"This dissertation addresses matters that, while appearing to be highly technical and specific at first, actually are vital for creating the human opportunities for individual well-being and happiness in the 21st Century. This is so because the issue covered, innovation policy, forms a foundation, and probably the most important one, of economic development in any society, especially in today’s society driven by information and communication technologies (ICT). Economic development is the result of innovations which originate in the private sector but greatly depend on public policies to advance them or even to make them possible..."