SERVING INNOVATION WELL? – MISMATCH BETWEEN THE SUPPLY AND DEMAND SIDE OF SERVICES BY INNOVATION INTERMEDIARY ORGANIZATIONS IN HUNGARY JÓL SZOLGÁLJÁK AZ INNOVÁCIÓT? – ELTÉRÉSEK AZ INNOVÁCIÓS KÖZVETÍTŐ SZERVEZETEK SZOLGÁLTATÁSAINAK KERESLETI ÉS KÍNÁLATI OLDALÁBAN

Innovation intermediary organizations play a significant role in the national innovation systems as they provide services for the actors of the innovation network. Their main goal is to connect these actors to promote knowledge exploitation and -transfer. In the past 12 years intermediaries were founded and developed in Hungary, however, the effectiveness of their service was not measured comprehensively. This paper presents the main results of an analysis examining the effectiveness of their offered services.


INTRODUCTION
Organizations like the innovation intermediary organizations play a significant role in the National Innovation Systems (NIS) (like Freeman (1987) and Capello (2006) emphasized). Freeman (1987) in his work about the Japan innovation system mentions that the NIS is composed of public and private institutions (such as intermediaries) working in the field of introducing, applying and spreading inventions. Capello (2006) describes several influencing factors of innovation like organizations participating in the innovation process. Gajzágó, É. Intermediary organizations provide services for the actors of the innovation process in which cooperation and trust-based connections are crucial. They are also significant in regional, subnational and local level (Hewitt-Dundas-Roper 2011) as they can influence local innovation factors -such as innovation milieu, knowledge creation and networks or knowledge capital -which contribute to the development of regional competitiveness (Johnson-Lehmann 2006, Lengyel 2010, Enyedi 1997 In the last decade, after Hungary joined the EU, Hungarian innovation system was developed dynamically. Since 2004 Hungarian national and EU strategic decisions and financial support fostered the establishment and development of the institutions serving the innovation process. Institutional background of the Hungarian NIS was founded and from 2006 till 2013 organizations serving the innovation process received more than Forints 120 billion from the calls of the Baross Gabor Program (national support), the New Hungarian Development Plan's and New Szechenyi Plan's Operative Programs (EU co-financed support) (Gajzágó -Gajzágó 2016).
Innovation Union key initiatives 22 foster the market impact and social scope of supported projects, and also Hungarian Innovation Strategy 23 aims to increase the social and economic sustainability of innovation investments. The strategy lists demand and supply side assets 24 to achieve goals of innovation policy and to give a solution to the difference between the high amount of support and the low effectiveness. The document emphasizes the development of intermediaries but does not mention the details (e.g. projects) of this development or the improvement of the effectiveness of organizations.
As stated above, Hungarian intermediaries received large amounts from national and EU funds. Recent (2014) country profile about innovation performance of Hungary also indicates that according to the effective innovation system indicators 25 ‚ 'Hungary is below the EU average in most of the areas'. However, the rate of business enterprise expenditure on R&D (BERD) financed by EU funds is significantly higher than the EU average. Hungarian and EU innovation strategies aim to use these supporting funds properly and increase the effectiveness of innovation projects. The effectiveness of promoted organizations implementing innovation projects influences the achievements of goals of these higher levels strategies.
The research introduced in this article examined the effectiveness of services of Hungarian innovation intermediary organizations. The main goal of the research was to reveal whether Hungarian innovation intermediaries 'serve' the innovation system effectively and whether their services are effective. Research results introduced below unfolded a mismatch between the supply and demand sides of the services of these bridging organizations. The empirical research had a quantitative approach and the paper intends to introduce its result by a descriptive method.
After the summary of the relevant literature about innovation intermediaries and effectiveness, including a model of effectiveness and briefly introducing the research methods, the paper represents the results of a research about the services of intermediaries.
The last chapter contains a synopsis of and some solutions for the revealed problems.

THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
Characteristics of the innovation process and the (national) innovation systems are described in details in several articles -see e.g. Freeman (1987) as above mentioned or Lundvall (1992), andNelson (1993). Based on these characteristics Arocena and Sutz (2002) explains that the examination of the innovation process and its actors give possible assets for exploring the economic effectiveness and elaborating specific directives.
Many articles (e.g. Guana-Chen 2012) emphasize national economic policies should focus on increasing innovation potential and governments need to introduce strategies -like the abovementioned innovation strategy of Hungary -and promoting instruments for the development of the national innovation systems (Flanagan at al. 2011, Lundvall 1995 as the investment in innovation can increase national and regional economic competitiveness. The establishment and development of innovation interemdiaries and their services are one of these instruments. Innovation intermediary organization offer services to the actors of the innovation process but these services differ according to the types or place of organizations in the innovation process (Lokshina et al. 2011). Their main goal is to connect knowledge producers with knowledge users, e.g. researchers and companies or educational and business areas in order to facilitate and promote knowledge exploitation and -transfer. These bridging organisations work as agents in the innovation process between different parties involved (Howells 2006).
Through providing specific services, they are also the enablers of innovation, improving innovation directly (enabling the innovation of firms) or indirectly (increasing the innovative capacity of regions, nations, or sectors -national and sub-national process) (Buzás 2007).
The tasks and the role of intermediaries -especially in higher educational institutes -are defined and listed in articles like Jain et al. (2010), Howlett (2010), Stamm (2003) or Filippetti-Archibugia (2011). In the research introduced in this article, we used a list of services elaborated by these literature. Filippetti and Archibugia (2011) emphasize that systems and organizations which influence the cooperation aiming innovation -thus the tasks of intermediaries -directly influence company innovation. Stamm (2003) lists 8 important factors which influence the tasks and services of intermediaries. These factors -like the timeframe, technology, knowledge, financial resources, actors, processes, cultural aspects, and consumers and markets -are significant for the management these organizations. Howlet The research presented in the chapters below was focusing on the participant of the Hungarian national innovation system, on intermediaries in particular. The Hungarian national and regional (subnational) innovation systems and its actors were examined by several Hungarian researchers. Their researches focused on a specific region of Hungary (Dőry 2000, Inzelt-Szerb 2003, Márton 2004, Szépvölgyi 2006, Bajmócy 2006, Csizmadia-Grosz 2008, examined one group of organizations such as industrial or scientific parks (Barta 2002 andBuzás-Lengyel 2002) or innovation system and networks and cooperation (Csizmadia-Grosz 2002, Lengyel-Leydesdorff 2008, Parag-Varga 2009).
However, the overall measurement of the effectiveness of services of innovation intermediaries was not carried out in Hungary before the research presented in this paper.
Defining the effectiveness of intermedaries is a complex task and can be based on several scientific fields like physics, economics, management or marketing. In physics and technical sciences effectiveness -or energetical efficiency -is defined as the quotient of outputs and inputs (Büki 2013, Frischherz et al. 2010. Economics and management theories (Samuelson-Nordhaus 2012, Varian 2005, Ostroff-Schmitt 1993, Mahoney-Weitzel 1969, Hoy-Hellriegel 1982 also uses the ratio of outputs and inputs for defining the effectiveness of companies and their profitability. Management scientists also emphasize that the effectiveness depends on 26 Higher education-business and community interaction survey factors of inner organizational and management. Mahoney and Weitzel (1969) examined 114 factors separately while Hoy and Hellriegel (1982) classified inner and external effectiveness indicators in their research.
Marketing theories of the effectiveness of service companies are closely connected to the topic of the research introduced in this paper. Kotler and Andreasen (1987) analyze the marketing strategies of nonprofit companies and reveal the importance of strategic planning in the effectiveness of the organization. Hughes and Luksetich (2010) also examined nonprofit copmanies' effectiveness and resulted that the accomplishment of the goals of these organizations is closely connected to the needs of target groups and the effectiveness of services. However, defining the effectiveness and quality of services is difficult and strongly influenced by the interpretation of the customer and by the trust based characteristics of the services (Nádor 2007).  The empirical research intended to find an answer for the problem that several Hungarian intermediaries enlists a high number of services, but doesn't provide all of them in reality. We were also interested in where services of innovation intermediaries can be positioned regarding the stages of the innovation process. Furthermore, the research wanted to reveal the differences between the offered services of intermediaries and the needs of their target groups.
The research was elaborated on three levels, containing a national, a regional and a local analysis. The national level research surveyed the intermediary organizations, while regional and local researches were focusing on target groups of services of intermediaries like researchers and companies. 129 organizations answered the national level questionnaire, the regional survey measured 300 companies and 30 experts in the Central-Transdanubian Region of Hungary while the local research resulted 131 answers (53 researchers and 78 companies) in the sub-region of Dunaújváros, Hungary.
This paper focuses on the results of the national level research and uses regional and local data supplementing these results with the data representing the opinion and motivation of the target groups of innovation services. Local data was collected in a middle-sized city of Hungary, in Dunaújváros. However local research cannot significantly be compared to national level results, there are several fields of effectiveness in which local factors give a more subtle aspect.
As stated above, this present paper describes only those research results which are The research aimed to reach all innovation intermediary organization of Hungary in these groups but did not examine profit-oriented companies participating in the innovation process as intermediaries. The respondent rate of the questionnaires sent to the organizations listed in Table 1 was more than 75 percent.
Spatial distribution and types of the analyzed innovation intermediary organizations are visualized on the following figure: 1. consultancy 2. education Gajzágó, É. 3. knowledge and technology transfer 4. establishment of cooperation and networks 5. involvement of resources (like applications and tenders) 6. activities regarding protection of intellectual property rights 7. other innovation activities National level data collection was implemented by questionnaires sent directly to all Hungarian organization in the above mentioned five groups.

MAIN RESULTS OF THE RESEARCH
The national level research examined the services of intermediaries in details according to the 31 types of services. Examining the rate of organizations offering the listed services, the TOP 10 rank of services (Figure 3) are the following:

Figure 3 TOP 10 rank of services offered by Hungarian intermediaries (percent of intermediaries)
Resource: own compilation Figure 3 reflects that for the intermediaries the involvement of resources -5 th group of services in the above-mentioned list -is crucial (three of the TOP 10 services are connected to financing). Lack of financing as a barrier to innovation has also been indicated in surveys published by the authors Csizmadia-Grosz (2011), or Dőry (1996. The target group of the services of innovation intermediary organization was examined by the data of the national level research. In this article, we only present the results about the two main target groups -companies and researchers. Gajzágó, É. The research indicated that most of the intermediaries (nearly 58%) offer the 5 th group of services (involvement of resources like applications and tenders) for the target group of companies. Other important services offered to this group are the establishment of partnership, education and other, innovation marketing services. However these services do not aim the target group of companies, rather the organization itself or other partner organization (finding resources) or the group of researchers (innovation marketing).
To the target group of researchers, most of the respondent intermediaries (65%) offer other innovation services like marketing or organizing events. Other important offered services for researchers are the protection of intellectual property rights and involvement of resources.
Comparing these results to the needs of the target groups (analyzed in the regional and local research) our results indicated problems of marketing segmentation of the intermediaries. Defining the proper target group and offering services which they need is crucial for an organization (Veres, 2002). Contrary to the preferred services of intermediaries companies do not need services like the involvement of resources or focusing on the establishment of partnership as they have their own network and can easily manage their cooperation. The target group of researchers would need information about local projects and wishes to participate in more R&D possibilities. Both national and subnational research indicated that there is a mismatch between the offered services and the needs of the target group of intermediaries.
The national level research also analyzed the positioning of innovation services by comparing the measured services to the stages of innovation process (based on the model of Rothwell, 1994). The results showed (in Fig. 4.) that Hungarian intermediaries are not specialized on a specific stage of the innovation process. More specifically, most of them serve mainly the 'starting' stages of the innovation process (i.e. ideation, invention or R&D phase) and only less than 60% of the respondent organizations offer services in the 'ending' commercialization phase. Focusing on the first stages means that intermediaries lose to obtain incomes from patenting or implementation. Gajzágó, É.

Resource: own compilation
The overemphasized scale of 'other' services (see the 'other' columns of the above diagram) -like innovation marketing or services regarding tenders -also indicate the marketing positioning problems of intermediaries. These services cannot be closely connected to one specific stage of the innovation process. Besides, intermediaries usually do not offer tender services to other organizations but try to involve resources for their own operation.
Comparing the results of the above analysis and the types of organizations it is clear that Technology Transfer Offices (TTOs) position themselves well in the innovation process, offering several types of services but mainly supporting the knowledge creation phase.
However, industrial chambers which are closely connected to companies in Hungary -due to a regulation about the obligatory registering -and have a huge network of partnership, seem not to utilize this advantage and do not focus on the market placement phase.
Communication problems and weaker impact of communication can also have an effect on the effectiveness of innovation intermediary organization. Communication and the motivation of the participants of the communication process (as the element of social capital) are specific local factors and influence the local innovation system (Enyedi 1997). Therefore the results of local and regional level survey examining the communication of the intermediaries can give a more subtle result representing the local relations and milieu. The research revealed that companies could be considered as well informed about the activities and services provided by innovation intermediary organizations. However, only one-quarter of them knows to whom they can turn to get information about innovation problems. Besides, less than 22% of the companies reported having a living contact with intermediaries. Similar or less percent (10-

Services of intermediaries compared to the innovation process (average % of intermediaries)
needs ideas R&D, manufacturing marketing and sales market placement other Gajzágó, É. 18%) of cooperation was highlighted in the publication of Grosz (2011) andBodas Freitas et al. (2013), thus these results correspond with other European and Hungarian researches. However, according to the results of our research, the percent of cooperation will drastically decrease in the next 3 years as less than 10% of the respondents intend to have a partnership with intermediaries.
About the communication channels used by the target groups, our local research indicated that online sources and personal connections are the most important ones. Most of the Hungarian intermediaries have their own websites (more than 56%) or can be found on the webpage of the hosting higher educational institute but still, many of these sites do not contain proper or specific information -e.g. about offered services -which the target group requires.

CONCLUSION
The introduced research results clearly indicate the ‚inner' management and service problems of Hungarian innovation intermediaries. There is a significant mismatch between the services they offer and the needs of their target groups and the positioning of intermediaries' services is erroneous too.
In consequence, inner management problems of the innovation intermediary organizations negatively influence their effectiveness. If they offer services which the target groups do not need, these services will be unsaleable and the target group will not cooperate with them in the future. The false positioning of services forces intermediary organizations to have an unreasonably wide service portfolio and implement more activities than they are capable of (e.g. not closely connected to the innovation process). Both cases implicate management and financial problems.
There can be a number of issues behind these problems. During the last decade, basic changes were made in the Hungarian system of institutions and also in the national innovation system (NIS). The main innovation institutions were founded in the early 2000s but since then the system was continuously changing. For instance, since 2004 one of the main organizations which is responsible for the coordination of the R+D+I (research and development and innovation) process in Hungary, the NKTH (National Research and Development Office) became the NIH (National Innovation Office), then changed to NKFIH (National Research and Development and Innovation Office). Gajzágó, É. 113 The system of grants supporting innovation has also been transformed continuously. The role of the government financing the innovation process has been gradually decreased but this reduction influenced the system of organizations only to a small extent. The structure of the NIS is extended and some of the organizations have parallel functions. Decentralization and networking -emphasized in the EU -have already begun but hindered. In the few last years, the financing of the organizations (like intermediaries) was de-emphasized.
Intermediary organizations face many difficulties because of the unstable, project-centered and non-continuous financing, therefore they are forced to focus on the involvement of resources. Financing of innovation is a part of the input dimension of the model mentioned in the theoretical background chapter and was also examined by the author during to the abovementioned national research. In Hungary, intermediaries can apply for several EU co-financed and national calls. However, these sources do not support the whole management and operation of innovation intermediaries as they only promote specific projects -like improving the licensing process or the establishment of start-ups. Besides, financing methods of applications do not give a stable financial background to the organizations as the sum and spatial distribution of the resources change according to time. In the beginning of the financing period more support are distributed to several regions but at the end of the period, only a few organization in some regions can receive grants. For instance, larger state aid was received by intermediaries in the first year (2006) of the national Baross Gábor Program, 70% of the total four year budget was spent then.
This unsuitable financing method and the fact that most of the services and activities of the intermediaries (e.g. licensing) do not result immediate profit multiplicatively increase the financial burden and liquidity problems of the organizations. Besides, involving investors in Hungary -e.g. for research projects -is also difficult due to the low level of trust (Research results about trust in the Hungarian innovation system are mentioned in Inzelt's (1998) article.) Financial and liquidity problems drive intermediaries to provide all kind of services and run projects that contribute to their survival. Importing more activities into the offered group of services to involve resources also causes dispositioning of the organizations in the innovation process. Industrial chambers, for instance, now need to focus on educational services to gain more prompt incomes rather than utilizing their wide range network and offering more 'ending phase' innovation services (positioned to the marketing phase of the innovation process) to the companies.
Solutions for the problems revealed in the presented research should be complex and need to use system approach. Implementation of long-term goals of innovation strategies, stable institutional and financial system can decrease financial burden of organizations and increase the trust of the participants of the innovation process in their partners. Trust-based cooperation of intermediaries with their target groups is also necessary for their development.
Besides of these 'input' dimensional changes, intermediaries also need to focus on the development of their inner management facilities and methods. Offering their services for the target groups which need it, positioning themselves clearly in the innovation process and increasing the effectiveness of their communication would result more operational effectiveness.
The above-mentioned problems of Hungarian innovation intermediaries influence not only of their organizational and service effectiveness. Inappropriate services, less effective communication result law cooperation of companies and researchers with intermediaries thus negatively influence the innovation process and the innovation potential of Hungarian regions. Therefore solving these problems is crucial for actors and decision makers participating in the Hungarian innovation system.

SUMMARY
Innovation intermediary organizations play a significant role in national innovation systems as they provide services for the actors of the innovation network. Their effectiveness influences the innovation potential of national or regional innovation system too. The main goal of intermediaries is to connect the actors of innovation network to promote knowledge exploitation and -transfer. In the past 12 years intermediaries were developed in Hungary, however, their effectiveness was not measured comprehensively. Our survey examined the services of Hungarian innovation intermediary in details. The main question was whether Hungarian innovation intermediaries 'serve' the innovation system effectively. Our results highlighted several 'inner' management problems of these organizations like the significant mismatch between the provided services and the needs of the target groups or the positioning of intermediaries' services. The problems have affected not only on their effectiveness but negatively influence the innovation process.

How much income (Ft) does your organization have annually? (Consider the average of the previous 3 years incomes).
a) under 10 million b) between 10-25 million c) between 25-50 million d) between 50-100 million e) above 100 million f) I do not know.

How many percent of your income comes from the services of knowledge and technology transfer and innovation?
a) 0-10% b) 10-30 % c) 30-50% d) 50-70% e) 70-100% f) I do not know.