Again I turn to my thesis. As I said it was written many years ago but I think that many of its elements are still in force. Today I reproduce here a brief summary of the conclusions section. I remind you that the thesis studied the process of the university technology transfer (TT), in its 3 ways: 1) Sponsored research, 2) Patents licensing, 3) Creation of spinoffs. Some of the ideas that the work generated are the following:
- Companies, in general, do not think of universities as suppliers of innovation. Few companies have the right characteristics to establish R&D collaborations with universities, an issue that, in fact, is the cause of the previous sentence. In short, sponsored research, due to the conditions of the demand, is a modality of TT of limited scope.
- Universities have restrictions on their offer. Research groups, by their finite amount of human resources, have a saturation point in their R&D activities with industry. Therefore, in order to increase TT, universities should promote push modalities, which allow those universities to take advantage of the results of that own research, not carried out by business commission, but financed with public funds. The creation of spin-off companies and patent licensing fall into this category of TT push modalities.
- Technology transfer units through patents and spin-offs have very specific core competencies, which, from a proactive vision and attitude, are aimed at the detection and evaluation of marketable university technologies and, above all, the contribution of specialized services that allow their transfer to the market.
- In this type of office, management tasks are minimized. Activities that are not core are outsourced. In addition, in general technology transfer offices do not have the responsibility of managing sponsored research, promoting entrepreneurial culture or managing Incubation spaces for new spin-offs. All these functions correspond to other types of actors within the university system.
- The university TT through patents licensing and spin-offs requires support units with specialized managers, with a very different profile from the personnel responsible for the management of R&D contracts. This new profile corresponds to a professional who understands both the research process and the marketing process. Therefore, previous experience in the business world is required.
- Universities and other public research institutions located in areas where traditional business and traditional industrial sectors predominate (understood as having little technological content, which, according to the thesis results, have a low potential to absorb research results) have in the spin-off way the possibility of modifying this industrial environment, introducing companies based on knowledge. These companies are very active in R&D collaborations with the universities from which they have emerged. They are also active using other TT modalities, for example patents licensing or staff mobility (incorporation of doctoral students, etc.).
- A science or technology park is an instrument oriented to promote the TT of the promoting University and the industrial competitiveness of the environment where they are located. Science parks intend to develop an environment where there is a phenomenon of diffusion of innovations and TT that would have to culminate in the birth of innovative SMEs. This objective implies the presence in the parks or in their surroundings of different actors: universities and research centers, established and newly created companies and entities that support the TT.
- The industrial sectors to which the park aims to be oriented have to be sectors of medium or high technological content. Initiatives that target traditional sectors, where innovation is not based on R&D and competitiveness is more determined by an efficient production process than by a constant introduction of product innovations, will not be effective. In short, a science park should be geared towards sectors with high added value, which base their innovative activity on R&D and that this innovation affects the product.
- A science or technology park is also intended to improve the competitiveness of its region or territory of influence. When the environment does not have the capacity to take advantage of the presence of the park, this initiative should be oriented to the improvement of the competitiveness in the long term. In short, you will have to orient yourself to modify the environment through the creation of new technology-based companies, rather than to respond to existing sectors.
- The thesis showed a clear relationship between TT activity and research activity. This relationship results, on the one hand, from the evidence that it is from the research of where the know-how, ideas and inventions that can be marketed arise. Also, of the fact that only universities with a sufficient research base (which are few) can articulate programs and efficient units of technology commercialization. Therefore, the promotion of TT necessarily involves support for basic research.
- It is not necessary for the researcher to leave the university to join the spin-off. Technology transfer units look for personnel who are in charge of the daily management of the company and the researcher acts as scientific adviser from the university. It is a behavior that prevents universities from losing the best teachers and researchers.
- TT is expensive. The results indicate that the “new” TT function requires significant economic input from academic institutions. In addition to the cost of personnel, the economic requirements come from the need to invest both in time and quantity. Patents and spin-offs take between five and ten years to generate significant economic returns.
- The economic requirements of the TT activity make the management offices’ sustainability difficult. Only some institutions, with very successful patent licenses, cover the costs generated by the operation of their units. In the field of spin-offs, there may be some significant return on the sale of shares, but in any case, it would be between five and ten years from the start of the activities of the university in this field. However, the economic returns that the spin-offs bring to the universities do not only come from the sale of shares as well as the R&D contracts that these companies formalize with the institution.
- University authorities cannot expect TT to be a significant source of income for their institution. For example, in large universities very active in the field of research, it is difficult for royalties derived from patent licenses to account for more than 10% of the research budget of the institution. The TT will have a greater relative importance in those universities with moderate research budgets.
- Government authorities in charge of the university policy of a country (departments or ministries of education or universities) have to decide on the new universities that will be located in the territory and on the educational orientation and specialization, through the corresponding allocation of new degrees. This educational orientation also defines the research direction of these academic institutions. On the other hand, the authorities in charge of the technological and industrial policy (the departments or ministries of industry) consider the universities as agents producers and diffusers of knowledge, which, through research and TT, increase the industrial competitiveness. The fact that only certain companies and sectors have the capacity to acquire university research has implications in this area.
- Thus, the university only acts as a key element in the innovative system when it addresses industrial sectors and companies that have the capacity to take advantage of their presence in the system. That is, a new research university located in a territory with a strong presence of traditional industrial sectors to which it directs and guides its teaching and research, will not have an impact on the competitiveness of these sectors (Unless, as seen later, measures are articulated that allow companies to take advantage of the presence of the university or public research center). In short, the effects of the offer of science and technology of a territory on the competitiveness of the industry that is located in it do not depend only on the quantity and quality of this offer, but also on the ability of the companies to access that offer.
- Therefore, if a government intends to increase the competitiveness of the country’s industry, the actions oriented to the supply of technology would have to be complemented by actions addressed to the demand of technology.
- Specifically, to the capacity of the demand to access the supply, through for example, programs that promote the systematization of internal R&D activities in industry
- When thinking about the differences between companies within a sector, this question can also be seen as follows. An institutional action on research and innovation (creation of a university, a technology center, a university-business center or any other initiative related to public research) does not affect the competitiveness of the entire industrial sector.
- It affects only the competitiveness of the more competitive companies in that sector. Companies that do not have the capacity to take advantage of scientific infrastructures will become even less competitive. In short, the inclusion in the territory of certain research centers acts as a process of natural selection among companies in a sector (which may be similar, however, for example, to what entails the introduction of certain lwas, quality requirements, environmental conditions, safety regulations, etc.)
- These results also inform about the influence and effectiveness of direct and indirect public aid to R&D collaboration. According to the conclusions of the thesis, this type of aid only encourages the carrying out of research and innovation activities in those companies that were previously active in this field.