Interview: Talented people key to tech transfer[fr][de] 

Europe is as good as the rest of the world regarding the technology transfer it conducts but does worse as far as quantity and intensity are concerned, said Andrew Herbert of the Cambridge-based Microsoft Research. 'Quantity and intensity' means in terms of number of big companies having good relationships with universities, universities licensing technology or spinning out new companies, Herbet said.

In addition, in the US and China "there is much more of an expectation that people doing research in universities as well as having an academic perspective will also think about how their ideas can be exploited, either by partnering with industry or by creating spin-out companies," he said.

The US also has "a stronger entrepreneurial risk-taking culture," while academics find it easier to get time off to start a company to try out their ideas - and still be welcomed back at their university to work on the next idea. "In many European university systems, once you're in the system it may be dangerous to leave it and you can't just come back in very easily," said Herbert.

He also argued that Europe has so far been rather dependent on big companies defining major industries and doing their own research internally because universities have been considered to have "bureaucratic governmental functions with primarily an academic and teaching objective rather than an economic objective that is changing". Therefore, the difference in technology transfer performance between the EU and the US is "in many ways a cultural thing," according to Herbert.

In order to boost technology transfer in Europe, Herbert recommends that academia first aspire to the highest international standards to ensure the excellence and quality of the teaching and training of students and second study universities which are successful at technology transfer as "'there are a lot of ideas that can be copied". 

Above all, he added, "the most important thing is to have the pool of talented people with smart ideas and the right incentives to help them create those companies and help those companies thrive".

Policy measures in support of technology transfer include making it easier to set up a business, helping young companies to be agile through more flexible employment laws and other regulations as well as tax incentives.

On the business side, "big companies can help a lot by recognising that they can support many eco-systems of smaller companies if they think about their suppliers, helping smaller companies to grow their businesses and partnering with them".

Andrew Herbert will be further dicussing the conditions for efficient technology transfer in Europe at a conference hosted by the French national institute for research in computer science (INRIA) in Brussels this Wednesday (28 May 2008).

To read the interview in full, please click here.