A Technology Transfer Model to Enhance University-Industry Collaboration

Abstract

There is no gainsaying the fact that intellectual property leverages the economic growth of a region. Further it cannot also be gainsaid that academic institutions have come up with renewed interests in developing new ideas and innovations to find solutions to emerging problems. Teaching and learning being the first two missions of any educational institute, the academic institutions have now evolved to fulfil the demands of their third mission focussing on research and technology transfer. It is not possible for companies alone to overcome the complexities of today’s markets. Therefore a synergistic collaboration between industry and academia based on a suitable Technology Transfer Model which fosters transfer of technology is inevitable in today’s knowledge economy in order to gain new knowledge and utilise innovation to provide solutions to emerging problems. However, this collaboration is easier said than done as it is usually fraught with barriers owing to the lack of a suitable model for universities, which impede the success of linkages between academia and industry. It becomes very important to understand the best practices incorporated in TT models that are being used by firms and use them in creating a suitable model for universities. This paper endeavours to discover best practices in TT by understanding various TT Models and drawing a comparative insight from the jurisdictions that are leading in the university-industry collaboration viz. China and Singapore. Finally the paper based on the survey of TT Models and comparative insight proposes a suitable technology transfer model that plays a significant role in industry-academia collaborations. It is combelieved that the study will help improve industry-academia collaboration’s success and will provide a foundational conceptual framework in order to come up with sound policy decisions in the said domain. Furthermore, the model can serve as a foundation for future research in the setup of industry-academia collaboration.

Keywords: Intellectual property, Knowledge transfer, Technology transfer model, University-industry collaboration.

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