Inventions and patents at universities: The case of Chalmers University of Technology

Demands for increased relevance of university research to society needs have stimulated interest in inventions at universities and raised questions about the proper balance between basic research and applied research at universities. Inventions from Chalmers University in the form of more than 400 patents, 1943-1994, are presented and the patent output is compared to that from other universities and from industry. The rate of inventing has increased sixfold in the period and is now showing a tendency to taper off at 15-20 new patents per year. The inventors are undergraduate students (8%), postgraduate students (33%), and professors (60%). The roles of professors and students are reversed with regard to starting spin-off companies. About 50% of the university patents have been used for start-up of new spin-off companies and for supporting their growth, while the other 50% have gone to established non-spin-off industry. The most prestigious US universities have an output of patents per capita which is more than twice as high (MIT, CalTech). The patent intensity (output of patents in relation to R&D) in Swedish industry is comparable to that at Chalmers. The economic value of the patents has been estimated on the basis of employment (turnover) in the spin-off companies. A general idea of the economic impact of the patents may be obtained from the fact that direct spin-off manufacturing companies with products protected by patents have contributed about 10% as many new jobs (70 each year) as the output of graduates from the university (700 per year). For all spin-off companies together the figure is estimated to be about 50% (350 per year). The results constitute a good basis for the many different actions the university may take to support an increased output of inventions. At the same time they offer a convenient means of measuring the efficiency of these actions. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd.