The Effect of Publicly Co-Funded Industry-Science Collaboration on Scientific Production

Abstract

Competitive industry-science collaboration programs encourage academic scientists to co-develop innovation projects with firms. They combine attributes of competitive research funding and of science commercialization policies. As these programs require more time and effort from scientists than traditional science funding and potentially lead applicants to adopt projects with higher commercial potential, the question arises whether such programs impose a cost on scientific productivity or direction. We find no evidence of negative impacts on science in an empirical analysis of a large-scale, cross-country R&D policy. Our results show an increase in top publications while the direction of research agendas remains unaffected.

Keywords: innovation, Academic engagement, Industry-science links, Science and technology policy, Joint Programming Initiative