Small College/ University and Industry Partnership Project
Delivering Development – strengthening the link between Academic Research and Industry Adoption of Innovations
By: Profs. Sue Christoffersen, Rob Fleming, Chris Pastore
Philadelphia University
Objective: development of a pilot system to facilitate interaction between university research and industrial needs.
There is a wealth of innovation and know-how contained within American Colleges and Universities but it is infrequent that this human capital assists pressing industrial needs. There are a number of obstacles that limit this interaction:
- University administrators may not be aware of the opportunities and issues associated with industry sponsored research
- Faculty are not always aware of current industrial needs
- Faculty inventions and innovations are not marketed well
- Industry is concerned about the perceived long delays in university research activities
Mechanisms have been explored to address these problems. Many universities have created Technology Transfer Offices to market inventions and other intellectual property. Although there are examples of successes, in other instances the Tech Transfer Office is perceived to hinder faculty-industry interaction for a number of reasons. Frequently industry is concerned that universities will claim intellectual property for everything done in a research project and charge them again to use the results of the research. Faculty feel pressure to “lock up” all intellectual property when performing research and to clearly delineate all activities which reduces the serendipity of interdisciplinary work. Industries feel that the cost of working with the university has become too high.
It seems that the most effective Tech Transfer Offices function in large, prestigious research universities, but in smaller schools they do not work well.
Invention Fairs have been explored wherein faculty present their new ideas to potential investors and entrepreneurs. These have varied outcomes and the frequent cause of dissatisfaction comes from the different expectations of the faculty and the investor. There is a gap between the “pure research” of the faculty and the need for a commercializable product. Some faculty feel offended that their brilliant idea would be reduced to a mass product market. Other faculty feel a need to be deeply involved in the product development even when this goes beyond their expertise or available time.
Industry sponsored research programs provide the opportunity for industry to guide the research program around specific needs that will assist them in developing new products and technologies. One of the great challenges here is that many universities are not interested in short-term research projects, but rather require 2 or 3 year projects that will sponsor graduate student research theses. This is appropriate for deep theoretical learning, but is not good for quick market response. Even more problematic is that there is widespread perception among industries that University researchers are too slow in completing projects a market that demands fast turn around. To underscore this, a recent Delaware Valley Industrial Resource Center found that many businesses will not consider working with universities on short term projects. This all points to the fact that in the invention process, from R&D to Commercialization, there is a weak link: Development. We will strengthen the D in R&D.
Our goal is to develop a model for small and medium sized colleges and universities that will facilitate industry-faculty interaction and provide quick response to pressing needs.
Tasks
We have identified three components that we believe will allow university faculty to overcome the current barriers to success.
Faculty Training
Some faculty, not all, are appropriate candidates for working on short term product development projects with industry. However there is a need to shift the institutional culture of the university and facilitate faculty identification of new opportunities. They must learn how to:
- be open to criticism from their industrial partners; to lower their egos
- partner with those in different fields, i.e., architects working with businesspeople, engineers collaborating with accountants
- share their real world expertise to their students on short term projects
- manage a time critical research projects
- focus on Development instead of Research
Executive Education
Perhaps primary to the success of this program is the executive education component wherein university administrators come to grips with the positive aspects of university-industry interaction. The traditional model calls for faculty to write refereed technical papers and win multi-year research projects from federal organizations. If the university wants to get more involved in promoting US industrial competitiveness and provide seamless learning environments for their students to be more productive after graduation, a new model must be incorporated.
We will work with university administrators to demonstrate to them the benefits of alternative paths for their faculty. The current system of tenure and promotion provides disincentive for faculty to solve problems for the industry. If there are options wherein a faculty member can choose to develop their career as a problem solver and hands-on educator then more faculty will pursue this route.
There is a major cultural barrier here that may be difficult to overcome. One of the authors made a presentation in Harrisburg to the AICUP (Association of Independent Colleges and Universities of Pennsylvania), attended by primarily presidents and vice presidents. In this presentation the importance of short term focused industrial research was presented. The author was astonished at the high level of interest in this model and was bombarded with questions about how to make this function at their university.
We believe this is more likely to happen at small colleges and universities and the model will be developed with them in mind.
Network with Industry
These ideas don’t work unless the industry knows about it and are willing to participate. Networking events are necessary to bring in the industry, introduce them to the faculty interested in these activities and start the process.
The industrial partners will be essential in identifying areas of need and communicating their particular goals.
To implement networking, we will identify multipliers – those organizations with a network of small and medium sized businesses that could commercialize inventions and benefit from collaborating at the development stage. Trade organizations, industry associations plus government organizations (export promotion and economic development) as well as large corporations could participate in the networking events. Our pilot would introduce these agents of growth to academe.
Outcomes
Industry will obtain “outsourced R&D” from universities through networking events
Innovation will be encouraged, economic growth and international competitiveness enhanced
Faculty will become agile in their response to the needs of industry including response to short term projects
Curriculum will be relevant, real world examples will be real and current
University administrators will remove barriers to industry sponsored research and receive the financial benefits of industry sponsored projects
College and University students will receive specialized, real world, education through industry sponsored projects and “hit the ground running” when they enter the workforce