By Tim Fisher, Senior Consultant for Global External Affairs, Liberty Square Group

In the innovation economy, a lot can happen in 48 hours. That was proven in grand terms at this year's BIO International Convention, held in Boston this June:

• Massachusetts and Israel provided a combined $1.3 million in initial funding to four joint ventures developing new technologies in life sciences, clean energy, and information technology.
• Massachusetts, Finland, Northern Ireland, and Catalonia, Spain, partners in the NIMAC initiative, supported a $300,000 grant for a multinational research study into developing non-invasive procedures to detect pre-malignant lesions.
• Massachusetts and seven global biopharmaceutical companies contributed $1.75 million to launch the Massachusetts Neuroscience Consortium, focused on groundbreaking pre-clinical neuroscience research and industry-academic collaboration at Massachusetts' academic and research institutions.
• Massachusetts announced it would host a US-EU conference on connected health this October, the first time such a meeting has taken place outside of Washington, DC.

No wonder governments around the world look to Massachusetts as a global leader in the innovation economy.

Innovative sectors such as biotechnology, clean energy, and life sciences are becoming significant economic drivers. Governments in both developed and developing markets know that innovation can be a powerful catalyst for investment, job creation, skilled labor, and higher wages. They want to know how Massachusetts has been successful at creating its innovation economy ' and how Massachusetts can serve as a model for their own innovation development.