The author believes that we must have a correct understanding before taking major actions of independent innovation. This paper talks about some cognitive problems about independent innovation, hoping to attract more attention.
Resolutely eliminate interference
China's independent innovation has been interfered by two aspects. On the one hand, interference is mainly manifested in "pan-politicizing" scientific and technological issues, ignoring or belittling the development trend of economic globalization, emphasizing everything from scratch and the so-called "completely independent intellectual property rights". In the process of formulating standards, this kind of interference is manifested in not emphasizing the principle of openness, seemingly safeguarding national interests, but actually safeguarding the interests of small units and small groups. This kind of interference is terrible, because it always labels its opponents as unpatriotic under the banner of "patriotism".
On the other hand, the interference is mainly manifested in the lack of technical blockade and containment of China by western developed countries, and the serious struggle between containment and anti-containment between countries is regarded as only a commercial exchange of needed goods; On the other hand, they look down on China's independent development ability, and place their hopes for scientific and technological development on technology introduction. Some mainstream economists in China believe that the cost of R&D in China is higher than that in foreign countries, technology can flow like capital, and key technologies can also be acquired through introduction. For a long time, China's technology source should mainly rely on foreign countries. At present, we can only focus on labor-intensive processing industries. We should first improve the endowment of industrial factors rather than conquer key technologies. Only when there are more funds and talents can we emphasize independent innovation. It is reasonable for economists to emphasize the importance of labor-intensive processing industry to the current economy by analyzing the comparative advantages of industries, but their conclusion that China's R&D cost must be higher than that of foreign countries and most key technologies can be imported may be untenable.
The opposite of independent innovation is not "open innovation". Independent innovation does not exclude openness and integration, and integrated technology can also have independent innovation. Independent innovation is not to encourage starting from scratch, but also to digest, absorb and improve imported technology. Independent development does not mean independent innovation. The results of independent development not only do not necessarily have intellectual property rights, but also may infringe on the intellectual property rights of others, and their own intellectual property rights may also include citing the patent rights of others. Advocating "independent innovation" mainly refers to avoiding being completely controlled by people and reducing "path dependence".
Have confidence, courage and strategy.
The important task of enhancing national competitiveness by improving the ability of independent innovation has fallen on the shoulders of contemporary scientific researchers, especially those in national scientific research institutions that should play a leading role.
However, whether researchers in China can shoulder this heavy responsibility is a matter of confidence and courage. Some scholars are opposed to mentioning "courage" when discussing the country's medium and long-term science and technology planning, for fear of developing the exaggeration of "how bold people are and how productive the land is". But the author's experience is that self-confidence is the basic condition for the success of high-tech research. We are fully capable of making world-class independent innovation achievements, solving problems for the country and providing core technologies and key technologies for enterprises. Our human and material resources are limited, and it is impossible to be world-class in many directions at the same time, but we have achieved or approached world-class in some selected directions. However, there are still quite a few people (including young people) in China who lack confidence in China's ability to master core high technologies. Whenever we publish an advanced achievement compared with foreign countries, there are always many sarcastic comments on the webpage. It seems that people in China are born short. Compared with South Korea and other countries with strong self-confidence, the main obstacle to China's independent innovation is lack of self-confidence, and the courage to "learn from other mountains". Many things are not impossible, but dare not.
When it comes to self-confidence and courage, we are not advocating unrealistic recklessness, let alone boasting behind closed doors. Courage must be combined with strategy to win. "Sun Tzu's Art of War" said: "Before the war between husband and wife, the temple was the winner. If the temple did not win before the war, it would be too little. " "temple calculation" is strategic planning, and "temple calculation wins" is to make decisions that are superior to others before the war. For independent innovation, the so-called "temple calculation" means deciding what to do first. There are many smart people all over the world, and what we want to do may have been done by others long ago, and even achieved results. There are not many scientific research directions that we really hope to have a significant impact. The value of the result depends largely on whether it is done or not. The detours in tuition fees are mostly because I don't know what to do in advance, that is, "there are too many temples to count."
Another important aspect of "temple calculation" is "how to do it", that is, how to organize large-scale scientific research projects and how to implement the strategy of "patents, standards and talents" in actual scientific research work. In recent years, the patent applications of various units have greatly increased, which is a great progress. However, patent application is a hand-to-hand combat in the field of science and technology, and we must pay attention to strategy. Many scattered patents we applied for did not form a self-protected patent group, and others could easily bypass it. For the existing patents of foreign companies, we lack in-depth and detailed analysis, and often can't find a breakthrough in scientific research, and we have done a lot of useless work. We should strive for technological leadership and integrate our patented technology into new standards. The so-called autonomous controllable technology, the so-called backbone and leading role, to a large extent, is not subject to people when formulating standards, but is based on equal consultation and truly realizes the technological development route of "changing pearls for agates".
Innovation can mark a new leap and catch up.
Independent innovation must seize the opportunity. In 1980s and 1990s, major multinational corporations and governments of developed countries invested huge amounts of money to develop information technology. At that time, information technology really advanced by leaps and bounds As Guo Shina, former president of IBM, said, the information industry is controlled by technology to the point of madness. At that time, our country had no human and material resources, and it was difficult for us to catch up with advanced countries during the period of rapid rise of information technology and industry. Since entering the 2 1 century, the information industry has faced a major turning point, which is a rare opportunity for us to achieve leapfrog development. The so-called "leap" often occurs not in the same direction of competition, but at the time of technological transformation. Generally speaking, you can catch up only if you cross sideways. For a long time, the strategy adopted by China in the information field is basically "Today in the United States is our tomorrow", which makes it difficult to narrow the gap. Our independent innovation should choose information products different from those abroad, that is, only innovation can mark the new.
Based on the enterprise nature of pursuing high profits, multinational companies prefer or are better at manufacturing high-performance new products that satisfy a few high-consumption people. When information technology enters the stage of widespread popularization, multinational companies may not have as much investment and energy to develop low-cost products if they want to develop information products that billions of ordinary people, including low-income people, can afford.
Low cost, like high performance, needs to develop high technology. China is the largest market for low-cost products. Meeting the information consumption needs of low-and middle-income people in China is the biggest driving force for independent innovation of information technology in China, and it is also a rare opportunity for us. Information products, especially integrated circuits and software, are different from traditional products such as automobiles. It is often difficult to obtain the first commercial sample in research and development, but it is easy to copy it in large quantities in the future. In other words, R&D cost is decisive for reducing product cost.
The key is to improve the industrial chain and create an innovative environment.
Improving the ability of independent innovation is a systematic project, involving the government, enterprises, research institutes, universities and other aspects, and it is necessary to mobilize the enthusiasm of all parties.
Technological innovation is a link in the whole independent innovation value chain. Enterprises are the main body of technological innovation, which means that the input of technological innovation mainly depends on enterprises, and it also means that enterprises can get the direction of technological innovation through understanding the market. Therefore, neither the government nor the enterprises should increase the government's direct investment in science and technology on the grounds of "projects". China's enterprises are short of financial resources, so it is reasonable to spend part of public finance on key high-tech enterprises with development ability to tackle key technical problems and promote these key enterprises to form international competitiveness as soon as possible. However, a better way to show government support is to offset the tax burden with the scientific research investment of enterprises in an appropriate way. At present, China enterprises directly receive more government R&D funds than their R&D; Tax relief for inputs. The common practice of all countries in the world is that enterprises invest in research and development on their own; D The more funds, the more government support will be obtained through tax reduction, thus prompting enterprises to increase investment in R&D.. It is against the principle of fairness to transfer taxpayers' money, including taxes paid by small and medium-sized enterprises that are more difficult than large enterprises, to key enterprises for competitive product development.
If we want to make great achievements in high-tech research, we must consider the scientific research chain and industrial chain as a whole-we can be collectively called innovation chain, and we must have an overall strategy. The success or failure of independent innovation often depends not on the breakthrough ability of individual technology, but on the overall planning ability of innovation chain. We can't wait for pearls to be cultivated and processed before we consider how to string them into necklaces, but we should process pearls according to the requirements of necklaces.
At present, the absence and dislocation of national scientific research institutions, universities and enterprises coexist in the innovation value chain, which has both the problem of two skins and the problem of downward orientation. Only when national scientific research institutions are positioned as core technologies and key technologies can they really play a leading and backbone role. There is a view in society that the more the state supports research universities and national scientific research institutions, the more serious the "two skins" will be. This is a misunderstanding. In the past, universities and research institutes in China provided few technologies to enterprises, not because there were too many core technologies and key technologies, but because there were too few core technologies that were truly competitive in the market. Most universities and scientific research units are doing the same level of research and development as enterprises, and the distance has not widened. According to the reasonable division of labor in the innovation system, national scientific research institutions should not compete with enterprises for the "market", but should withdraw from the technological research that enterprises can do. Scientific research units should emphasize the radiation effect of scientific research achievements, rather than the general transformation of achievements.
There is also a public opinion in China that application is not the core technology. As long as the so-called core technology is mastered, the application will naturally develop. This idea is manifested in not paying attention to the strategic application of high-tech research, but pursuing high indicators of single technology. In scientific research, the so-called "cutting-edge" technology is constantly studied in the way of "breaking the stick with the bear" and "sharpening the knife without cutting the wood by mistake". The breakthrough of core technology cannot be overcome by a few researchers behind closed doors. It must be continuously used by users and improved according to their feedback in order to become a truly competitive product. In this sense, the core technology is used, and competitive domestic products are cultivated by users. We should attach great importance to discovering scientific and technological problems from applications, lead scientific research with demand, and drive breakthroughs in core technologies with applications. Regardless of scientific research, development or industry planning, we should closely focus on demand objectives.
In addition to attaching importance to high-tech industries based on independent technologies, China also attaches great importance to the digestion, absorption and improvement of imported and open technologies. We should make great efforts to digest and improve the input of imported technology. We should not be willing to be a dumping ground and testing ground for foreign products for a long time, nor should we naively wait for the so-called "spillover" benefits of foreign-funded enterprises.