Commercial knowledge transfers from universities to firms: improving the effectiveness of university–industry collaboration

By Donald S. Siegel, David A. Waldman, Leanne Atwater, Albert N. Link. 2003

867 citations recorded by the source corpus.

There has been a rapid rise in commercial knowledge transfers from universities to practitioners or university–industry technology transfer (UITT), through licensing agreements, research joint ventures, and start-ups. The purpose of this study was to analyze the UITT process and its outcomes. Based on 98 structured interviews of key UITT stakeholders (i.e., university administrators, academic and industry scientists, business managers, and entrepreneurs) at five research universities in two regions of the US, we conclude that these stakeholders have different perspectives on the desired outputs of UITT. More importantly, numerous barriers to effective UITT were identified, including culture clashes, bureaucratic inflexibility, poorly designed reward systems, and ineffective management of university technology transfer offices (TTOs). Based on this qualitative evidence, we provide numerous recommendations for improving the UITT process.

Subfields: Management of Technology and Innovation, Strategy and Management

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/dced6832442c554226399b8ca3c7426057268f2e

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In Management of Technology and Innovation

In Strategy and Management

Citations in the corpus

Firms’ genetic characteristics and competence-enlarging strategies: A comparison between academic and non-academic high-tech start-ups (2012, background): “…establishment of start-ups aimed at commercially exploitng the technological knowledge generated within public research rganisations is an increasingly popular option to create wealth rom the results of academic research (Siegel et al., 2003; Vohora t al., 2004; Wright et al., 2004).”
University Spin-Out Companies and Venture Capital (2006, neutral): “The financial returns to this increased interest in knowledge transfer from universities have so far been low (Shane, 2004; Siegel et al., 2003a).”
Engaging Excellence? Effects of Faculty Quality on University Engagement with Industry (2011, positive): “Finally, following Siegel et al. (2003), we included a measure (Regional) reflecting overall R&D expenditure by business in university’s local region.”
The research university, entrepreneurship and regional development: Research propositions and current evidence (2012, background): “It has a strengthened steering core, formal means of university–economy–community interaction and diverse source of funding which underpin interaction and implementation (Rinne and Kovivula 2005; Siegel et al. 2003).”
Technology commercialization: a literature review of success factors and antecedents across different contexts (2016, background): “erature that the absence of a mutual understanding between universities and industry causes difficulties (Siegel et al. 2003).”
The creation of spin-off firms at public research institutions: Managerial and policy implications (2005, background): “There has also been a significant rise in the number of science parks, incubators, and other property-based institutions designed to launch and nurture new-technology based firms (NTBFs) (Siegel et al., 2003c; Phan et al., 2005).”
Entrepreneurial orientation, technology transfer and spinoff performance of U.S. universities (2005, background): “…and Henderson, 2002; Siegel et al., 2003a,b) and university technology transfer performance (Henderson et al., 1998; Thursby and Kemp, 2002; Siegel et al., 2003a,b; Chapple et al., 2005), few studies have systematically attempted to explain why some universities are more successful than o…”
Entrepreneurship from the Ivory Tower: Do Incentive Systems Matter? (2004, background): “In short, it becomes apparent that universities intensify their focus on, and hone their capabilities in, turning proprietary technology into attractive economic opportunities ( Siegel et al., 2003 ).”