The purpose of this paper is to make an overview of the recent economic tendency surveys as the source of information on enterprises' innovation activities in market and transition economies. The introductory section focuses on innovation theory as the basis of currently conducted innovation tests. The second and third sections are devoted to the analysis of changes in innovation activities of West and East German enterprises reflected in the results of regular surveys. The fourth section examines the original data obtained through innovation surveys recently started in Russia by the team of "The Russian Economic Barometer" information bulletin (International Center for Research into Economic Transformation). Section five concludes, identifying the main trends in innovation behavior of Russian industrial enterprises in comparison to their West and East German counterparts.