Showing papers in "Journal of Technology Transfer in 2022"

Establishing successful university–industry collaborations: barriers and enablers deconstructed

Abstract: Abstract University–Industry Collaboration networks are increasingly significant to national economies. Previous studies have identified barriers and enablers of University–Industry Collaborations, however our understanding of the evolution of such collaborations is still limited thereby restricting our ability to nurture their development. This study explores the establishment of a successful University–Industry Collaboration and considers a range of perceived barriers and enablers through four emergent evolutionary phases: embryonic, initiation, engagement and established . The study adopted a qualitative research approach using a single site case study, focusing on the pharmaceutical industry, with 10 multinational firms and 8 academic institutions involved in a pharmaceutical collaboration. The results demonstrate that specific University–Industry Collaboration barriers and enablers emerge at different points in time, for example, strong lack of trust; strong fear of knowledge leakage, reluctance to share in the embryonic phase evolve to achieving integrity based trust and an intellectual property agreement in the engagement phase. These barriers were overcome using a range of phase appropriate mechanisms, for example, prior experience of the partners was critical in the embryonic phase, while cohesiveness and knowledge complementarity were vital in the engagement phase. The study emphasizes the significance of public funding and its distribution among members in order to support industry evolution and competitiveness. The University–Industry Collaboration continues to attract new participants and additional network-specific investments and has become a global centre of excellence for pharmaceutical research and development.

Automation and related technologies: a mapping of the new knowledge base

Abstract: Using the entire population of USPTO patent applications published between 2002 and 2019, and leveraging on both patent classification and semantic analysis, this paper aims to map the current knowledge base centred on robotics and AI technologies. These technologies are investigated both as a whole and distinguishing core and related innovations, along a 4-level core-periphery architecture. Merging patent applications with the Orbis IP firm-level database allows us to put forward a twofold analysis based on industry of activity and geographic location. In a nutshell, results show that: (i) rather than representing a technological revolution, the new knowledge base is strictly linked to the previous technological paradigm; (ii) the new knowledge base is characterised by a considerable—but not impressively widespread—degree of pervasiveness; (iii) robotics and AI are strictly related, converging (particularly among the related technologies and in more recent times) and jointly shaping a new knowledge base that should be considered as a whole, rather than consisting of two separate GPTs; (iv) the US technological leadership turns out to be confirmed (although declining in relative terms in favour of Asian countries such as South Korea, China and, more recently, India).

The costs of collaborative innovation

Abstract: Abstract Collaborations between actors from different sectors (governments, firms, nonprofit organizations, universities, and other societal groups) have been promoted or mandated with increasing frequency to spur more innovative activities. This article argues that there is an essential gap in evaluating the issues of these collaborative arrangements on innovation and a need to theorize the costs of these arrangements systematically. This article identifies three implicit assumptions in current research that prevent a sound analysis of the costs of collaborative innovation and advances a new cost theory based on the integration of studies from several research fields and explanations provided by three main economic theories: transaction cost economics, game theory, and the knowledge-based view. In particular, four overarching factors are posited to impact the effectiveness of collaboration for innovation: governance (the number of collaborators and the hierarchical relationships among them); compactness (the degree of relationship formality that binds collaborators together); reliability (the quality of the relationships); and institutionalization (the extent to which the relationships have been pre-established by practice). We discuss the importance of leveraging these factors to determine an optimal governance structure that allows collaborating actors to minimize transaction, cooperation, and knowledge costs, and to reward participants proportionally to the cost they bear, in order to foster conditions of reciprocity, fair rates of exchange, and distributive justice.

Task complementarity in academic work: a study of the relationship between research, education and third mission tasks among university professors

Abstract: Abstract Professors have multiple responsibilities and tasks. They should contribute to research, teaching and ‘third mission’ activities such as commercialisation of scientific knowledge and industry collaboration. These tasks are expected to be complementary and that synergies between different tasks can lead to positive outcomes. But are professors’ work tasks really complementary or are they rather characterised by trade-offs, and what are the implications of having multiple tasks for academic performance? This study of tenured academic staff in Norwegian universities, observe that there are many positive associations between academic tasks. The data supports the assumption that student supervision is positive for research performance, as is research collaboration with public and private organisations. We also find a positive association between student supervision and participation in third mission activities, but only with research collaboration and not commercialisation activities. The data also indicates that the combined effect of participation in third mission and teaching activities is neither negative nor positive for research performance, and as such we do not find indications that having multiple task is negative for work performance in the form of research output.

Barriers to university–industry collaboration in an emerging market: Firm-level evidence from Turkey

Abstract: Abstract University-industry collaborations (UICs) are one of the main sources of external knowledge and technologies for industrial firms, particularly in the context of emerging markets (EMs) and firm development. It is thus highly relevant to identify potential barriers internal to the firm as well as in the regional innovation system that might prevent firms from using UICs for innovation, in particular in an EM context. In order to address this issue, we conduct a firm-level study of the R&D-related segment of the manufacturing industry in Istanbul. Logistic regression analysis is used to test the effect of potential barriers on using UICs for innovative activities. With this approach, we are able to identify barriers that prevent innovation-related UICs and thus form a bottleneck to collaborations in the first place. Our findings show that lack of information about UIC opportunities as well as lack of financial support for UICs are the most relevant barriers that inhibit firms’ usage of UICs for innovation. This firm-level evidence points out the importance of university technology transfer offices in regional innovation systems and for fruitful UICs. We further find that administrative barriers have no significant effect, while barriers related to trust and skill matching with scientific partners even have a reverse effect to what we would have expected from the literature. This finding might point towards an effect of perceived versus deterring barriers that has been observed in innovation studies before and might be relevant for studying UICs as well.

Digital technology and national entrepreneurship: An ecosystem perspective

Abstract: Abstract Although the importance of digital technology has been recognized in the entrepreneurship literature, we know relatively little about how and to what extent it influences a nation’s entrepreneurial activities. Drawing on the concept of entrepreneurial ecosystem, this study developed a conceptual model to explain the impact of digital technology on national entrepreneurship and the interactions between digital technology and other ecosystem elements. The hypotheses are tested by using unbalanced panel data of 101 countries from 2001 to 2018. The empirical results show that the level of digital technology is positively associated with the output of national entrepreneurial ecosystems, and this positive relationship is strengthened in nations with a supportive culture, high-quality institutions, supportive policies, accessible resources, and well-developed service industries. The findings highlight the importance of digital technology, provide fresh insights into the interdependence between elements and causal mechanisms in national entrepreneurial ecosystems.

Conceptualising the entrepreneurial university: the stakeholder approach

Abstract: Abstract This study uses the stakeholder perspective to knowledge spillover theory at university to explain how various characteristics of internal and external university stakeholders will affect its entrepreneurial outcomes. Acknowledging the heterogeneity between entrepreneurial universities, we theoretically developed and empirically tested a model for four types of stakeholders (knowledge enablers, knowledge creators, knowledge codifiers, knowledge facilitators) across three university types (Russel group, teaching-based and polytechnic universities). To test our hypotheses related to the role of stakeholders in entrepreneurial outcomes of a university we used panel data on 139 UK universities that achieved entrepreneurial outcomes during 2010 and 2016. The results demonstrate significant differences in the role that stakeholders play in knowledge spillover entrepreneurship at universities with the effects vary across three distinct university types.

Barriers to university–industry collaboration in an emerging market: Firm-level evidence from Turkey

Abstract: Abstract University-industry collaborations (UICs) are one of the main sources of external knowledge and technologies for industrial firms, particularly in the context of emerging markets (EMs) and firm development. It is thus highly relevant to identify potential barriers internal to the firm as well as in the regional innovation system that might prevent firms from using UICs for innovation, in particular in an EM context. In order to address this issue, we conduct a firm-level study of the R&D-related segment of the manufacturing industry in Istanbul. Logistic regression analysis is used to test the effect of potential barriers on using UICs for innovative activities. With this approach, we are able to identify barriers that prevent innovation-related UICs and thus form a bottleneck to collaborations in the first place. Our findings show that lack of information about UIC opportunities as well as lack of financial support for UICs are the most relevant barriers that inhibit firms’ usage of UICs for innovation. This firm-level evidence points out the importance of university technology transfer offices in regional innovation systems and for fruitful UICs. We further find that administrative barriers have no significant effect, while barriers related to trust and skill matching with scientific partners even have a reverse effect to what we would have expected from the literature. This finding might point towards an effect of perceived versus deterring barriers that has been observed in innovation studies before and might be relevant for studying UICs as well.

Migrant inventors as agents of technological change

Abstract: Abstract How do regions enter new and distant technological fields? Who is triggering this process? This work addresses these compelling research questions by investigating the role of migrant inventors in the process of technological diversification. Immigrant inventors can indeed act as carriers of knowledge across borders and influence the direction of technological change. We test these latter propositions by using an original dataset of immigrant inventors in the context of European regions during the period 2003–201. Our findings show that: immigrant inventors generate positive local knowledge spillovers; they help their host regions to develop new technological specialisations; they trigger a process of unrelated diversification. Their contribution comes via two main mechanisms: immigrant inventors use their own personal knowledge ( knowledge creation ); they import knowledge from their home country to the host region ( knowledge transfer ). Their impact is maximised when their knowledge is not recombined with the local one (in mixed teams of inventors), but it is reused (in teams made by only migrant inventors). Our work contributes to the existing literature of regional diversification by providing fresh evidence of unrelated diversification for European regions and by identifying important agents of structural change. It also contributes to the literature of migration and innovation by adding fresh evidence on European regions and by unveiling some of the mechanisms of immigrants’ knowledge transmission.

Regional technological capabilities and green opportunities in Europe

Abstract: Abstract The goal of the paper is to elaborate an empirical overview of green technological development in European regions. This is a timely pursuit considering the ambitious commitments stipulated in the recent European Green Deal to achieve climate neutrality by 2050. Our analysis is organised in three steps. First, we map the geographical distribution of innovative activities in Europe and profile regions in terms of technological capabilities. Second, we elaborate a metric to identify regions’ green innovation potential. Third, we check whether possessing a comparative advantage in specific, green and non-green, technological domains is associated with a region’s capacity to develop green technologies.

Project management practices in major university-industry R&D collaboration programs – a case study

Abstract: University-industry collaboration (UIC) projects are complex undertakings, that can involve multiple parties or stakeholders. Effective management of UICs can mean the difference between success and failure, in terms of technology transfer and research commercialization. This research paper focuses on the micro-level analysis of UICs and in particular the project management practices that can help major UICs deliver benefits and broader societal impact. PM has been evolving toward more hybrid approaches involving both traditional and agile practices. A conceptualization of a hybrid approach is presented based on a literature review. This conceptualization is then used as a starting point for exploratory empirical research. Participant observation, document analysis, and thirty semi-structured interviews were conducted in a large UIC case study to help identify PM practices and check their relevance. Data analysis led to a framework comprising 29 transversal or must-have practices distributed throughout the project lifecycle and 30 contingent or optional practices, divided into traditional, agile and common. This research extends the existing knowledge on UICs by giving a micro-level perspective on managing UIC projects and providing evidence of the adoption of hybrid approaches to assure the overall governance of significant inter-organizational endeavors. The framework provides a roadmap for future major UIC projects.

Co-evolution patterns of university patenting and technological specialization in European regions

Abstract: Abstract This paper provides novel evidence on co-evolution patterns of the technological specialization of innovation activities of firms and academic institutions located in the same European region during the years from 2003 to 2014. We exploit a novel and unique dataset merging data on EU-funded R&D projects, universities, patents, and economic region-level data for a large sample of universities and firms co-located in geographical areas at the third level of the Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics (NUTS3), which correspond to a sub-regional scale of analysis. Our results indicate the presence of substantial heterogeneity across the analyzed EU regions with respect to the co-evolution of industry and academia specializations. In particular, we find that the specialization into a new technological domain is led by the local academic research system only in a few cases. We also document that a number of factors, at both the university and region levels, are associated with convergent or divergent processes in the relative specialization of the innovation activities carried out by firms and universities co-located in the same region.

Who wins the race for knowledge-based competitiveness? Comparing European and North American FDI patterns

Abstract: Abstract The geographical dispersion of value-added activities triggered by the ‘great unbundling’ of production has made the race for competitiveness increasingly shaped by the capability of multinational corporations (MNCs) to orchestrate global innovation networks at world scale. However, major differences in the distribution of foreign investments across value chain functions undertaken by MNCs based in different economic areas have drawn little attention in the empirical literature. This work attempts to fill this gap by focusing on the FDI patterns of European and North American MNCs, which have historically played a key role in the internationalization of production and innovation. To this aim, we compare outward FDI flows of European and North American MNCs in manufacturing and knowledge-intensive activities over the period 2003–2017. We show that while European MNCs are key players in global networks of production, they do not reach the heights of North American investors in the dispersion of knowledge-based activities. Most importantly, European MNCs rely on emerging economies more to offshore production than to set up R&D labs in these countries; by contrast, US-based MNCs are more prone to engage in knowledge-intensive FDIs towards the most dynamic emerging countries (especially China and India, as well as the Four Asian Tigers). Further, we account for the growing role of new entrants in global FDI markets by comparing the advanced economies’ foreign investment decisions with those from Chinese MNCs. Drawing from the literature on the globalization of R&D and cross-border knowledge transmission, a discussion is finally offered on the potential implications of the detected differences in internationalization patterns, together with possible directions for future research.

The performance effects of corporate venture capital: a meta-analysis

Abstract: Abstract The effect of corporate venture capital (CVC) investments is far from being conclusively discussed in literature. Although the expected benefits of CVCs for corporations and start-ups are undisputed, empirical evidence is mixed. We combine and analyze the results of 32 CVC studies, including 105,950 observations: Our results suggest that while CVC investments are positively linked to start-ups’ and investors’ as well as strategic performance, we find no significant relationship between CVC investments and financial outcomes. The effects are moderated by the timing of the investment, the country and industry-effects. For instance, CVC investments in North America and the ICT sector report significant positive effects, while we find no statistical evidence for the health care sector.

Network-driven positive externalities in clean energy technology production: the case of energy efficiency in the EU residential sector

Abstract: Abstract In this paper, we propose a model of national innovation production that formalizes the role of trade partnerships as a channel of knowledge spillovers across countries. The model is used to investigate the energy efficiency technological domain in the European Union (EU) using a panel database covering 19 EU countries for the time span 1990–2015. The model is estimated by using a novel empirical strategy which allows to assess the knowledge spillover effects benefiting a country depending on its relative position in the trade network, and correct for common endogeneity concerns. We show that being central in the trade network is a significant determinant of a country’s innovative performance, and that learning-by-exporting mechanisms are responsible for increased innovation performances. We further reveal that neglecting network effects may significantly reduce our understanding of domestic innovation patterns. Finally, we find that the benefits obtained from knowledge diffusion varies with the domestic absorptive capacity and policy mix composition. Our main implication is that policy design informed by network-based case studies could help maximizing the exploitation of positive knowledge spillovers.

Entrepreneurial networks, geographical proximity, and their relationship to firm growth: a study of 241 small high-tech firms

Abstract: Start-up firms in high-tech sectors normally engage in networking to overcome their lack of resources, knowledge, and competence constraints. A newly established firm's network can provide a source of social capital, which may enhance its growth prospects. In this study, 241 new technology-based firms (NTBFs) in Sweden are studied during their early formative years to investigate how entrepreneurial networks and the geographical proximity to actors in these networks affect the early performance of these firms in terms of growth. Three underlying factors are identified in the analysis: geographical proximity and professional and consultative networks. This study finds that professional networks have a positive and significant effect on NTBFs' growth, which indicate that utilizing these networks benefit the growth of both young and growing firms. NTBFs in initial stages can acquire business opportunities by constructing professional networks. In addition, several formal links positively affect growth, such as regional business partners, incubator networks, and links to universities.

The role of relatedness and strategic linkages between domestic and MNE sectors in regional branching and resilience

Abstract: Abstract Despite the key role of multinational enterprises (MNEs) in both international markets and domestic economies, there is no consensus on their impact on their host economy. In particular, do MNEs stimulate new domestic firms through knowledge spillovers? Here, we look at the impact of MNEs on the entry and exit of domestic industries in Irish regions before, during, and after the 2008 Financial Crisis. Specifically, we are interested in whether the presence of MNEs in a region results in knowledge spillovers and the creation of new domestic industries in related sectors. To quantify how related an industry is to a region’s industry basket we propose two cohesion measures, weighted closeness and strategic closeness which capture direct linkages and dense inter-industry links between local industries respectively. We use a dataset of government-supported firms in Ireland (covering 90% of manufacturing and exporting) between 2006 and 2019. We find that domestic industries are both more likely to enter and less likely to leave a region if they are related to so-called ‘overlapping’ industries containing both domestic and MNE firms. In contrast, we find a negative impact on domestic entry and survival from cohesion to ‘exclusive MNE’ industries, suggesting that domestic firms are unable to ‘leap’ and thrive in MNE-proximate industries likely due to a technology or know-how gap. Finally, the type of cohesion matters. During the economic recovery (2015–2019), it is strategic rather than weighted closeness to overlapping industries that is associated with both domestic industry entry and survival.

Environmental innovation and R&D collaborations: Firm decisions in the innovation efficiency context

Abstract: Abstract To develop innovation, firms make several decisions on the allocation of resources to specific innovation activities. Important innovation decisions include among others the decision to collaborate with other partners for innovation activities and the decision to engage in complex R&D projects such as projects with environmental benefits. Although there are very few empirical works that examine these two decisions together, while supporting that R&D collaborations are more important for the development of environmental innovations than for conventional innovations, an empirical work that examines the joint impact of these two decisions on corporate innovation efficiency is still lacking. This study aims to fulfill this gap by making one of the first attempts to employ a new dataset based on the Greek Community Innovation Survey (CIS), conducted for the years of 2012–2014 analyzing 2456 companies. Econometric results indicate that firm’s decision to eco-innovate exerts a positive influence on firms’ innovation efficiency directly. On the contrary, regarding the decision to engage in R&D collaborations, econometric results indicate that there is not a direct or an indirect, via eco-innovation, impact on innovation efficiency.