0.1 Regions and clusters  (Page 7/15)

• Knowledge and innovation for growth
• Making Europe a more attractive place to invest and work
• Creating more and better jobs

Recognising R&D as a key driver for innovation, the European Union has set the objective of raising expenditure on R&D to 3% of GDP by 2010. If left to follow current trends by the end of the decade it would remain at 2.2% (EU 2005), just below the OECD average of 2.3% (OECD 1996).

United kingdom: strengthening innovation

The UK Government has put much emphasis on the promotion of Innovation to reduce the productivity gap with our major competitors. This was the focus of the Department of Trade and Industry ‘ Innovation Review ’ undertaken in 2003 (DTI 2003).

One of the most pivotal pieces of work on University Collaboration was the Lambert Review of Business – University Collaboration by Richard Lambert the former Editor of the-Financial Times from August 2002 Lambert spent a semester at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. He was subsequently asked to write an independent review of Business-University for the then known Department of Trade and Industry.

It is reported in the Lambert Review of Business University Collaboration, that the exploitation of university IP played a vital role in improving UK’s innovation.

The number of patents issued to business and universities has increased rapidly in the US, EU and Japan since the mid 1980s. The highest levels are found in the most innovative countries such as the US, Sweden and Finland. In many industry sectors, businesses will not invest in research and development (R&D) to develop early stage technologies without a patent to guarantee them exclusive rights to commercialise their work. (DTI 2003)

Patent application numbers in the UK are low and have been falling relative to the US, France and Germany, mainly because of its low investment in R&D. The UK’s investment in R&D is heavily concentrated in the pharmaceutical industry, which has a high propensity to patent. So its low level of patent output is especially worrying. The UK has a strong science base, which is highly productive in creating “pure” research outputs such as publications and citations. There is significant potential to transfer this knowledge to industry through IP. (DTI 2003)

Universities account for only a small share of the UK’s patents each year. The highest proportion is in Scotland where, partly due to low industry investment in R&D, universities file around 10 per cent of patent applications. This is more than double the proportion across the UK. (DTI 2003)

It has been noted in the Lambert review that there is a change in the way that business and universities are interacting and that there is optimism in the prospect of creating innovation from these interactions.

Historically, US universities were Land Grant universities or colleges, which are US institutions, which have been designated by a Congress to receive the benefits of the Morrill Acts of 1862 and 1890. These acts funded educational institutions by granting federally controlled land to the states. The mission of these institutions, as set forth in the 1862 Act, is to teach agriculture, military tactics, and the mechanic arts, not to the exclusion of classical studies, so that members of the working classes might obtain a practical college education (www.wordiq.com 2007).