Because Europe trails the United States by 10 to 15 years, universities and institutes forgo hundreds of millions of dollars in revenues from licensing and company startups that could pay for additional research and reward innovation. "In many places in Europe, technology transfer has been left to the individual scientist and academic with little participation by the university," says Martin Wood, director of licensing and agreements for Medical Research Council (MRC) Technology, the licensing arm of the MRC in London.
But European scientists and institutions are changing to keep up with their US counterparts and encourage talented scientists to remain in their own countries, according to top technology transfer experts.
Each European country has its own situation regarding ownership of intellectual property; they lack consensus, says Rudy Dekeyser, technology transfer manager and general director of the Flanders Interuniversity Institute for Biotechnology (VIB) in Belgium. VIB manages technology transfer for nine ...
