| This dissertation is written with the hope that its contents will provide useful information to policy-makers engaged in growing high-tech economies through fostering university-industry-government collaborations and linkages. As an in-depth look at a particular case, from the perspectives of both the innovation network and government, and in assessing both performance and expectations, it allows us to present an understanding of what those most engaged in assuring the success of an innovation network believe is needed for them to succeed. In addition, new methods to assess the potential and efforts of relatively new1 government-induced, university-led, and industry-directed R&D centers are presented to assist government stakeholders in designing, implementing, and conducting their own assessments of these centers.;As an academic endeavor, this research seeks to add to the body of literature concerning innovation networks through the practical application of theory regarding the so-called triple-helix model of innovation to a particular case, the Buffalo innovation network centered at the New York State Center of Excellence in Bioinformatics and Life Sciences of the University at Buffalo. In addition, it presents a novel framework concerning the possibility of a separate triple-helix comprised of the federal, state, and local scales of government emerging within the government sphere of the triple-helix.;The triple-helix model is quite influential in Europe and has and continues to be applied to public policies concerning innovation-based economic development. With limited scholarship concerning its application in a U.S.-based situation, the results of this research offer the potential to apply aspects of the theory to other situations in the U.S. as a model for innovation-based economic development.;1As compared to longer established and better supported ones, for example, those based at MIT and Stanford. This usage of the term "early stage" is derived from what one of the study's major theorists (Charles and Benneworth 2010) consider as akin to "relatively new."... |
