is the academic and industrial research link working

The relationship between industry and academia is a varied and interesting one. I've seen it work well but I have also seen it go the other way. In a sort of ideal scenario then an academic would have a bright idea which would be investigated with grant funding. After a suitable period of investigation where the concept is proven it should be picked up by industry who will develop it into a practical realisation that can ultimately be sold. Everyones happy, the academic got funding to do some interesting work, the industry acquired something useful that they can sell. The industry didn't have to invest lots of its own money in a range of ideas that mostly did not work, but was able to pick the winner and put its resources behind it with confidence. The grant funding body is happy because it has successfully used tax payers money to good effect so that a commercial gain will boost the economy. Consumers are happy as they have something new to buy. The university may well have filed some intellectual property and will have some successful publications. All is well then, except it rarely works like that. Almost every grant proposal now must explain the impact of the work. How the results will be exploited so as to provide some economic benefit. Apparently every piece of research is going to do something significant. I wonder if anyone has correlated the pay offs against the promises. Does the country get value for money from its investment in research? I know that science should be done for the sake of knowledge, but exploitation is now part ot the exam question so is it working or not? Exploitation requires a proper relationship with industry, not just a cursory letter of support  with the grant proposal, but on going involvement. Small leverage of the project direction at the beginning can make a big difference at the end of the project to how easy to develop the idea is. Industry also has to be willing and able to get involved and stay involved. That can sometimes mean that industry needs some funding stream. This is an often neglected aspect. There is an assumption that industry is awash with money that it can throw around . There can be several reasons why this is not the case. Firstly small companies may not have any spare cash to risk. Larger companies may have more money, but for the industrial researchers they will have to make a business case to get internal funding to pursue academic relations. This is competed money and therefore the results have to be worth it. My experience is that timescales can be problem. Academia will offer a 3 year PhD whereas industry might want the product in 2 years. Timescales are the big disparity. Academia just does not have the people on tap to rapidly switch on a project. This is where the value of the researh organistions, such as the Faunhofer institutes should really start to showas you can get the best of both worlds. With industry and academia seemingly competing for the same funding streams it is ever more important that we collaborate to get the best out of everyone.