Hurdles in University-Industry Technology Transfer: Why Research-Based Inventions are Not Transferred to the Market?

Abstract

Despite their importance, previous literature on university-industry technology transfer has overlooked identifying the factors and the mechanisms inhibiting the successful commercialization of research-based inventions (RBIs). In this article, we adopt an inductive approach to explore the factors inhibiting the transfer of RBIs developed within universities to the market. We do so by conducting a case study on 15 RBIs developed within a prominent Italian technical university. Our results show that three main classes of inhibitors prevent the commercialization of RBIs: institutional, interpersonal, and cultural. Although all three factors are important in preventing knowledge and technology transfer between universities and their industrial ecosystem, we find out that relational inhibitors are the most prevalent ones, whereas institutional and cultural contribute to reinforcing the effect of relational inhibitors. We discuss how such inhibitors could be tackled by technology transfer ecosystem actors to eliminate obstacles to the transfer of knowledge and technologies from universities to industry; we also discuss the effectiveness of formal policies and instruments in lowering such inhibitors.