Institutional Changes and the Commercialization of Academic Knowledge: A Study of Italian Universities' Patenting Activities between 1965 and 2002

Abstract

The impact of internal intellectual property right(IPR) regulations on the patenting activities of Italian universities isinvestigated. These regulations are an organizational response to a major setof reforms designed to increase universities' autonomy from the centralgovernment. After a discussion of Italian legislative changes in university and patentlaws, data on 637 patent applications filed by 64 Italian universities between1965 and 2002 are used to address the central research question. According tothe data, the number of Italian university patent applications rosesubstantially between 1996 and 2006. Another key finding suggests that patenting activities almost tripled inuniversities with an internal IPR regulation. Each time a university createsits own patent regulation, there is a 9 percent increase in the likelihood thatuniversities without an internal patent regulation will establish one. Finally,results show that larger universities patent more and that patenting activityis greater in the north of Italy, which features a higher level of industrialdevelopment. (SAA)

Keywords: European Patent Office, U.S. Patent & Trademark Office (USPTO), Patent productivity, Patent law, Patent applications, Academic research, Organizational change, Technology transfer, University-industry relations