Two indicators are used to measure the diffusion of recent innovations or the national technological innovation transformation capability. The first, Internet hosts, reflects the diffusion of the Internet which enables the fastest transfer of information and an easier adaptation of firms and organisations in a changing environment. The second, exports of high technology and medium technology products, illustrates the country’s level of specialisation in technologically intensive goods. Finally, the human skills index, or the national exploitation capability, is measured by two indicators: mean years of schooling, representing the fact that people can be users of technology if they have a basic education on which to develop cognitive skills; and the gross tertiary science enrolment ratio, showing that the higher the number of inhabitants with the ability to develop skills in science, mathematics and engineering, the greater the number of technology creators. Both diffusion of recent innovations and human skill indices are used as proxies of realised absorptive capacity in the present paper.