Methodological approaches to determination of the innovative activity development level in the manufacturing sector

The Russian economy’s transition from the raw material export development model to the innovation one is a national priority, since it contributes to intensive and sustainable economic growth and reduces the economy’s dependence on external markets. In the developed world (the USA, Japan, Germany, Britain, France) and the newly industrialized countries of Southeast Asia and China GDP growth is achieved by 75 - 90% due to “progress of knowledge” - intellectualization of the main production factors. Due to this fact, to increase standard of living of the Russian population and overcome its technological and economic gap with the more developed states is possible only on the basis of boosting productivity, the country’s competitiveness on international markets of innovative products, modernization and sustainable development of industrial enterprises through the creation of new and the extensive utilization of accumulated innovation capabilities. Manufacturing industry is one of the powerful drivers of economy’s innovation development, since this sector concentrates the main production of most technologically sophisticated and knowledge-intensive products with high added value. However, in the process of market transformations the products of domestic manufacturing enterprises is considerably inferior on international markets. There is a steady trend of import growth and export reduction in enterprises of this sector. This requires identification of the main problems and reasons hindering the innovative activity development in the manufacturing industry. In this regard, the paper proposes the method to assess the innovative activity development level in the manufacturing sector and reveals the factors greatly influencing the development of the process to create and introduce innovations in the sector. The author builds the multivariate regression model to determine the impact of various socio-economic factors on the innovative activity development level in the manufacturing sector and elaborate proposals and recommendations for its promotion.