THE ROLE OF UNIVERSITIES IN STIMULATING THE DEVELOPMENT OF INNOVATION

The article examines the place of education in the system of factors of the country's international competitiveness. It is proven that universities are one of the institutional platforms for international scientific and technological exchange in the context of deepening techno-globalization processes. It is emphasized that within the framework of a team of like-minded scientists, they not only generate breakthrough scientific ideas in the most relevant areas of global innovative progress, but also form successful business projects on their basis and attract financial capital for their implementation from various funds and private investors. It is confirmed that France, Spain and the United Kingdom currently hold leading positions in the world in terms of the effectiveness of university startups and their potential impact on the dynamics of national economic development. As the data show, modern world universities are characterized by rather asymmetric efficiency indicators in generating consumer value for the global market by startups and their potential opportunities for accelerating global economic development. Characterizing the scale of state funding of university research and development, it is confirmed that the United States of America is currently significantly lagging behind other leading countries in global scientific and technological progress. Among the reasons that determine the growing lag of the United States of America in terms of state funding of university R&D, the key role is played primarily by their significant underfunding by state governments and a certain displacement of American higher education institutions from the global market of scientific and educational services by foreign universities. Specific global benchmarks of entrepreneurial efficiency in international scientific and technological transfer are given. It is argued that universities have become powerful platforms for organizing on their own startup base, making a significant contribution to the global development of scientific research and technology and accumulating the largest number of registered patents.