Q11: Academic Innovation: A true source of untapped potential
As the orchestrators of an innovation ecosystem, we end up talking to many different stakeholders about meaningful innovation and what both strengthens and stifles it. There are many relevant factors, some of which we will get to in the coming weeks and months. However, regardless of context, there is one arena that consistently comes up as having untapped potential: academia.
Our universities are beacons of innovation. They’re places called “home” by some of our most avid learners and ambitious thinkers. They output research that leads to groundbreaking opportunities to solve our greatest problems with intentionality, setting the trend for future progress. And yet, somehow, we still have major difficulties maximizing sustainable, innovative output in a way that fully engages the academic ecosystems at our disposal.
This has never gone unnoticed, and various parties have tried to tackle this accordingly. Theories like the triple helix model of innovation were conceptualized to highlight how academia can work with industry and government to bring about innovation. Legislators globally have moved in the direction of institutional ownership of intellectual property (with Sweden being an outlier through their “professor’s privilege” — which we will cover in coming pieces!). This has all in turn given rise to tech- and knowledge transfer offices, there to bridge the gap between what’s traditionally academic, and inherently industrial. And, it has given governments and larger public organizations reason to heavily fund R&D for various intents and purposes, and private investors to take an interest in university spin-offs and technology licensing from higher education institutions.
This has, nonetheless, not solved the problems we had from the get-go. This is seen across the spectrum. Globally, clashes between researchers and corporate/commercial interests remain. Dissonance between internal and external stakeholders persist. And in all cases, questions around the core purpose of university-based research, and doubts about most institutions and stakeholders having real clarity on the answer, become more potent.
There are many factors that play a role here, but we believe most of them fall into two core categories, both of which we’ve discussed earlier here on the blog:
Incentives: The audiences that make up an academic ecosystem often want different things, and those things may not be the same as what the decision makers are hoping for. An example would be that a professor’s path to receiving tenure, above all, is about publishing research and not commercializing research — guess what that means for an innovation office that wants a researcher to think more about commercialization, or for them to patent before they publish? How much freedom does a researcher have to reprioritize, if they want to do well in their roles? Incentive-based clashes like these are very common in academic ecosystems, and they have multiple suboptimal outcomes.
Mindset: Even when they do want the same thing, they are unable to see how they can help each other out. One classic, two-way example we hear about is how researchers are at odds with most commercially minded stakeholders, and vice versa. On the researcher side, it is often due to reasons like perceived misrepresentation and abuse of the value (and intended impact) of their research, which makes collaboration a barrier — especially if new use cases are seen as mindless and/or outright unethical. On the commercially minded side, perceived stubbornness from researchers and resulting difficulties in working with them are frequently cited patterns.
The above only scratches the surface. There is so much left to unpack and remedy here — and we seek to play a role in doing just that. As part of Inventia — FuzeQube’s dedicated academic ecosystem — we are delving deeply into these challenges to enhance and refine solutions we believe are already available. We already work with universities on capacity building, focused on getting all relevant audiences involved, incentivized and more informed. We provide students with the know-how they need to contribute to academic innovation. And, we work directly with university spin-offs to strategize their growth and get the right teams, collaborators and investors on board. It is thus in our immediate interest to explore the open questions and to keep you all — the people who share our passion for more meaningful innovation and believe academia is one of the legitimate routes — posted on the perspectives and answers we find.
We agree with the general sentiment: academia is indeed a true source of untapped potential, and there is more we can do to manage the complexity of academic ecosystems to ensure what comes out of them (commercial and non-commercial) is purposeful, sustainable, and aligned with the intended outcomes of the players involved and impacted. As always, if this sounds interesting, we want your input, involvement and collaboration — regardless of the role you believe you play in academic ecosystems. Don’t hesitate to reach out. 😊
Bardia Bijani
Managing Partner, FuzeQube Group
