The RKW: A new approach towards technology transfer. methods for the promotion of innovation in small- and medium-sized companies

The ‘Rationalisierungskuratorium der Deutschen Wirtschaft’ (RKW) is a German management institute and productivity centre. The RKW analyses and promotes rationalisation measures, assists mainly small- and medium-sized enterprises in the rationalisation of firms and plants, and supports adaptation, cooperation and expansion efforts, as well as the introduction of new processess and products.RKW services — provided by the central office in Frankfurt a.M. and the regional centres in the Länder — are not so much dependent on progress in the fields of science, research and technology, but rather on the analysis and determination of short-term and long-term development trends and of the demand situation of companies and branches of industry, and on the transfer into practice of new knowledge pertaining to rationalisation.The main instruments of the services of the RKW are consulting operations on selected problems of individual enterprises in connection with work in the fields of information, documentation, management training, inplant training, and systematic performance control. The horizontal and vertical organisation and coordination of these measures are an example for integrated technology transfer where scientific and technical knowledge, products, and inventions are not only transferred in a onw-way process from science into the economy but where, through organisational changes in connection with supporting and integrating measures, both areas interact with each other. In this respect the RKW differs from other institutions such as the National Research Development Corporation in the UK or the NASA Technology Utilization Program in the USA.