University Culture Impacts Research Commercialization

(Investor.gov)

A Baylor University management professor in Waco, Texas finds research universities with an organizational climate that supports commercialization and encourages interdisciplinary collaboration among researchers are more likely to produce invention disclosures and patent applications. The findings by Baylor’s Emily Hunter and colleagues from University of Houston and University of California at Davis appeared in the 29 June issue of the Journal of Research Policy (paid subscription required).

The study covered Engineering Research Centers (ERC), formed by the National Science Foundation (NSF) in 1985 to support commercialization. Some 218 faculty, ERC leaders, industrial liaison officers, and post-doctoral researchers from 21 ERCs completed an online survey. From 5 to 26 respondents per ERC completed the surveys. Four in 10 respondents (40%) were faculty members, while two in 10 (21%) were members of the administrative leadership team, and half (51%) had dual research-leadership roles.

Between 1985 and 2006, NSF gave $57 million to research programs at 41 ERCs. By 2007, ERCs produced 1,431 invention disclosures and 528 patents. Because of their organizational structure and track record, ERCs often promote multi-disciplinary research and emphasize commercial applications and technical prototypes. NSF funded this research.

Hunter and colleagues find university inventors believe they are more likely to generate early-stage commercialization when they work in an atmosphere that was supportive of commercialization and provided opportunities for collaboration which spanned traditional academic disciplines. “We also found that a good organizational climate is more readily influenced by management,” says Hunter, “than by other environmental factors such as the availability of venture capital.”

Other factors encouraging commercialization of research findings, in the minds of ERC participants, include direct involvement in commercialization by department chairs and their academic colleagues. “Researchers who perceived support from their laboratory were often more likely to engage in such activities, even if commercialization had not been their priority before joining the ERC,” Hunter adds.

Yet another attribute of the university climate that encourages commercialization was the the role of the institution’s technology transfer office (TTO). If ERC participants consider the TTO as having a customer-service orientation, researchers are more likely to pursue invention disclosure and patents. Also TTOs that are organized, well-funded, and knowledgeable, appear better able to process paperwork and pursue commercialization.

Read more. Survey: University Startups, Products Keep Pace in 2009

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