January 2002. General
and specialised courses are organised, such as a capacity-building bio-
informatics training course to promote the capability of African scientists
to apply cutting-edge DNA technology and genome information to trop-
ical diseases research. In 2001 SANBI was also centrally involved in the
creation of the South African Genomics Platform, a network of genomic
scientists who collaborate in researching key areas where genomics and
bioinformatics can have an impact on South African science and be of
national benefit. It facilitates pooling of resources to provide the capacity
to tackle large genomics projects that would otherwise be intractable
due to the scale of the investment required.
From the point of view of commercialisation, Electric Genetics is seen
to be at a disadvantage relative to its competitors because it is geograph-
ically remote from the locus of innovation and cutting-edge science, and
there are few customers in South Africa. The extent to which local industries
such as the pharmaceutical industry can benefit is limited, largely because
of the limited capacity for manufacturing pharmaceutical products.
A serious limitation identified by researchers relates to the shortage
of expertise in bioinformatics, which will not be overcome easily as ex-
pertise takes time to build and grow. Sophisticated software needs require
supercomputing capabilities that exist partially, but need to be extended.
This capacity is expensive and cannot feasibly be developed by individual
institutions. The National Bioinformatics Network has been established
to facilitate the development of such capacity and undertake negotiations



with national players such as the Department of Communications, Telkom
and others. Limitations in South Africa’s communications infrastructure
may, thus, constrain further development of this network.

Drivers of Biotechnology Networks

In general, funding criteria and pressures to generate research income,
institutional missions and a desire to enhance research specialisms encour-
aged academics to undertake collaborative research and pursue networks
in biotechnology. This intersected with the primary driving motivations
for industry and intermediary partners—the importance of innovation to
competitiveness and efficiency, the high costs of R&D, and statutory
obligations. The lack of a developed bioeconomy in South Africa or of
venture capital and bridging funds were identified as significant barriers
for the success of networks pursuing commercialisation.

Understanding the New Materials Development Networks

In contrast, new materials development is a more mature field than bio-
technology in South Africa, both in terms of research and in relation to
the industrial sectors with which it is involved. However, government
policy and financial support for the sector was cut in the early 1990s,
leading to a loss of the research capacity built up in the apartheid era,
given the strategic emphasis on materials research for the military, energy
self-sufficiency and food security sectors (Knutsen 2002). Knutsen argues
that many established industry partnerships disappeared, the existing
materials capacity was significantly eroded, and the research community
fragmented into pockets of activity. There are recent signs—for example,
the development of an Advanced Manufacturing Technology Strategy
(AMTS 2003) and the formation of a South African Nanotechnology
Initiative (2002)—that the situation is beginning to change. There are
exciting instances of network collaboration around fundamental and stra-
tegic research to expand downstream applications of primary resources
to create new markets, but at the same time there are signs that old contract
forms of partnership continue to operate in ways that are not entirely
beneficial to the interests of the higher education partner.
The new materials development networks differ from the biotechnol-
ogy networks, particularly in terms of the degree of secrecy surrounding
the research.6 Indeed, although selected as a network, it became evident


340 Glenda Kruss

that one case, the recovery of metals, in fact operated as the older organ-
isational form of a dyadic contract partnership. In a mature industry such
as platinum mining, the enterprise has chosen a strategy of improving
recovery operations to address the inefficiency of a specific upstream
operation in order to enhance competitiveness. The company has signifi-
cant R&D capacity, but not in relation to the electrochemical recovery
of minerals, hence, it turned to a university that offers such research cap-
acity. The relationship is governed by strong confidentiality agreements,
and is essentially limited to supervision of the master’s theses of two
employees of the enterprise. There is virtually no collaboration between
the industry and higher education partners around knowledge creation,
and both the university and the students are severely restricted in terms
of publishing the research in order not to infringe the company’s pro-
prietary knowledge and future competitiveness.

The New Materials Cases: Enhancing Downstream Applications

Starch-based Plastic Compounds Network

In contrast to the earlier two networks, this a complex network formed
around developing a biodegradable plastic from cornstarch, which has
equivalent properties too, but is cheaper than, petroleum-based plastic.
The primary enterprise partner is a large company, African Products, a
producer of cornstarch, motivated to invest in R&D by concerns to expand
the downstream, value-added applications of its product. Significantly,
researchers from a government science council, the Council for Scientific
and Industrial Research (CSIR), serve as an intermediary link between
the primary enterprise partner and the primary research partner, the Insti-
tute of Applied Materials, also based at the University of Pretoria. The
network includes researchers from international networks, as well as
secondary enterprise partners, including a spin-off company from the
university, Xyris Technology, which was established by the director of
the research institute. The research is funded by the government THRIP
programme, and, hence, there are significant matching contributions from
the industry partners.
The university partner brings research expertise and capacity (including
students) to the network, the science council brings polymer expertise,
facilities and equipment as well as an interest in commercialisation, the
spin-off enterprise partner brings sponsorship as well as expertise and
manufacturing capacity in the area of additives, and the primary industry



partner brings venture capital, the capacity to commercialise the product
and international connections. The goal of the partners, to produce com-
mercially viable cornstarch plastic products, could not be achieved with-
out the network, as none has all the capabilities and facilities necessary
to accomplish the task. For the university partner the major knowledge
benefit is in advanced polymer compound technology, the opportunity
for students to be involved in cutting-edge research in the field and pub-
lishing in scientific journals. The industry partner benefits from providing
the funding and being able to steer the research and set the targets for a
product it is keenly interested in producing. Although the industry partner
has research laboratories, these are devoted to food technology research,
and it does not have the facilities nor expertise in polymer compounds.
At the broadest level the project has the potential to contribute to na-
tional and economic development. Success would have important en-
vironmental benefits in that it would produce compostible plastics, reduce
the production of non-biodegradable waste, reduce the use of petrochem-
icals, and ultimately, in so doing, is likely to reduce the production of
greenhouse gases. In addition, the production of compostible plastics is
likely to create jobs, which will depend partly on the uptake of the project
by companies internationally, since the market in South Africa is relatively
small. African Products is well positioned to exploit possible international
markets as is Mondi, a company with whom the network is collaborating
around the production of compositible seedling trays, the first marketable
product to be produced by an IAM student in the CSIR laboratories.
Tests are still being run on its biodegradable and compostible qualities,
and it is not yet ready for commercial-scale production. Possible uses
for pot plant holders, golf tees and food containers are being explored,
and there is a food store interested in replacing polystyrene used for
packaging with a biodegradable product.
The industry partner believes there is benefit to be gained in being in-
volved in the research process in order to have the competitive advantage
once a suitable compound is found. They will then be able to lay claim
to the technology put in a system to supply the starch additive. There is
a strong belief that project goals can be achieved, but there is also recog-
nition that some research efforts go unrewarded and that it is necessary
to keep investing in research even if there is project failure. Polymer
compound research will continue, but perhaps not in this direction, if no
progress is made within the limits set by the THRIP funding. Funding
and time thus appear potentially more threatening to this network than
competition from a different source.


342 Glenda Kruss

The Beneficiation of Phenolics Network

The beneficiation of the phenolics network is similarly driven by the
confluence of industry interests to expand downstream applications of
phenols (pure chemicals distilled from chemical raw materials that have
a wide range of applications in the fine chemicals market), with Port
Elizabeth Technikon’s interest in improving the synthesis methods for
beneficiation processes. The network is centred on a joint venture com-
pany established by SASOL (a major South African company, a former
parastatal, producing oil from coal) with an American company, to add
value to its raw materials. The enterprise has its own limited R&D cap-
acity, and can draw on that of SASOL, but neither is geared towards this
type of research. Hence, in order to cut costs, minimise risks and avoid
duplication, they turned to higher education institutions for research input.
The research yields more new processes and products than it can strateg-
ically pursue, hence, the network includes a few small start-up companies,
and a national chemical technology incubator, based at the technikon,
pursuing commercialisation of the technologies yielded.
The nature of the chemical industry in South Africa has a bearing on
the networks that have evolved. The chemical sector has shrunk con-
siderably in the last ten years because of the limited apartheid strategy to
make the country self-sufficient rather than to become globally com-
petitive. The chemical industry is dominated by commodity-producing
companies and very little is done to develop the downstream, value-added
side of the industry. In its role as a sectoral intermediary, the technikon-
based incubator partner, Chemin, strives to develop downstream applica-
tions by building cooperative relations between it and the established
part of the industry. Other research partners include the science council,
the CSIR, which brings its pilot manufacturing facility to the network,
and a cognate university research unit, based in another province, but with
a distinct, complementary set of expertise, skills and equipment. The
network has, thus, developed on the basis of specialisation and avoiding
duplication, but of pooling resources to address the technical, financial,
marketing and other complexities involved in the process of beneficiating
phenolics. Obstacles identified include a poorly developed venture capital
market and a reluctance by banks to take ‘risks’, government-funded
agencies that tend to focus on the expansion of existing industries and
products, the lack of an ‘entrepreneurial’ culture in the country, and the
elaborate and time-consuming regulatory process associated with the
establishment of a new business.



Understanding the Creation of Networks

Essentially, in these cases knowledge networks are created when enter-
prises—large or small7—are willing to enter into cooperative alliances
with higher education and intermediary partners, to meet their complex
knowledge and technology needs, in order to enhance future competi-
tiveness. Or they happen when entrepreneurial academics enter into
cooperative alliances with higher education, industry and intermediary
partners to meet their complex knowledge and technology needs in order
to commercialise their knowledge products. As Klerck (2003) has phrased
it, the dynamics of competition in a particular product market or industrial
sector are closely linked to the dynamics of cooperation found.
Of course, the knowledge and technology needs of the enterprise do
not shape the structure and dynamics of a network alone. Rather, they
intersect with the levels of expertise in higher education, in terms of the
existence of a critical mass of academics in a research specialism, but
equally with the motivation for and tacit knowledge of managing research
partnerships with industry. The cases show that this is usually embodied
in an academic entrepreneur, who is the linchpin in ensuring the ‘con-
nectedness’ of many of the networks. Closely linked is the significance
of centralised higher education institutional support, whether financial,
legal or administrative. Higher education institutions with strong research
expertise and management structures appear to be more effective in sup-
porting academics in the creation and maintenance of networks.
The involvement of an intermediary partner drawn from the public
sector in a range of ways provides a further layer of complexity that may
intersect to determine whether a network is created, and the specific
structure and dynamics of its functioning. The intermediaries take a num-
ber of forms. Actively involved in funding, knowledge generation or even
commercialisation, were market-driven government science councils such
as the CSIR. Government departments or agencies such as the Water Re-
search Commission were involved in directly funding and shaping the
direction of research, or even in mediating relationships within the net-
work. More passively involved in funding only, shaping the formal con-
tractual structure of networks, were government funding programmes
such as THRIP, the Innovation Fund or the Godisa incubator schemes,
and international government agencies with bilateral agreements.
The intersection of interests—or ‘consistency’—gives all partners a stake
in the research project at the heart of the network, and builds the levels


344 Glenda Kruss

of trust required for it to ‘work’ or ‘succeed’. It was evident that although
many of the networks studied were yet to realise their goal of delivering
a finite innovation of product or process, networks in South Africa can
lead to substantial benefits in the form of increased profit for industry, an
improved research profile for higher education, and wider socio-economic
benefits. A key intangible benefit identified by both industry and higher
education partners was broadening their organisational ‘learning inter-
face’. Conversely, conflict and tension were evident within those networks
that were not constructed on the basis of sufficiently sound organisational
‘learning’, particularly as they approached the point of commercialisation.
Such are the multiple interdependent determinants shaping the creation
of knowledge networks. What does the analysis suggest is significant to
inform the creation of knowledge networks in a late developing country
like South Africa on a wider scale?

Problematising the Notion of Innovation

The cases suggest that we need to foreground an expansive and nuanced
conception of innovation. The South African R&D strategy is committed
to science and technology for poverty reduction in the interests of the
most marginalised as one key thrust, and identifying new technology
platforms in line with global trends as another. The cases are a reminder
of the need to balance the two. Cutting-edge innovation includes the social
good, and a wide range of degrees of innovation, not only prioritising re-
search oriented to high-technology global competitiveness or that which
is new to the world.
There were clear-cut cases of potential synthetic innovation of product,
such as the cornstarch plastic, and cases of potential synthetic innovation
of process, such as the genomic information, computational biology
and analytical tools developed in the bioinformatics project. There were
also, however, cases of incremental innovation, particularly those based
in technikons, that appeared to be ‘improvements’ on existing technology
(such as the water membrane technology) or adaptation of technologies
developed elsewhere in specific South African or regional contexts (such
as the mychorrhizal research). However, the potential outcome of projects
like the water membrane technology, which can have a widespread impact
on the quality of life of many, particularly those living in rural areas that
have not had adequate access to water resources, means that it is a critical



innovation in a late developing country context like South Africa. It is
important for the goal of promoting a South African knowledge economy
that policy makers and higher education managers value the entire spec-
trum of innovation.
Second, the cases provide important insight into the relationship be-
tween networks and the promotion of innovation. Incremental innovation
new only to a specific firm may arise out of contract or consultancy forms
of partnership, and does not necessarily require a network. There is con-
siderable evidence from the study that contracts may be an important
‘step’ in organisational learning as an industrial sector matures. However,
the tree protection network that can contribute to enhancing the quality
of the core product of the entire timber and paper sector is one example
of the value of the collaboration and cooperation inherent in the network
form of organisation. Significantly, the project operates to the benefit of
the higher education partner by developing a new field of research ex-
pertise, attracting students, and generating knowledge and publications.
The new organisational form of the network brings partners at each node
together in a way that can lead to innovation and economic growth, but
at the same time further advance the goals of higher education.

The Need for a More Nuanced and Targeted Approach

The cases provide evidence of the significant role played by multiple
government departments and agencies as intermediaries shaping the cre-
ation of networks. A key implication of the analysis is that for a develop-
mental state to play a more expanded role in facilitating networks, public
sector stakeholders require a more sophisticated and informed analysis
of where they can best impact than is currently the case. That is, the
complex intersection of industry, higher education and intermediary
strands of the ‘triple helix’, shaping knowledge networks suggests that
we need to understand the ‘embeddedness’ of institutions, particularly
of enterprises, in greater depth to inform cross-sectoral steering measures.
Understanding the embeddedness of the research and technology needs
of specific industrial sectors may inform more refined ways in which the
reach and coverage of government intermediary agencies like THRIP
and the Innovation Fund can be expanded. Or it may suggest better-
targeted ways in which incubator schemes can draw more small, medium
and micro enterprises (SMMEs) into innovation programmes. It may allow


346 Glenda Kruss

better coordination of the mechanisms and programmes adopted by dif-
ferent government departments to promote research and innovation in
the higher education sector. It may inform regional innovation strategies
in the light of growing evidence to suggest the significance of provincial
and local government levels.
Such an understanding is equally significant for research managers
and leaders in higher education institutions to facilitate cross-sectoral
interventions across the system. Individual institutions need to develop
their own internal institutional coordinating strategies and mechanisms,
to promote network forms of partnership across a greater spread of their
research entities. National higher education associations need to coord-
inate strategies more effectively across the sector. The full implications
of the analysis for the strategies and practices of higher education, how-
ever, must remain the subject of another article.
Thus, in conclusion, the major insight offered for countries grappling
with similar challenges and dynamics is the value of undertaking such a
contextualised analysis. The ideal enshrined in South African policy, of
the desirability of partnership between higher education and industry,
was subjected to an empirically informed analysis of the complexity of
creating knowledge networks. Analysis of the cases underscores the value
of researching what drives enterprises in specific industrial sectors, re-
searchers in universities with differentiated research and innovation cap-
acity, and intermediary partners with diverse public goals, to seek network
forms of partnership. Understanding the embedded nature of network
creation and dynamics, and the success or limitations that result, can in-
form how mutually beneficial networks may be facilitated by better tar-
getted, more nuanced cross-sectoral interventions.

NOTES

1. Innovation: ‘The application in practice of creative new ideas, which in many cases
involves the introduction of inventions into the marketplace. In contrast, creativity is
the generating and articulating of new ideas. It follows that people can be creative
without being innovative. They may have ideas, or produce inventions, but may not
try to win broad acceptance for them, put them to use or exploit them by turning their
ideas into products and services that other people will buy or use’ (DACST 1996: 15).
2. The system now consists of eleven universities, six comprehensive universities and
five universities of technology (see Council on Higher Education 2004).
3. For instance, research, intellectual property or partnership policies, research manage-
ment offices, technology transfer offices or commercialisation offices.



4. For each case study an institutional profile of partner organisations at the three nodes
was compiled, from Web sites and interviews. Semi-structured face-to-face interviews
were conducted with senior management and research staff at the primary university,
industry and intermediary partners, and telephonic interviews were conducted with
the subsidiary partners. The interviews focused on developing a profile of the partner
and on understanding of the dynamics of the network. A case study report was com-
piled, and comparative analysis of the cases in a specific technology field against the
policy and industrial sector context was first conducted, followed by a comparative
analysis of trends in the three fields.
5. So far UWC is reported to have received close to R 1.5 million from Electric Genetics
(Business Day 2003).
6. A number of networks selected for inclusion refused to participate in the study on
grounds of confidentiality agreements surrounding their research.
7. Firm size is commonly believed to influence the nature of networks, but the evidence
from the cases supports Audretsch’s (2003) argument that the relative innovative ad-
vantage of small and large firms varies across industries. However, he shows that the
evidence increasingly suggests that strategic partnerships may be more important for
smaller firms than for larger corporations with access to their own R&D. In the South
African case 66 per cent of THRIP industry partners in biotechnology were SMMEs,
58 per cent in ICT and 51 per cent in new materials projects (HSRC 2003).

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Development, Human Sciences Research Council, Pretoria.
Knutsen, R.D. (2002), ‘Towards Understanding the Role of New Materials in the South
African Society’. Unpublished Report for the Research Programme on Human Re-
sources Development, Human Sciences Research Council, Pretoria.
Kruss, G. (2005), Working Partnerships in Higher Education, Industry and Innovation:
Financial or Intellectual Imperatives. Cape Town: HSRC Press.
Kruss, G., ed. (2006), Creating Knowledge Networks. Cape Town: HSRC Publishers.
Mboniswa, B. (2002), ‘Biotechnology and Collaborative Research in South Africa’. Unpub-
lished report for the Research Programme on Human Resources Development,
Human Sciences Research Council, Pretoria.
Mouton, J., T. Bailey and N. Boshoff (2003), A Survey of Research Utlisation. Stellenbosch:
CREST (Formerly Centre for Interdisciplinary Studies), University of Stellenbosch.
Steyn, G. and P. De Villiers (2006), ‘The Impact of Changing Funding Sources on Higher
Education Institutions in South Africa’. Research report for the Council on Higher
Education, Pretoria.
Walwyn, D. (2003), ‘Biotechnologists’, in HSRC, HRD Review 2003: Education, Employ-
ment and Skills in South Africa. Pretoria: HSRC Press, and East Lansing: Michigan
State University Press.
Wickham, S. (2002), ‘Unlocking Intellectual Knowledge: External Partners’ Views of
Research Partnerships with Selected Higher Education Institutions in the Western
Cape’. Report Prepared for International Development Research Centre/Trade and
Industry Policy Secretariat, Pretoria.



Further Readings

Adam, R. (2003), ‘The National R&D Strategy and Utilisation of Research Findings’.
Presented at NACI Conference, 9 October, Midrand, South Africa.
Boshoff, N. and J. Mouton (2003), ‘Science Policy Indicators, in HSRC’, in Human Re-
sources Development: Education, Employment and Skills in South Africa. Pretoria:
HSRC Press and East Lansing: Michigan State University Press.
Itzkin, E. (2000), ‘How to Compete in the Perpetual Innovation Economy’, South African
Journal of Information Management, 2(1), pp. 1–10.
Lorentzen, J., A. Paterson, G. Kruss and F. Arends (2005), ‘Warm Bodies, Cool Minds:
Counting Innovative Human Capital in South Africa’. Presented at DRUID 10th
Anniversary Conference, Copenhagen Business School.
National Research Foundation, South Africa (2005), Facts and Figures 2005. The NRF
Evaluation and Rating System. Pretoria: National Research Foundation.


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