Factors influencing industry relevance for university research
Since gaining independence from Yugoslavia in 1991, Slovenia has made significant achievements in economic and social development. In 2004 it became a member of the European Union and a member of OECD in 2010. It has been recognized as an economic leader among the states of the former Yugoslavia and ranks favorably among its EU colleagues in many measures of economic performance and innovation.
In March of 2011, Slovenia’s National Assembly adopted the Resolution on Research and Innovation Strategy of Slovenia, 2011-2020. The strategy aims to improve the nation’s innovative capacity and to stimulate private-sector research and development (R&D) by leveraging public investments in research and innovation. It also aims to cultivate technology-driven small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and to develop solutions to contemporary economic, technological, and social problems.
A key component of the Innovation Strategy is improving the relevance and uptake of public research to the private sector. Yet recent reviews of Slovenia’s NIS have pointed to industry-university partnership as a key weakness of the system (OECD 2012). Experts point to a lack of incentives for researchers to ensure relevance of university research to private sector needs. Nevertheless, successful partnerships do occur and the current administration is committed to engaging in reform that will increase the economic benefits of publicly funded research.
The goal of this paper is to inform that process by examining the factors that stimulate success for industry-university partnerships for technology commercialization in Slovenia. The factors examined include those that have been found to encourage collaboration between universities and industry in the US and elsewhere (for example, Bramwell et al 2012), including:
- The specific research area and its tie to national and local economic strengths and strategy;
- The institutional arrangements and incentives for partnership and collaboration;
- The extent to which university research has evolved to a multidisciplinary orientation;
- International influences;
- Sources of funding for research collaboration.
Data/Methods
We examine data from a survey of 160 small and medium sized enterprises in Slovenia to assess the extent of partnership between universities and companies. Then we use the survey responses as a sampling frame to choose a small number of cases (ten to twelve) of industry-university collaboration. Case studies of these collaborations define the degree of success of these collaborations and examine the factors that influence the degree of success. We examine factors in the literature (cited above) and explore how the Slovenian context differs from that of the US and other European nations.
Results/Expected Results
We expect to identify systematic factors that are important to overcoming existing barriers to the commercialization of public sector research. We expect that these factors will be connected to incentives for individual researchers to build strong partnerships and the capacity for specific companies to identify potential partners within universities. We hope to use this research to inform current reform efforts in Slovenia and elsewhere.