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Figure 3-1: Components of an innovation systemSource: OECD (2003: 9)Modern innovation models describe the network of relationships among academia, industry, andgovernment as an overlay of reflexive communications that increasingly reshape the institutionalarrangements. (Etzkowitz and Leydesdorff, 2000: 109). The linear innovation model eitherexpressed in terms of ‘‘market pull’’ or ‘‘technology push’’ was insufficient to induce transfer ofknowledge and technology. Publication and patenting assume different systems of reference bothfrom each other and with reference to the transformation of knowledge and technology intomarketable products (ibid: 110). Modern, non-linear, models of innovation extend upon linearmodels by taking interactive and recursive terms into account. These non-linear terms can beexpected to change the causal relations between input and output (ibid: 114). There are severalmodern non-linear innovation models that can be used to conceptualize the interaction betweenHEIs and industry in relation to research and innovation.Gibbons et al. (1994) argue that a new form of knowledge production started emerging from themid 20 th century which is context-driven, problem-focused and interdisciplinary. It involvesmultidisciplinary teams brought together for short periods of time to work on specific problems inthe real world. Gibbons et al. label this ‘mode 2’ knowledge production. This is to bedistinguished from traditional academic, investigator-initiated and discipline-based knowledgeproduction, which they label ‘mode 1’. Other innovation models that are indicative of flux,reorganization, and the enhanced role of knowledge in the economy and society are ‘nationalsystems of innovation’ (Edquist, 1997), ‘research systems in transition’ (Cozzens et al., 1990;Ziman, 1994) or ‘the post modern research system’ (Rip and Van der Meulen, 1996).The Triple Helix configuration of university-industry-government relations assumes that anetwork of overlay communications, networks and organizations continuously reshapes theinstitutional arrangements in the innovation system. Most countries and regions have presentlyattained what Etzkowitz and Leydesdorff (2000: 111) call Triple Helix III type of innovationmodel; a knowledge infrastructure in which the three institutional spheres are overlapping, witheach taking the role of the other and hybrid organizations emerging at the interfaces. Thecommon objective is to realize an innovative environment consisting of university spin-off firms,tri-lateral initiatives for knowledge-based economic development, and strategic alliances amongfirms (large and small, operating in different areas, and with different levels of technology),government laboratories, and academic research groups (ibid:112).54