Despite the general understanding of the necessity of innovative development both of the national economy and individual enterprises as well as active public funding on innovative projects, no active growth of innovative activity in the manufacturing sector designed to be a necessary element in ensuring the competitiveness of the country as a whole and in enterprises has been observed. The aim of the study is to identify problematic elements of innovative development of industrial enterprises, to discuss indicators related to an innovation economy, and to suggest ways of improving the process of innovation. After analyzing the existing system of the assessment of innovation, it was concluded that the majority of methods to assess the level of innovation activity and innovation are designed to assess a region or a country, while much less attention is paid to the company as a unit of innovative development. The process of introducing innovations into production is not found to be in the focus of attention at all. The study analyzed the statistics on a regional and national scale, which made it possible to draw conclusions about the state of the innovation process, its elements and their relationships. The main result of the study is the “gap” that was found between fundamental science as the place of creation of innovations and manufacturing enterprises as the place of implementation of innovations. The authors believe that there is now a need for a process of control not only over the creation, but also over the introduction of innovations in production; formation of an infrastructure that can provide the interaction of science and industry, the transformation of scientific developments into the manufacturing process. This structure should become a buffer zone between the elements of the innovation process and create an “area of mutually beneficial cooperation.”