Universities across Europe are under pressure to use their knowledge and discoveries to drive economic growth, but a UK study has shown their ability to do this depends on the local economy. In the UK, universities in the greater south-east of England seem to be better than those in less competitive regions at commercialising their research and innovation.
The study, led by Robert Huggins at the University of Wales Institute Cardiff, made a regional comparison of how knowledge flows out of universities and into the business community, both in the local area and beyond the region where particular universities are based.
“We found that it really does matter where you are in the country,” Huggins said. “Universities in more competitive regions, especially the south-east, are generally more productive than those located in less competitive regions. They are more successful at bridging the gap between the knowledge they create and concrete business applications. Universities in less competitive regions tend to underperform in this respect.”
One of the main reasons for this pattern is that universities in the south-east benefit from a high concentration of other research and development institutions and innovative companies in the region. Universities in less competitive regions don't have the same density of local research groups in their networks, so there are fewer links, less interaction and less opportunity to collaborate.
Huggins does not place blame at the door of the universities. The study suggests that in less competitive regions, businesses are less likely to seek to engage with universities, and universities are left to take the initiative to spin-out and commercialise their own knowledge assets. The findings highlight how important universities are to regional economic growth; with their ability to commercialise the knowledge they create being critical to competitiveness.
“Uncompetitive regions lack the additional knowledge infrastructure, besides universities, which is more commonly a feature of competitive regions” Huggins notes. “Universities are just part of the picture; I think the onus placed on them to become the principal bases of tradable knowledge in many regions is probably too heavy.”
The study is based mainly on the results of a survey of around 6,000 companies and university knowledge transfer officers from universities across the 12 regions of the UK. It also involved nine detailed case studies of knowledge transfer activities in the UK and the US to tease out the processes for turning knowledge into commercially successful products, services or more productive business operations.
The research is part of a larger joint research project on ‘The Impact of Higher Education Institutions on Regional Economies in the UK.’
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