Knowledge Economics is a theory that explains how ideas help societies progress. Knowledge has some unusual qualities, so simply estimating its value through contributions to GDP does not capture its entire value.

Creating value looks a lot different in the brave new world of knowledge economics. Despite the evidence, we tend to think “selling product,” rather than “building networks” is the successful business model.

Old development models delivered things to communities and then often witnessed their abandonment shortly thereafter. Knowledge networks reveal how to build sustainable systems.

Knowledge Economics and the 4th Industrial Revolution have many similarities. A comparison shows how they are merging and may reveal the outlines of “the 5th Revolution”.