Evolution of the economic content of innovation and its specifics at the current stage of socio-economic relations

The latest era of global socio-economic transformations has turned mobility into virtually the only sustainable characteristic of business development. Modern manifestations of mobility of the modern economic process involve a rapid response to changing conditions of national and world markets, the development of formal and informal institutional environment, information asymmetry, the development of the global economic system, etc. The dynamism of modern conditions of development necessitates the formation and development of innovation and investment model of development, as the most successful and most promising. The innovation process involves several significant stages from the identification of innovative demand to the spread of mastered innovation and its commercialization. The economic content of innovation processes has interested scientists almost since the emergence of economic theory, but as a subject of special scientific understanding of innovation in the twentieth century. The article examines the peculiarities of the evolution of views of domestic and foreign scientists on the interpretation of the concept of «innovation» and the development of the innovation paradigm. Scientists of different periods provided different content of innovations: first, considered as a result of STP, innovation and practical / technical use of innovations; secondly: as targeted changes in the functioning of the enterprise and qualitative changes in all elements of social production; third: as a system or set of measures for the introduction of new equipment, technology; fourth: as a process of creation and practical use of innovations and reproduction of an economic element through a new idea, invention or process; fifth: as a commercial solution or product innovation activity. The article substantiates the direct impact of innovation processes on the level of competitiveness, and also offers a comprehensive interpretation of the definition of «innovation» taking into account the peculiarities of modern socio-economic transformations: emphasis on the need for continuous investment and optimal innovation and management infrastructure at the micro, macro, meso and mega levels