the management of university-industry partnerships in eastern asia

Improving the managerial effectivenessof higher education institutions

The management ofuniversity-industry partnershipsin Eastern AsiaReport of an IIEP/ESMU Distance Education Course,2 April – 5 July 2002

Michaela Martin

International Institute for Educational Planning

The management of university-industry partnerships in Eastern Asia

The views and opinions expressed in this report are those of the

authors and do not necessarily represent the views of UNESCO/IIEP

or of ESMU. The designations employed and the presentation of

material in these contributed papers do not imply the expression of

any opinion whatsoever concerning the legal status of any country,

territory, city or area or its authorities, or concerning its frontiers

or boundaries.

The publication costs of this report have been covered through a

grant-in-aid offered by UNESCO and by voluntary contributions made

by several Members States of UNESCO, a list of which will be found

at the end of this volume.

Published by:

International Institute for Educational Planning

7-9 rue Eugène-Delacroix, 75116 Paris

e-mail:[email protected]

IIEP web site: http://www.unesco.org/iiep

Cover design: Pierre Finot

Typesetting: Linéale Production

Printed in IIEP’s printshop

© UNESCO 2003 - IIEP/WD/1316391/R1

(except for material from Module 1 of the Course: © UNESCO/ESMU

2002 and for material from Module 5 of the Course: © ESMU 2002)

mailto:[email protected]

http://www.unesco.org/iiep

5

CONTENTS

List of abbreviations 7

Section I: Introduction 111. The programme on the management

of university-industry partnerships 112. Underlying assumptions and objectives

of the course 133. Course design 154. Letter of invitation and institutional commitment 165. Instructional approach 176. Communications support 187. The participants 19

Section II: Course content and assignments 211. University profiles 212. Module 1 – The strategic management

of university-industry partnerships 223. Module 2 – The management of interfaces

for university-industry partnerships 424. Module 3 – The financial management

of university-industry partnerships 575. Module 4 – Staff management

of university-industry partnerships 816. Module 5 – Developing an action project

to strengthen co-operation with industry 105

Section III:Evaluation of the distance education course 1271. Attainment of the objectives – participants’

expectations 1272. Course organization and schedule 1283. Course design 1304. Course content 1335. Communications 1356. General comments 1377. Final remarks 139

Appendix 1. List of participants 141

Appendix 2. Course calendar 146

The distance education course on:The management of university-industry partnerships in Eastern Asia

2 April – 5 July 2002,

was organized jointly by theInternational Institute for Educational Planning (IIEP/UNESCO), Paris,

and the European Centre for Strategic Management of Universities(ESMU), Brussels.

The IIEP/ESMU course team consisted of:

Michaela Martin, Course Co-ordinator, IIEPNadine Burquel, ESMU

Moshe Vigdor, Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJ), IsraelBikas C. Sanyal, Consultant, IIEP

John Hall, Consultant, IIEP

This Report has been prepared byMichaela Martin, Course Co-ordinator, IIEP

International Institute forEducational Planning

7-9 rue Eugène Delacroix,75116 Paris, France

European Centre for StrategicManagement of Universities

31 rue Montoyer, B-1000Brussels, Belgium

7

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

AGSB Ateneo Graduate School of Business

AJCA Atma Jaya Catholic University

AMU Ateneo de Manila University, the Philippines

AU Assumption University, Thailand

CCE Centre for Continuing Education

CRM Centre for Research Management

CU Cantho University, Viet Nam

DFS Department of Food Science

DLSUPS De La Salle University of Professional Schools Inc.

DUT Dalian University of Technology

ECIU European Consortium of Innovative Universities

EITD Engineering Innovation and TechnologyDevelopment Unit

ESMU European Centre for Strategic Managementof Universities

GAA General Appropriations Act

GSB Graduate School of Business

HUJ University of Jerusalem

IC Innovation Centres

ICC Innovations and Consultancy Centre

ICT Information and CommunicationsTechnology

IIEP International Institute for Educational Planning(IIEP-UNESCO)

ILO Industrial Liaison Office

IPR Intellectual property rights

IRCU Industrial Research and Consultancy Unit

IRPA Intensification of Research in Priority Areas


8

IS Incubator Structures

ISI International Science Institute

ISSI Institute of Small-Scale Industries

IT Information Technology

ITA Investment Tax Allowance

LDCs Least Developed Countries

LGU Land Grant Universities, USA

LMD Leadership and Management Development

LOs Licensed Offices

MITD Medical Innovation and Technology Development Centre

MOE Ministry of Education

MOOE Maintenance and Other Operating Expense

MOSTE Ministry of Science, Technology and Environment

MTDC Malaysian Technology Development Cooperation

MTP Medium-Term Plan

NSF National Science Foundation

NTBFs New Technology-Based Firms

PBL Problem-Based Learning

PHIs Public Higher Institutions

PUPL Polytechnic University of the Philippines

RMU Research Management Unit

RUPP Royal University of Phnom Penh

R&D Research and development

SCI Science Citation Index

SSCI Social Science Citation Index

SME Small- and medium-sized enterprises

SP Science Parks

SRG Strategic Research Grant

STC Smart Technology Centre

S&T Science and Technology

9

List of abbreviations

SWOT Strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats

TBI Technology Business Incubator

TF Toray Foundation

TLO Technology Licensing Office

UA University of Aalborg, Denmark

UI University of Indonesia, Indonesia

UKM Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, Malaysia

UM University of Malaya, Malaya

UNAM National Autonomous University of Mexico

UNIPEQ Unit Penyelidiukan Kualiti Makanan (Food QualityResearch Unit), Malaysia

UP University of the Philippines – Diliman, the Philippines

USM Universiti Sains Malaysia, Malaysia

11

SECTION I. INTRODUCTION

1. The programme on the management of university-industry partnerships

Higher education systems worldwide are currently faced with a

number of challenges which drive them to closer collaboration with

industry:

• many governments are seeking to reduce public core funding for

higher education, normally the most costly level of education;

• governments tend to be more selective in their funding and they

increasingly provide incentive funding for targeted purposes, one

of which is university-industry linkages;

• new knowledge, in particular in the realms of science and

technology, is acknowledged to be the main driving force for

economic development in the knowledge economy and is expected

to lead to job creation;

• graduate unemployment or under-employment is increasing and

there is a growing concern with the relevance of education and

training with regard to the requirements of the labour market,

itself changing rapidly in the era of globalization;

• there is growing acceptance that collaborative ventures with

enterprises are one way to assure access to changing skill

requirements and life-long learning.

In countries in transition, universities have found themselves

faced with rapidly changing socio-economic conditions. There is also

limited access to information on international experiences which

could serve to inform discussion and debate with ideas and


12

approaches from other institutions and countries in the area of

university-industry partnerships.

In this context, IIEP decided to undertake a research project

during the period of its ‘Medium-Term Plan, 1996-2001’ on The

management of university-industry linkages. The main objective of

this research project was to collect empirical evidence on innovative

mechanisms through which universities worldwide manage their

relations with industry.

As part of the research, IIEP launched a series of 12 case studies,

inviting institutional managers of university-industry relations to

document innovative approaches used in the area of organizational

development, financial and personnel management and the

management of intellectual property, at institutional, departmental

and programme levels. Such an applied approach was chosen to make

available practical advice and options to other managers of

programmes with industry, regarding structures and processes whose

appropriateness needs to be discussed in the light of specific

institutional contexts.

The universities chosen were those having developed their

relations with local, national and international industries and

businesses – for instance, in the teaching domain (i.e. continuing

education programmes, ‘sandwich courses’, joint curriculum

development), R&D, consultancies and enterprise development.

Ideally, they would have had a formalized institutional commitment

to the development of university-industry linkages.

The objective of the research programme was also to collect

empirical evidence from a limited number of innovative cases, but

representing experiences from all continents and quite diverse

development contexts, including one western industrialized country

Introduction

13

and a country in transition, several middle-income countries and

one least developed country.

For its part, ESMU has been concerned with the subject of

university-enterprise co-operation since the early 1990s. A number

of projects have been developed, particularly in Europe, to alert

universities of the need to work in partnership with the private

sector in order to respond better to the needs of society and to

improve the preparation of their students.

2. Underlying assumptions and objectives of the course

This distance education course, organized by IIEP and ESMU from

2 April to 5 July 2002, was intended to help senior managers and other

professionals involved in higher education to identify strategies for

the improvement of current management practices in the domain of


The course was based on the following basic assumptions:

• university-industry relations have great potential for improving

teaching, learning and research activities and may contribute to the

generation of extra-budgetary funds;

• it is necessary to develop a strategic vision and top management

commitment with regard to the objectives and domains to be

developed;

• university-industry relations need to be managed in a professional

manner through specialized structures and appropriate

procedures;

• for the creation of these structures and procedures, there exist a

number of options which have different implications – the options

may be appropriate in some contexts but inappropriate in others;


14

• it is important to be aware of these options and their implications

in order to make better choices for institutional policy and

development in university-industry partnerships and to avoid

possible unintended effects.

For IIEP and ESMU, the primary objective of the distance education

initiative was to devise a training approach that would enhance the

skills of the individual participants, but also maximize the impact on

the universities by building a broader management capacity through

the participation of a group of participants from each institution.

Distance education was chosen as a delivery method because it

offered several advantages – it allowed a number of persons from

each university to participate in the course without prohibitive cost,

and it allowed the participants to work in their own environment

with ready access to documents and information. Working together

as a group, participants in each university had an opportunity to

consider issues and undertake tasks related to their responsibilities,

but often outside the context of their actual day-to-day activities. They

had the opportunity to reflect and work on problems together while

being informed of international trends, common problems faced by

universities and some of the solutions devised. In addition to gaining

an international perspective, they were able to meet, in a virtual sense,

and exchange information with participants in other universities in

their own region.

The format of this course combined the advantages of a traditional

face-to-face workshop, that is, instruction and interaction with the

course team and among the participants themselves, with the

flexibility of time and place of independent study. During the course,

independent study was supported by group work at the institutional

level, with some interaction among the groups of participants in the

institutions. This structure was intended to allow the participants a

Introduction

15

certain amount of flexibility in determining their own study schedule

since they remained on the job in their universities throughout the

course. Each participant needed to plan and schedule his or her group

work so that it was convenient for all members of the group.

The IIEP/ESMU course team provided guidance through:

• the pacing of work based upon a clearly established calendar of

activities (see Appendix 2), and

• regular interaction and feedback on the assignments.

It may be noted here that the distance education approach has a

great potential for institution building. In most traditional workshop

settings there is normally one participant per institution, which limits

the impact of the training on the institution. However, the distance

education format facilitates the participation of a group of individuals

from the institution, giving them the opportunity to work together

in a structured learning environment and allowing them to benefit

from the experience as a group. The format of this course was thus

designed to promote effective institutional change.

3. Course design

The design of this course was based on a combination of the

following three learning techniques:

• independent study of materials and individual reflection on

questions and assignments;

• scheduled group sessions to discuss individual responses and to

prepare a group response;

• interaction with the IIEP/ESMU course team and with other

institutions (through an on-line discussion using e-mail, and access

to the submissions of these participating institutions).


16

The rationale for this format was to vary the activities over the

duration of the course. The training modules and supplementary

reading materials were intended to stimulate independent reflection.

They comprised elements of a conceptual and theoretical nature as

well as many practical case examples. In particular, case examples

were intended to outline available options with regard to crucial

management domains and they thus stimulated reflection among

professionals confronted with their own experience and particular

problems. Indeed, the participants brought their own experiences

and professional objectives to the course – they were asked to keep

these very much in mind as they worked independently and to share

them with others inside and outside their universities throughout

the course.

The group interaction at the institutional level was intended to

give the participants an opportunity to work with colleagues who

had the same institutional environment, although not the same

responsibilities. All the participants were facing similar challenges

in striving to make the management of university-industry

partnerships at their institutions as effective as possible. They shared

the same political and cultural environment. By learning of the

challenges and experiences of colleagues in other institutions, they

were able to evaluate the similarities and differences to their own

institutional experiences and thus determine which efforts or

strategies might be suitable to their situation.

4. Letter of invitation and institutional commitment

The first step was to send a letter of invitation to the Heads (Vice

Chancellors, Presidents, Rectors) of a number of selected universities

in Eastern Asia, inviting him or her to determine whether the course

would be of interest to the university and to complete an application

form if the university wished to apply.

Introduction

17

The involvement of the heads of the universities was seen as

essential if there was to be full institutional commitment to the

practice of developing partnerships with industry. Participants were

informed that there was institutional support at the most senior level.

5. Instructional approach

The course was based upon a set of five modules with the following

titles:

Module 1 – Strategic management

of university-industry partnerships.

Module 2 – Management of interfaces

for university-industry partnerships.

Module 3 – Financial management

of university-industry partnerships.

Module 4 – Staff management of university-industry partnerships.

Module 5 – Developing an action project

to strengthen relations with industry.

Some selected readings were also supplied together with a study

guide that had been developed for independent study or distance

learning.

The overall objectives of the set of modules was as follows:

• provide teams of managers in selected Eastern Asian universities

with concepts, tools and options to develop and sustain relations

with the productive sector in different domains (e.g. initial training,

continuous professional development, R&D, enterprise

development, etc.);


18

• inform participants about the implications underlying these

different options and stimulate reflection about their adaptation

to different institutional contexts;

• provide a range of specific examples of international experiences

concerning the management of university-industry partnerships;

• identify strategies for improved university-industry strategies in

the institution as a whole.

The tasks that participants were assigned varied from independent

study and ref lection to group discussion or activity and the

completion of assignments that were sent to the IIEP/ESMU team for

comment. In each module, individuals worked first by themselves to

read and study with a set of guidelines. This task was intended to

ensure that everyone came to the subsequent group meetings ready

to contribute to the discussion and the preparation of the required

group task. The format also served to vary the rhythm of the work

from week to week over the 3-month period of the course.

An effort was made to vary the nature of the tasks and to make the

interaction as active and interesting as the communication mode

allowed. The tasks were designed to be appropriate to the learning

intended from each of the five modules and included the preparation

of an institutional ‘vision statement’ for the development of

university-industry partnerships, responding to questions for

reflection, preparing a case study, and participating in an ‘on-line

discussion’.

6. Communications support

In designing the interactive aspect of the course, one of the factors

taken into consideration was that not all participants could be

expected to be frequent users of e-mail facilities and even less of

Web facilities. As a consequence, all interactions took place through

Introduction

19

e-mail messages to one IIEP/ESMU address. There were frequent short

messages sent to participants to provide continuous contact and

interaction with the IIEP/ESMU course team.

In addition, at the beginning of the course a special web site for

the course was established, access being restricted (by the issuance

of a password) to members of the course team and to the participants

in their universities. All the course materials and all the documents

produced for, and during, the course were placed on the Site. An

extensive documentation bank (over 160 items) on the topic of the

management of university-industry partnerships was thus built up

during the period of the course.

Well in advance of the formal start of the course, the

communication-related information submitted by each university was

reviewed for potential problems and the communication capability

tested through the sending of several messages. This step was

essential in order to identify any potential problems before the course

began to function so that participants would be unlikely to face any

aggravating communication problems that would disrupt their ease

in following the course. There is always the potential for disruption

of electronic support, but every effort was made to ensure that this

was minimized. Since e-mail interaction is so immediate, there can

be a high level of frustration when any communications are delayed.

7. The participants

A total of 15 of the invited universities submitted Application Forms

with details of their proposed participants – all were accepted for

the course. The universities were located in 8 countries: Cambodia,

China, Indonesia (2 universities), Republic of Korea, Malaysia

(3 universities), Philippines (4 universities), Thailand (2 universities)

and Viet Nam.


20

Each university had 3-6 participants who worked together as a

group, with one member being identified as Group Co-ordinator

(who was responsible for disseminating course information and

documentation, organizing group work, and being the principal

contact with the IIEP/ESMU course team). The participants

represented a range of functions in the universities – Rector, Deputy

Rector, Registrar, Deans and Vice-Deans of Faculties, Associate and

Assistant Professors, Heads of Departments, Directors of Institutes

and Centres, Lecturers, etc.

All of the 15 universities completed the course on schedule, the

total number of participants being 67. The full list of participants is

given in Appendix 1.

21

SECTION II. COURSE CONTENT AND ASSIGNMENTS

1. University profiles

Prior to the formal beginning of the course, an ‘Introductory

Phase’ was organized with the objective of ‘getting to know each

other’ – the IIEP/ESMU course team, the participants and their

universities. The task that was undertaken during this phase was the

preparation of a brief descriptive document on each university. This

document was intended to provide basic information about the

university and its university-industry partnerships to the IIEP/ESMU

course team and to the other participating universities.

An outline for the document was provided. The first part was to

be a general description of the university – its mission, its role in the

overall higher education system, student and staff numbers by

discipline or academic programme, the importance of research and

services (research budget, priorities, research centres), its governance

and organizational structure, and the university’s total budget.

The second part of the document was to be a description of any

recent developments in university-industry partnerships, such as

student placement schemes, continuous professional development,

consultancies or technical assistance, joint or commissioned R&D

projects, staff exchanges, small enterprise development, etc.

For the third part of the document, each university group was asked

to identify the most important problem(s) and obstacles in the

development of university-industry partnerships in their university.


22

Each university group submitted the required descriptive

document on their university during this introductory phase of the

course. The series of documents showed that the 15 participating

universities differed in many ways – for example, two thirds were

state universities and one-third private. The number of students

varied from under 5,000 (in two universities) to over 40,000 (in three

universities) with the budgets ranging from no specific budget (fully

dependent on what the ministries of education were able to pay each

year) to an annual budget for the university of US$ 200 million. Some

of the universities had only just begun to think about the possibility

of organizing university-industry partnerships whilst others already

had long experiences in such initiatives – in fact, one university had

a total of 450 research contracts with industry in 2001, the sum of the

contracts being about US$ 14.5 million. Between them, the universities

produced a long list of the most important problems and obstacles in

the development of university-industry partnerships.

2. Module 1 – The strategic management of university-industry partnerships

For the first ‘official’ week of the course, the participants were

asked to read, first, Module 1 and, second, the supplementary reading

material “In what way do the changing university-industry relations

affect the management of higher education institutions?”, by

Dr. Michael Shattock, the former Registrar of Warwick University – a

particularly active and successful British university in the area of


After their reading, the participants were asked to reflect on the

following three questions (first individually and then in their group):

Course content and assignments

23

1. The development of university-industry partnerships

What is (if already formalized, or otherwise what should be)the vision of your university for the development of university-industry partnerships? In other words, where does your universityintend to be (or where should it be) in 10 years’ time in the fieldof university-industry partnerships?

In order to reply to the above question, you should keep inmind the current challenges arising in your environment (e.g.budget cuts, governmental or supranational programmes for thestimulation of university-industry linkages, current status andexpected developments in the surrounding local and nationalindustry) as well as your university’s internal strengths andweaknesses (in terms of academic programmes, managementstructure, organizational culture, etc.).

You should ask yourself questions with respect to thegeographical outreach of university-industry linkages. Doesyour university want to be a predominantly regional player, anational player or an international player? Obviously, opting forregional, national or international roles needs to ref lect theinstitution’s current status and its strengths and weaknesses.

Are your partners (actual or potential) mainly in largeindustries or in small- and medium-sized enterprises?

Another set of questions relates to the type of linkages whichyou would want to foster. Do you have particular strengths in thedevelopment of initial training, continuous professionaldevelopment, consultancies, technology transfer, small enterprisedevelopment, etc.?

2. Obstacles

What obstacles do you anticipate in pursuing the objectivesoutlined in your vision above (for instance, lack of vision andpolitical support, lack of support structures, lack of incentivesystem, etc.)?


24

The participants were then asked to meet in a group session to

compare notes, discuss the individual answers, and organize the

preparation of a consolidated group answer (no longer than four

pages) on the above three questions. It was suggested that each group

may wish to nominate a member of the group as the group rapporteur

who would take notes on the discussion during the group session

and prepare, with the help of colleagues, the group statement. This

statement was to be e-mailed to the course team no later than the

Thursday of the following week.

Each group statement was commented upon by the course team

during ‘Week 3’ and a synthesis was prepared of all group submissions.

The group submissions, the comments and the synthesis were then

made available to all participants on the course web site.

A typical group submission (from the University of the Philippines

– Diliman) is reprinted below.

3. Overcoming the obstacles

How can you overcome these obstacles by designing anappropriate strategy and adequate structures/policies to support yourvision? One obstacle you might face is an adverse organizationalculture geared towards traditional academic values. Whatinstruments could be put in place to change the organizational climateof your university to become more ‘entrepreneurial’ and outwardlooking?


25

IIEP/ESMU Distance-Education Course

for Eastern Asian Universities on

‘The management of university-industry partnerships’

2 April – 5 July 2002

Assignment for Module 1

University of the Philippines (UP) – Diliman

Diliman, Quezon City, Philippines

Edward V. Deveza (Group Co-ordinator), Edison Cruz,

Maria Sagrario R. Simbulan and Reuben Campos

Section 1: The development

of university-industry partnerships

In its Five-year Plan, the UP Diliman Administration has stated that

UP must more aggressively aspire to become a first class university

committed to serve the interests of the Filipino but attuned to the realities

of a highly complex, technologically advanced and globally competitive

world. It is in this context that UP aspires to lead in the development of

university-industry partnerships in the Philippines in the near term and in

the ASEAN region in the long-term.

A. The university is faced with the following challenges:

• Limited government subsidy because there are other state universities

and colleges that also require budget allocations.

• Bureaucratic restrictions may impede the development of university-

industry partnerships.

• Inadequate infrastructure to support university-industry partnerships/

projects.


26

B. UP’s strengths:

• Faculty:

– Highly qualified, highly trained.

• Researchers:

– Highly qualified and produce world-class research outputs,

particularly in the sciences and engineering fields.

• Alumni:

– Willing and able to help the university in terms of providing funding

for grants, scholarships and training.

– Roster of alumni includes industrialists, businessmen, etc. who

would be interested in keeping their ties with the university alive.

– The alumni network gives the university a global network that it can

tap for support for its university-industry partnerships.

• Academic Programmes:

– Presence of strong academic programmes in science, technology,

and management.

• Reputation:

– UP is the Philippines’ premier academic institution. UP’s well-

deserved reputation for scholarship and for its pursuit of academic

excellence makes it the ideal partner in university-industry

partnerships.

– The R&D efforts of the university have generated output that has

great potential for commercialization. Commercialization will allow

the university to generate revenue to improve research and training

facilities and generate research funds to sustain the continuing

R&D efforts.

– Many companies are actively looking for partnerships with UP to

gain access to its pool of highly-trained researchers and faculty.

This would be a mutually beneficial relationship if the university

were able to harness these opportunities.


27

• Availability of land resources:

– This allows the university to host S&T parks, thus facilitating

collaboration between the government, the university and its

industry partners.

• Pioneer in S&T parks development:

– The university has a head start in establishing and developing S&T

parks in the Philippines.

• Location:

– Proximity to urban centres as well as industrial and business

districts facilitate interaction between the partners.

C. UP’s weaknesses:

• Compensation:

– Low salaries (mandated under the Salary Standardization Law)

make it difficult for the university to keep and motivate its faculty and

research staff. This allows other institutions to take advantage of

the situation, resulting in the loss of talent to other universities and

corporations.

• Inadequate research funds:

– R&D institutions within the university compete for the same slice

of the pie with other equally urgent projects (example: rehabilitation

of old buildings).

• Little or no merit associated with commercialization:

– The commercialization of research outputs is currently not considered

as a basis for career promotion. There is, therefore, little incentive

to engage in research activities leading to commercialization.

• Financial dependence:

– Dependence on government subsidy.

– Inadequate financial resources of the university.


28

D. Geographical outreach

Concerning the geographical outreach of the UP’s university-industry

linkages, given the existing constraints, the university sees itself as being

the premier academic institutional partner in university-industry

partnerships in the ASEAN region.

E. Actual and potential partners

UP sees its partners, both actual and potential, as coming mainly

from large industries as well as from small- and medium-sized enterprises

(SMEs). The university will therefore focus on partnerships with both large

industries and SMEs. The university-industry partnerships with large

industries will allow the university to offer basic research outputs for

further development and application within industry. The university also

gains access to private industry funds and facilities to further its basic

and applied research. University-industry partnerships with SMEs will

allow SMEs to gain access to basic research that they neither have the

time, nor the manpower, to generate themselves.

The university currently provides basic and professional development

training for both government and private institutions. Within certain limits,

faculty and researchers are allowed to go into consultancy arrangements

with private industry. UP is trying to establish the necessary mechanism

to formalize technology transfer. Lastly, the university has two institutions

that are engaged in small enterprise development activities: the Institute

of Small-Scale Industries (ISSI) and the UP-Ayala Technology Business

Incubator (TBI):

· ISSI focuses on training for SMEs in general management,

entrepreneurship and productivity development. They have also recently

developed new programmes in strategic business planning, designing


29

and implementing poverty-alleviation projects and business

communications training.

· TBI’s target clientele are prospective Filipino entrepreneurs intending to

establish businesses in the targeted technology areas (Information

Technology (IT), electronics and telecommunications, IT- related services,

manufacturing technologies like automation and robotics, medical

related technologies and innovative energy systems), and existing

New Technology-based firms (NTBFs) that have not yet fully attained

the commercialization stage.

Section 2: Obstacles

• Insufficient government support. UP has always needed more than

what the government provides it through the yearly General Appropriations

Act (GAA) or national budget covering all government entities. For

calendar year 2000, the Maintenance and Other Operating Expense

(MOOE) budget of the university was cut by the Senate from P.844.1

million in 1999 (equivalent at that time to US$ 21.8 million) to P 677.4

million in 2000 (equivalent to US$ 16.5 million) 16.5 million).

• Unattractive salary structure The university’s unattractive salary scale

makes it difficult for UP to retain its best and brightest faculty because

of offers of higher compensation from comparable universities. It

almost always results in the loss of faculty and researchers to other

academic and research institutions, and also to industry (salaries and

benefits, access to better facilities and funding).

• Weak university-industry linkage. In the past there has been a very

weak link between the university and industry. On the one hand the

university is focused mostly on basic research, unmindful of the

immediate application of their research while the industry sector are

more concerned on the immediate application of new knowledge – new

discoveries and inventions.


30

• No unit monitoring and implementing a technology transfer programme

from the university to the end users.

Section 3: Overcoming the obstacles

• The university should continue vigorous support of the operation of the

UP-Ayala Technology Business Incubator (TBI). At present, the

university has two science and technology parks – one in the south and

the other (at the planning stage) on the north side of the Diliman

Campus. UP-Ayala TBI is part of the already operational S&T Park

(South). The university should sustain its strong support of the

operation of the TBI since the latter’s success is needed to induce a

‘snowball’ effect that will hopefully generate interest among other

potential industrial partners and also among the university’s scientists

and engineers. On the one hand the operation of the TBI provides

several valuable benefits. Among these are:

– Provides an opportunity to collaborate in the commercialization of

technologies developed by the university.

– Generates revenue for both the researcher and the university.

– Contributes more prestige to the university.

On the other hand, industrial partners have access to technology via

the university’s researchers and engineers.

• Technology transfer and commercialization: The university should

vigorously ‘educate’ the faculty about the need to ‘commercialize’ the

technologies developed. There should be a continuing series of

symposia in which issues related to technology commercialization

and university-industry linkages are discussed. Among the topics

should be a discussion of best practices related to university-industry

partnerships. This information-dissemination is necessary to change

the thinking of some faculty members that their only concern is to


31

generate new knowledge (and publish the same) whilst leaving the

technology transfer aspect or commercialization to other organizations.

• Incentives: The university should provide merit points for promotion,

not only for teaching and research publications, but also for successful

university-industry collaboration. For example, a professor should be

promoted if he/she is part of a collaboration that results in a new

successful company.

• Technology Licensing Office (TLO): The university should also create

a TLO which can assist in bridging the gap between the knowledge

producers and industry. The TLO should also review pertinent rules and

regulations to ensure that the latter will facilitate university-industry

linkages.


32

The following comments were provided by the course team on

the submission from the University of the Philippines (UP) – Diliman.

Comments on the Group’s SubmissionComments on the Group’s SubmissionComments on the Group’s SubmissionComments on the Group’s SubmissionComments on the Group’s Submissionby Michaela Martin

IIEP/ESMU Distance-Education Coursefor Eastern Asian Universities on

‘The management of university-industry partnerships’2 April – 5 July 2002


University of the Philippines (UP) – DilimanUniversity of the Philippines (UP) – DilimanUniversity of the Philippines (UP) – DilimanUniversity of the Philippines (UP) – DilimanUniversity of the Philippines (UP) – DilimanDiliman, Quezon CityDiliman, Quezon CityDiliman, Quezon CityDiliman, Quezon CityDiliman, Quezon City, Philippines, Philippines, Philippines, Philippines, Philippines

1 .1 .1 .1 .1 . The vision statementThe vision statementThe vision statementThe vision statementThe vision statement

This is a well thought through contribution, which is admirablytempered with realism as to the university’s situation, whileencapsulating an ambitious vision for the development of university-industry linkages.

I note with interest that the university has already established ascience park, incubator facilities, and that it has mechanisms in placeto ensure that the income generation aspect of industrial collaborationis not counterproductive to the specific task of the university which isthe creation and generation of knowledge. By any means, youruniversity is at an advanced stage of university-industry linkages.

2 .2 .2 .2 .2 . Strengths and weaknessesStrengths and weaknessesStrengths and weaknessesStrengths and weaknessesStrengths and weaknesses

From your contribution, it is obvious that the university has inplace not only a set of policies designed both for academic success andindustrial interaction, but a range of activities that are well-placed to


33

deliver real outcomes. These are, in particular, the presence of strongacademic programmes in science, technology and management, a soundreputation as a leading national public university and a strong networkof alumni with leaders in the surrounding business community.

The weaknesses, as described in the SWOT analysis, are endemicin the sense that most public universities worldwide struggle with thesame features. Regarding your point about low salaries for academicstaff, it is somewhat easy to conclude that university-industry linkagesprecisely make it possible to supplement salaries through appropriateincentive structures. Nevertheless, given attractive outsideopportunities in terms of salaries and work environments, jointventures with the private sector do also enhance the risks of a braindrain. In many cases, the only solution is non-monetary incentivessuch as alleviation of workloads, access to equipment, sabbaticals anda part of the benefits generated through university-industrypartnerships.

3 .3 .3 .3 .3 . Overcoming the obstaclesOvercoming the obstaclesOvercoming the obstaclesOvercoming the obstaclesOvercoming the obstacles

It seems to me the first point is that one of the strategies youruniversity should be committed to is the development of anentrepreneurial culture. Such a culture tends to be generated byindividuals who break out of the usual rather bureaucratic culture,that pertains in universities and build operations with considerableinputs from external funding which challenge long-establisheduniversity rules and regulations. Universities need to cherish suchindividuals, not suppress them, and be prepared to take the long-termview about what their success may bring, even when they are oftenextremely difficult people to work with. Mixed funding – private andpublic – is the key to developing an entrepreneurial culture, but itneeds to be recognized that some parts of the university will never beentrepreneurial, nor probably should they be, e.g. the humanities.


34

Plans to maintain a competitive edge. No modern university cando this working with public funding alone, so considerable efforts needto be made to generate external funding and to devise systems withinthe university whereby external income is shared, in some way,between the institution and the research group which, or individualwho, has raised it. Academic and research groups respond to incentivesand, if successful, become role models for their colleagues. But for thisapproach to work satisfactorily institutions must develop flexibility inresponding to these kinds of challenges to the rules. This demandsadministrators who are themselves flexible, and supportive, ofmanoeuvring around the rules rather than upholding them rigidly.

A second point is that if the university is to work ‘in the market’ itneeds to have mechanisms to link it to the market. One good wayforward is an Industrial Forum (IF) where industrialists and seniorpeople from the financial world have regular meetings with universitypeople. Managed effectively, this can open up new lines ofcommunication which will stimulate projects and partnerships.

Establishing a centre to co-ordinate. While there is certainly a needto establish an operational focal point, in particular in such a biguniversity as yours with multiple initiatives in the area of university-industry linkages, I am more wary of a centre which has a ‘co-ordinating’role, except in a notional sense. The academic entrepreneur in myexperience does not take kindly to co-ordination, and there is also thedanger that if a centre is established the rest of the university will tendto leave the task of relating to industry to the centre, rather thandoing it itself.

Continuous professional training. There is not much mention ofthis in your submission, which is much more geared to collaborationin the research domain. This needs to be a priority, I am sure. It needsto be remembered that this can also generate significant funding if


35

you get the changing policies right. But to get most value you need tohave appropriately designed premises and facilities so that companyexecutives feel that their fees are being well spent. Increasingly,business schools and engineering departments are finding it possibleto link a series of one-week programmes with a dissertation to createa Master’s degree. By involving industry itself in the teaching, thetraining programmes serve to bridge the gap between a university’sacademic teaching and the application side.

Developing support structures for technology transfer andcommercialization of research. I think you are absolutely right inpointing to the importance to put in place an adequate support structuresuch as an Industrial Office (IO) / Technology Transfer Office (TTO)/R&D Office which will:

i. provide a point of contact for local and regional industry;ii. market the university’s expertise;iii. provide support, including negotiating and financial expertise to the

academic community where industrial links have been, or are aboutto be, established;

iv. provide expertise on intellectual property issues.

It will be important, however, that such an Office does not operatein a manner that puts bureaucratic obstacles in the way of thoseprofessors already engaged in industrial work. Many projectsundertaken are ‘one off ’. This is not surprising, but you might findthat partnership would be assisted by establishing a programme ofshort executive updating courses tailored to particular companies orindustries. This would have the effect of building relationships as wellas contributing to what is called nowadays ‘the learning region’.


36

The following is the synthesis prepared by the course team of all

the submissions on the Assignment for Module 1.

Assignment for Module 1:

synthesis of submissions

by Michaela Martin


for Eastern Asian Universities on The management




1. A total of 13 out of the 15 universities participating in the distance

education course were able to contribute to the Assignment for

Module 1 by the time this synthesis was prepared. Their task

consisted of preparing the major lines of a vision statement for the

development of university-industry partnerships within their

universities. It was to be based on an identification of internal

strengths and weaknesses, opportunities and threats from the

environment, as well as an anticipation of obstacles and resistance

that may constrain the implementation of the university vision.

Institutions needed to reflect in particular on the types of enterprises

to serve (‘local’, ‘national’ or ‘international’; and ‘big’, ‘medium’ or

‘small’), the types of services they wish to develop, as well as the

type of support structures they need to put in place to implement the

vision.

2. A majority of universities indicated that they have been involved in

strategic planning for their overall institutional development, but in

most cases the development of university-industry partnerships is

not an explicit element of the strategy. This is rather common in

universities where university-industry partnerships are mostly driven


37

forward by particularly committed academic staff. Income generation is

in many cases a supplementary and implicit aim of university-industry

linkages, especially in a context where universities feel that they are hit

by the East Asian economic crisis.

3. As part of this commitment to the local community, most universities

emphasize their current strategy or intention to strengthen locally

relevant applied research as one line of developing university-

industry partnerships. Some universities are already quite research

intensive while others feel that they would want to strengthen their

research orientation. In many cases, universities have created

separate research entities, such as centres or laboratories with a

distinctive research profile and which collaborate closely with local

enterprises. Such research centres, in addition to the existing

departmental structure, seem to provide more than what a regular

university department would do – a more focused point for both the

entry of external partners and their research agenda.

4. The economic environment of institutions is however quite diverse,

depending on the economic development of the country but also on

the specific location of a university within a country. It is quite clear

that universities in higher income countries have a broader range of

opportunities than those in lower income countries. Those universities

that are located in a metropolitan area mention that they have access

to large public or private enterprises. Some of them even benefit from

an economic environment built up of a critical mass of high tech

enterprises, which allows them to engage in manifold collaboration

with them. The majority of participating universities, however, are

located in an economic environment made up of a majority of small-

and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), whose technology needs are

in general ill-defined and of a relatively simple nature. They are most

commonly in need of consultancy services to identify technological

needs and to upgrade existing production or operating structures. In


38

the context of low economic development, SMEs are in dire need of

support in both technology and management, but they do not have

the funds to pay for services which could be provided by industry. In

such a situation, there is need for external funding support.

5. Continuous professional development which is particularly geared to

the needs of SMEs is another line of action that participating

universities envisage in their vision statements or that they are

already committed to. In this domain, universities have generally a

great advantage over other providers, even if the market has recently

become tighter, both in western industrialized and in developing

countries. Those institutions that have a specific commitment to

community development have become particularly active in this

domain. They already focus most commonly on short courses in

information and communication technology, business administration

and languages. These universities have usually already become

quite active in developing interface structures whose function it is to

market and provide support services.

6. In their vision statements, participating universities tend to emphasize

their role in local regional development, often for the benefit of SMEs.

However, most universities stipulate that they also intend to become

players at the national or even international level. Indeed, both

intentions do not need to be incompatible or contradictory. In many

cases, universities may strive for excellence in specific applied

areas in which their collaboration with leading local industry represents

some type of ‘strategic alliances’. However, universities must clearly

define their areas of strengths and seek active partnerships, not only

with local industry, but also through international networking.

7. Most of the universities present, in their submissions, an analysis of

existing strengths and weaknesses. Some emphasize their research

potential in applied or pre-competitive research; others deplore their


39

lack of resources and equipment or the fact that they, as private

universities, do not have access to public research funds.

8. Many universities identify a lack of specific policy in the domain of

university-industry partnerships and stipulate that university-industry

partnerships in many cases remain informal, and only the affair of

individual dynamic staff. Other universities have developed a clear

policy which is backed up by leadership, but they lack adequate

support structures such as special administrative entities (e.g.

Industrial Liaison Offices (ILO), Offices for Continuing Education

(OCE), etc.) or structures to stimulate collaborative research (e.g.

Incubators Structures (IS) and Science Parks (SP), etc.). Policy,

leadership commitment and support structures are all very important,

but it was pointed out, through the comments, that it is support

provided by university management to particularly dynamic and

successful staff that can make university-industry partnerships

visible internally and provide role models for others.

9. Some contributions expose a very high level of interface development

for university-industry partnerships. In addition to the above-mentioned

Research Centres, such interfaces tend increasingly to be of an

external nature, such as wholly-owned subsidiaries for the commercial

exploitation of R&D, Consultancy Centres and Centres for the

organization of continuous professional development. Once there is

an institutional commitment for the development of such linkages

and an income generation objective, marketing becomes an important

ingredient. The establishment of databases (often outdated by the

time they are created) is less important than the building up of

contacts and the broad dissemination of information on available

services and products to surrounding industry. This can be done

through the regular organization of industrial forums, or affiliation

programmes that regularly invite potential industrial partners to the

university and allow them to meet with leading academics. One of the


40

most promising strategies in marketing is to build on already existing

contacts between leading academics and industrials.

10. Interface and support structures particularly geared to enterprise

development – either existing SMEs or university high tech spin-offs

– are very high on the political agenda of those universities that have

a clear commitment to the development of university-enterprise

partnerships. The existence of Incubator Structures, Innovation

Centres or Science Parks is mentioned in several contributions. For

such initiatives, the universities should seek active partnership with

local authorities that generally have considerable interest in such

structures, because they are expected to speed up local economic

development and contribute to employment creation. Universities

should, however, bear in mind that the commercialization of R&D

results – through the creation of spin-offs or licensing – is a new

business which needs considerable new and highly-specialized

competencies, and which is often only profitable in the long run. In

many cases, venture capital needs to be made available, and the

non-existence either from government or the private sector, was felt

to severely hamper the commercialization efforts of R&D.

11. Expected obstacles for the development of university-industry

partnerships are both of an internal and external nature. In many

cases, with few exceptions, university-industry collaboration implies

a change in organizational culture. Often, neither the academics

within the university, nor the local industrial community, are convinced

that university-industry linkages are a worthwhile new mission for the

university. On the one hand lack of financial and material incentives,

a promotion system totally geared to publications and an academic

culture which values what is theoretical, rather than what is applied,

does not naturally push academics towards outside linkages. On the

other hand, a weak academic image of the university, lack of R&D

capacity and lack of tradition all have the effect of deterring industry.


41

12. Over and above identifying these obstacles, most of which are

systemic, many of the contributions have also tried to identify

strategies in which such systemic obstacles can be overcome. The

first line of action for a strategy geared towards the development of

university-industry partnerships to be successful, it is important to

identify and publicly reward those teams that are already successfully

operating. It is also important to establish which research and training

areas should be built and developed, relating particularly to local

industry. The development of a strategy in the domain of university-

industry linkages should thus depart from an analysis of substance,

i.e. strengths and weaknesses in the academic provision. A second

line of action is the development of adequate support structures,

equipping them with competent professionals, often those staff with

a knowledge of industry. A third line is the initiation of an entrepreneurial

climate. Appropriate incentive and reward systems are crucial. One

university mentioned that the promotion system of their school

included an academic track (built on performance in teaching and

research) as well as a professional track (built on performance in

consultancy and teaching).

13. Two general points need emphasis, however. The first point is that

universities need to recognize the political benefits of being seen to

be at the heart of the economic regeneration process in local

(sometimes impoverished) areas. Many universities now regarded

as world class institutions – such as the Land Grant Universities

(LGU), USA – took that as their mission and have benefited

enormously from so doing. Universities need to recognize that this

has become very much part of the university’s agenda in some

western countries, and that it has opened up increased funding from

banks, development agencies and even governments. The second

point is that collaboration with industry has to accept that industrial

timescales and modes of working are different. The best strategy is


42

to support vigorously those entrepreneurial faculty members who can

adjust to this and who flourish in this environment, rather than design

a strategy which assumes that every faculty member can do this.

The less bureaucratic a university’s approach, the more industry will

find the institution easy to work with.

3. Module 2 – The management of interfacesfor university-industry partnerships

In ‘Week 3’ of the course, participants were requested to turn

their attention to Module 2 – a module dealing with different models

of interfaces for collaboration with industry.

Part I of the module discussed the rationale for setting up

interfaces and presented three ideal-types. Part II set out different

options regarding functions and organizational structuring., and

Part III presented some options with regard to their governance and

control.

The readings on Module 2 also comprised supplementary material

by Mr. Moshe Vigdor, Director-General of the Hebrew University of

Jerusalem (HUJ), on YISSUM – the interface for the management of

university-industry partnerships. It was explained that YISSUM, as a

wholly-owned subsidiary, represented one interesting model in this

respect.

The participants were informed that the following two questions

should be used to prepare their submissions on the Assignment for

Module 2:


43

Question 1: Please describe the different interfaces whichyour university has developed for the management of relationswith industry. Are they internal or external? What are theirfunctions? What are their organizational and governancestructures? Are they located at the central university level or atthe level of sub-units? If they are external, how are they controlledby the university? Do they play a role in the protection ofmainstream activities?

Question 2: From the case examples presented in Module 2

(in Parts II and III) and the supplementary reading material, whichcase examples could inspire the development of your owninterface(s) in terms of functions, organizational structures,governance and control? In other words, in what directions shouldyour interface(s) evolve in order to fit better the vision for thedevelopment of university-industry partnerships described inyour submission on the Assignment for Module 1?

The participants were told that they did not need to address all

the items mentioned above and to feel free to emphasize those

aspects they thought to be the most relevant issues for the

development of university-industry partnerships. Each group

submission should not be more than four pages.

A typical group submission, from Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM),

is reprinted on the following pages.


44






Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM)

Penang, Malaysia

Wan Ahmad Kamil Mahmood, (Group Co-ordinator),

Mohamad Abdul Rahman

Morshidi Sirat, Ahmad Haji Mohamed and Yuserrie Zainuddin

The management of interfaces for university-industry

partnerships

Section 1: USM’s interfaces for the management

of relations with industry

A. Introduction

The need to have an efficient link or interface to handle university-

industry relations has become a foregone conclusion for a university that

conducts research activities. As such, USM-industry relationships have

existed for a long time. Being a science-based university, inevitably there

has been a constant albeit slow demand for a structured mechanism to

deal with the relationships formed between the university staff and

industry. The demand however has increased substantially within the

last 10 - 15 years due to the increase in research activity in the University,

particularly concerning applied research.

With the Government’s ‘corporatization’ of all public universities in

1998, funding in the form of subsidy and grants from Government sources

is being decreased over time (eventually the subsidy is going to be reduced


45

to 70 per cent) and inevitably a reduction of research funding will follow

suit. Hence universities are now forced to look for non-traditional sources

for funding to offset those reductions in subsidies. Industries and the

private sector are the logical targets. With that scenario, the need for a

very well-structured and efficient interface between the university and the

private sector, is critical to ensure that the effort to secure more funding

from the private sector can be maximized.

B. USM’s approach

Relationships between the university and industry were initially co-

ordinated by the Industrial Research and Consultancy Unit (IRCU). Later

on, IRCU was revamped to become the Innovations and Consultancy

Centre (ICC), an internal unit of the University (1981-99). Its management,

more structured and streamlined, is headed by a Director who reports

directly to the Chief Executive of the University (the Vice Chancellor).

The objectives of the ICC are as follows:

• to provide a formal channel through which the intellectual and physical

resources of the university can be applied to assist in the solution of

problems in industry, commerce, government and the community in

general;

• to act as the interface in developing contacts and entering into contract

research between the university and industry and governmental

agencies, as well as other interested parties;

• to undertake joint research with the industrial and commercial sectors

and with government agencies;

• to provide industry and individuals with access to the university’s

physical facilities, and expertise, to assist in the establishment of their

own research and development groups;


46

• to encourage the commercialization of R&D undertaken by the staff

and students of the university by providing the necessary infrastructure

and environment;

• to provide opportunities for other individuals with innovative ideas to

develop their products for commercialization;

• to promote the growth of small- and medium-sized industries as one

aspect of the university’s contribution to society;

• to promote research and development of technology for the benefit of

the state and country.

Over the years and particularly with the impending ‘corporatization’ of

USM, the role of ICC became increasingly important and the demand for

a dedicated unit to handle university-industry relations, particularly dealing

with commercial activities, became inevitable. Accordingly, the Education

Act was amended to provide a proviso that Public Higher Institutions

(PHIs) such as universities can form wholly-owned companies to carry

out commercial activities based on their core-competencies. The amended

Act specifically stipulates that the commercial arm should focus primarily

on the utilization of the PHI excess capacity, both physical and human

resources, and uses this opportunity to strengthen its core business of

teaching and research. The commercial arm of the university should also

play a pivotal role in the commercialization of its R&D findings.

In 1999, USAINS Holding Pte Ltd, a wholly-owned company of the

university was formed. The primary role of USAINS is to seek financial

resources from the private sector for the university by embarking into

areas such as partnerships, joint ventures, licensing agreements, product

commercializations, training and development, contract research,

franchising of programmes, etc. Many of the roles previously carried out

by the ICC were transferred to USAINS Holding. A few more functions

were added or expanded, for example, the building of a dedicated office

space cum incubation centre, the creation of specialized full-time


47

management posts to address the specific needs of university-industry

relations and the incorporation of a more streamlined structure of the

company to ensure an efficient service to all of the parties involved.

The structure of the company formed is similar to that of a holding

company with two subsidiaries under it, as illustrated in the following

figure:

USAINS Holding SDN, BHD.

USAINS Technical Services SDN, BHD.

USAINS Technical CapitalSDN, BHD.


48

The management structure of USAINS Holding is given below:

Notes:1. The members of the Board of Directors of USAINS Holding are: (i) the Chairman (appointed by

the University Board of Directors); (ii) two members from USM; (iii) the Deputy Vice Chancellorof R&D; and (iv) the Managing Director of USAINS.

2. The Legal and Company Secretary is a requirement of the Government (Registrar ofCompanies). Every company is required to have a person handling/overseeing the legal, andbureaucratic matters, on behalf of the company, even on a part-time basis.

The creation of Incubation Centres on the university’s main campus

is seen as an excellent innovation to further extend the co-operation

between USM researchers and those in industry. Normally, industries

are only interested in finished products, or at least prototypes, that are

nearly ready for marketing. With the introduction of the Incubation

Centres, however, the industry is involved in nurturing the products from

a very early stage, thereby increasing its commitment to that particular

venture.

In addition to USAINS Holding, two specialized internal units are also

operating at the regional campuses (the Health Sciences and Engineering

Campuses). Those units cater for the highly specialized needs of their

University Boardof Directors

Boardof Directors

ManagingDirector

FinanceAdministration

OperationBusiness

Development and Marketing

Legal andCompanySecretary


49

respective campuses. The two units are the Engineering Innovation and

Technology Development Unit (EITD) and the Medical Innovation and

Technology Development Centre (MITD).

USM has never used the services of outside agents directly to market

its products.

Section 2: The future

As USAINS Holding is still relatively new to the university, it is

anticipated that the ‘set-up’ is going to be retained for at least a few

years. More importantly, the setting up of USAINS Holding was the

culmination of an intense research and thought process to find the best

system to suit USM. It is working well, so far, and indications are that

the set-up should be able to manage USM-industry relations in the years

to come.


50


the submission from University Sains Malaysia (USM).

Comments on the Group’s SubmissionComments on the Group’s SubmissionComments on the Group’s SubmissionComments on the Group’s SubmissionComments on the Group’s Submissionby Moshe Vigdor




Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM)Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM)Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM)Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM)Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM)Penang, MalaysiaPenang, MalaysiaPenang, MalaysiaPenang, MalaysiaPenang, Malaysia

Your university has taken major steps in order to build a viablesystem for university-industry relations. It is extremely interestingto follow all the stages since the formation of IRCU and thereafter ICCand finally, for the moment, USAINS Holding Pte Ltd., a wholly-ownedcompany of the Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM).

The process described is even more interesting when analyzing itwith the legislative changes made by the Government. The creation ofIncubation Centres on the University’s main campus is also a veryinteresting and encouraging step.

However, it is to be noted that regulation is of crucial importance toprevent conflict of interest in such a rapid development (relative to theslow motion of conservative universities).

The work of industries within the university campuses creates avery solid base for co-operation, but if not handled properly to avoidconflicts of interest of researchers, may become counter-productive.

It is much more important in such close positive relations to haveclear definitions of ownership of intellectual property. It is important


51

to file patents and to ensure that know-how is being transferred inaccordance with regulations and agreements. It is also important toenable the university’s researchers to publish their research findingswithin a reasonable delay – not to block such publication as the soul ofacademic research is in publications.

On the one hand, incentives by the university to researchers mightbring more researchers to co-operate with industry while, on the otherhand, they will also keep their interest within the university becausethe incentives are given by the university.

I think that it is important also to define the sharing out of royaltiesbetween the researcher and the university in the event of commercialsuccess.

It is also beneficial to provide incentives to the employees of USAINSHolding in order to encourage them to be more efficient and moretargeted.

Another issue which I would like to raise as a consideration by auniversity (such as USM) which deeply understands the need forefficient links and an interface to handle university-industry relations,is the issue of students. It is a very delicate matter to involve universitystudents in work for industry – students normally enrol in a universityto acquire a degree and to be trained and equipped for their professionallives. However, there are cases where they will find themselves workingwith a researcher on industrial development. As the publications bystudents for advanced degrees cannot be withheld, conflict might ariseon this issue with the industrial party.

If the student becomes an inventor, a series of difficulties mightarise. I recommend that this issue be looked into. I feel that USM is atan appropriate stage to seek venture capital to be managed in co-operation with USAINS Holding to provide seed money for newdevelopment.


52

It is of major importance in order to ensure continuous basic researchwhich is the basis for any good applied research. Having seed moneyfor very early research stages will encourage researchers to start theirbasic research knowing that even in basic research, some universityseed money will be available to bring their research results to a moreadvanced stage whereby industry will show interest in them.


53


the submissions for the Assignment for Module 2.



by Michaela Martin


for Eastern Asian Universities

on The management of university-industry partnerships



1. All 15 participating universities in this distance education course

made a submission on the Assignment for Module 2 The task was

to prepare a short account of the characteristics of available

interfaces in the participating universities in comparison with those

described in Module 2, and to reflect on a desirable evolution of

existing interfaces so that the interface structure corresponds to the

implementation of the vision that had been presented under the

Assignment for Module 1.

2. Interface development represents a wide array of organizational

developments in the participating universities. A small number of

institutions (mainly located in low income countries) mentioned that

university-industry linkages still depend widely on individual initiatives

of particularly dynamic academics. As a consequence, there is no

framework of rules and regulations which guides university-industry

relations and no specific structure to support such initiatives.

Several universities of this category envisage the creation of an

internal interface, such as a Licence Office (LO), in order to initiate

and sustain a university-wide culture of university-industry relations.


54

At more advanced stages they see a development towards a wholly-

owned subsidiary.

3. A number of universities have created a series of so-called centres,

the focus being on substance while providing an entry point for

industrial or business partners. The most common are research

structures affiliated to academic units and their task is to implement

specific research projects, some of which are funded or co-funded by

industrial partners. Such Research Centres provide a good focal

point for industrial partners because the centres usually benefit from

a higher visibility than other academic units (such as departments).

Also, since they are directly controlled by the academic units, they

create a high sense of ownership and motivation among academics.

However, it is advisable to co-ordinate the activities of such Centres

by a central authority in order to establish common guidelines and a

university-wide framework of action with regard to a number of policy

issues (for instance, intellectual property rights and outside

consultancies).

4. Most universities of the Group, however, have developed a more

diverse set of interfaces, not only substantive ones as the above-

mentioned Research Centres, but also support structures for

consultancies, continuous professional development, and interfaces

– such as a License Office (LO) – which are developed to foster

technology transfer and the commercialization of R&D results. It

seems that those structures have been developed in some kind of

organic fashion, i.e. as needs arose, but that they do not correspond

to a planned evolution or the implementation of a vision in the domain

of university-industry linkages. Here again, it is important that some

co-ordination is developed, with a view to keeping overheads low and

defining a common framework of interaction.


55

5. Many of the participating institutions mention that they have put in

place one or more central interface. There is in general a high level

of centralization in the management of university-industry linkages,

both in terms of co-ordination of university-industry linkages at the

institutional level, but also in terms of a clear preference for internal

interfaces (probably because of easier control by university authorities).

The wholly-owned subsidiary, which has been created initially to

provide support services to the collaborating research units across

the university, seems to be the model for future development in many

cases. Even those institutions which only embark on university-

industry partnerships as a development objective see it as a

desirable model for the future, provided that it is in a context of strong

economic development.

6. The development of external interfaces seems to be driven primarily

by privatization processes as is the case in Indonesia and Malaysia,

where government funding is expected to decline and where

universities are pushed to generate more and more resources from

the business sector. As a consequence, more administrative autonomy

is granted to the universities, which are then obliged to operate much

closer to the market. This in turn results in universities tending to

create external interfaces (such as holding companies) to offer their

services as private business units. Universities also seem to prefer

such external interfaces because they provide the possibility to offer

specific services and products while widely preserving the traditional

functioning of the university.

7. Interfaces are developed to correspond to specific functions. These

functions evolve over time. Several universities mention that their

interface will increasingly be involved in enterprise development and

in particular in the creation of spin-offs and start-ups. This is

becoming an important avenue of income generation, but also a

means to maintain staff and students within the university who would


56

otherwise leave. However, strong involvement in spin-offs creates

unknown levels of conflict of interest, since staff may become

heavily involved and committed to them. As a consequence, the

rules and regulations for university-industry relations will have to be

revised in this new context to fit in with upcoming challenges.

8. One university has mentioned that they have already set up a fully-

fledged Science Park; others are considering doing so. Such Science

Parks, especially in the USA and in Western Europe, have been

created from the early 1980s onwards. Some have become very

famous such as the Silicon Valley in the USA. In general, they did

provide relatively cheap land and office space to companies.

Universities and local authorities were hoping that they would

naturally attract the right type of high-tech industry, willing to engage

in collaborative ventures with the university. This hope has in many

cases proved unsuccessful, since cheap office space did attract all

kinds of tenants and not necessarily those which had a potential for

collaboration.

9. The more promising approach is the one which limits access to the

Science Park to seed-stage high-tech companies which have either

emerged from the university or which have the potential for fruitful

collaboration in a specific area, such as Information Technology.

This allows the possibility to maintain academic entrepreneurs close

to their university laboratories and teaching halls while avoiding start-

up companies to develop within university laboratories, thus benefiting

from the university infrastructure without clearly established rules.

Also, such a Science Park obviously supports still fragile seed-stage

companies, which would have more difficulty to survive in the first

years of their development.

10. However, it should be borne in mind that enterprise development

through the creation of ‘start-ups’ or ‘spin-offs’ involves more than

making subsidized space available to them. For this reason many


57

universities prefer to set up incubators or technology centres which

provide space and office equipment as well as expert management

support for the administrative and financial planning of such

enterprises. The other very important aspect is the availability of

venture capital, either through the existence of a university fund,

governmental seed funding or from venture capitalists. In many

universities, interfaces fulfil a brokerage function and mediate

between venture capitalists and the academic entrepreneur.

11. The diversity of the interfaces described by the universities participating

in this course points to the diversity of what can be covered by so-

called university-industry partnerships. Many options are, however,

also based in cultural habits. The level of centralization and control

over interfaces is certainly a striking example in this respect. Within

the context of privatization of many aspects of higher education and

the growing need to manage conflicts of interest arising from this

situation, interfaces can be expected to gain more administrative

autonomy. They will, however, also be confronted with tighter

frameworks for accountability arising from the university authorities

or from the public at large.

4. Module 3 – The financial managementof university-industry partnerships

Module 3 of the course was on the financial management for

university-industry partnerships. Part I of the module described the

context of the financial management of university-industry

partnerships. Part II discussed the marketing and income-generation

functions of university-industry partnerships. Part III set out

different approaches to the costing and pricing of services and made

special reference to the difficulties in calculating appropriate

overhead provisions. Part IV introduced the participants to various

ways of distributing generated income from continuing education


58

programmes, patents, royalties, overheads and surpluses. Finally, Part

V presented a number of means of providing risk and venture capital

for university-industry partnerships.

The participants were asked to first read the module on their own

(during ‘Week 5’ of the course). They were then to prepare a group

response (a ‘mini case study’), structured on the two questions below

and to send it to the course team towards the end of ‘Week 6’. Finally,

during ‘Weeks 7 and 8’ the participants were to participate in an ‘on-

line discussion via e-mail’ on the group responses (mini case studies)

with questions being put directly to the authors.

The ‘on-line discussion via e-mail’ was intended to give the

participants an opportunity to ask questions, share experiences and

engage in a discussion with colleagues on selected issues with other

participants in the course from other universities, as they would in a

face-to-face workshop setting. Although the interaction was clearly

not as direct, it was pointed out that it could be even more effective

as the participants were given the opportunity to reflect upon the

input of other participants and to ask for clarifications or make

comments.

The two questions to be used to prepare the mini case study were

as follows:


59

The groups of participants were told that they did not need to

address all of the items mentioned above, or they might want to stress

other aspects. It was important for them to feel free to emphasize

what they thought were the most relevant issues in the area of

financial management of university-industry partnerships, keeping

Question 1: Please describe one particular type of university-industry partnership conducted at your university (such ascontract research, consultancies, continuous professionaldevelopment) which has proved to be successful financially. Youmay also choose an unsuccessful case and share your experienceon how to avoid problems. Describe in particular the followingaspects:

• The process of developing this type of partnership/project(from its creation to its present stage).

• Its management structure (i.e. Academic Department, CentralAdministration, internal interface such as a DevelopmentOffice, or an external interface such as a Foundation, etc.).

• The amount of generated income from this activity (forcomparative purposes, kindly indicate also the value in USdollars). Please compare this amount with (i) the total incomegenerated by the university, and (ii) the total budget of theuniversity (including government grant, student fees, etc.).

• The basis for determining the price of your product/service(continuing professional development programme, a researchproduct, a specific service, a commercial venture, etc.).

• The distribution of the surplus created by this activity to theindividual or the team, the Department, and the university.

• The use that is made of the generated income.

Question 2: What problems did you encounter in the financialmanagement of this type of linkage and how were they overcome?What advice can you give to your professional colleagues for thesuccessful financial management of a similar type of partnership/project, i.e. what do you consider as a success factor?


60

in mind that their case study would be shared with participants in

the course from other universities. The groups were urged to provide

enough information so that other participants could understand their

situation and assess it from their own perspectives. Each ‘mini case

study’ contribution should be around four pages.

A typical group submission (from the Ateneo de Manila University

(AMU), Philippines) is reprinted below.


61






Ateneo de Manila University (AMU)

Manila, Philippines

Angelina T. Conel (Group Co-ordinator), Alberto L. Buenviaje, Venus C.

Ibarra,

Temay G. Padero and Josefina Anna Musa-Rodriguez

An example of the financial management


The Centre for Continuing Education

Section 1: Response to Question 1

A. Background

In 1993, the Ateneo Graduate School of Business (AGSB) addressed

one of the crucial issues of the School – that of growth opportunities.

The parameters within which the non-degree programmes would be

developed and conducted had to be defined more clearly. Thus, a review

of the performance of the then Business Leadership Programme led to

the creation of the Centre for Continuing Education. The Centre became

a division of the AGSB whose role is to fulfil the mission and vision of the

Ateneo de Manila University (AMU) in the fields of business and

management for both public and private sectors.


62

B. What the CCE offers

The thrust of the Centre’s client development focused on four fronts:

the energy sector, pharmaceutical firms and medical practitioners,

manufacturers and retailers, and the insurance companies. It offers two

types of training programmes, namely in-house or customized

programmes and public offerings. Its programme offerings on Leadership

and Management Development (LMD) have gained a good reputation

and have been conducted in customized form to both private and

government sectors. The Centre soon became the AGSB’s operational

vehicle in the area of adult education.

Currently, the CCE offers non-degree programmes that are shorter

than the AGSB programmes but which mirror the latter’s breath and

depth. The Centre combines the elements of the degree programmes

with flexibility to tailor-fit courses to the specific content and time needs

of client organizations. In this way, the CCE is the AGSB’s link to the

world of both industry and government by offering courses that are related

to specific institutional issues.

CCE courses award MBA credits, which can lead to a Master’s degree

and serve as an entry point to the graduate programmes. At the same

time, CCE offers executive development programmes to those who already

have MBAs.


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C. Management structure

Shown below is the organization chart of AGSB and CCE:

D. Financial results of operations

Table 1 below shows the growth of gross income, expenses and net

income of the CCE for the last five financial years (in US dollars):

Dean

AcademicProgrammes

Faculty Support Services Staff

RegistrarAdministrative

Services

Centre forContinuingEducation

Ateneo Graduate School of Business (AGSB)

Director

Project Initiators(programme,

conceptdevelopment)

CustomerCare

ProjectImplementers

(Training Director,research & technical

consultants

Technical SupportServices

(training courses,seminars)

Administrative(finance,

physical plant)

Centre for Continuing Education (CCE)


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Table 1. CCE: Growth of gross income, expenses and netincome, last five financial years (in US dollars)

1997-1998 1998-1999 1999-2000 2000-2001 2001-2002

Gross Income 410,600 397,394 487,000 635,336 590,972

Expenses 289,010 366,600 442,040 596,147 565,874

Net Income 121,590 30,794 44,960 39,189 25,098

% of Net to Gross 30% 8% 9% 6% 4%Income

CCE Budgeted 360,148 464,100 534,768 576,800 580,160Gross Income

AGSB Gross Income 1,653,100 2,151,000 2,796,100 3,620,400 3,718,000

E. Price determination

In setting the prices of its programme offerings, CCE uses the costing

approach, which takes into account the following:

1. Desired price per participant

a. Identify the parameters of the seminar, e.g. number of days the

programme will run, the number of expected participants.

b. Compute for the total cost of the seminar. This is arrived at by getting

the sum of all variable or incidental costs and then adding a targeted

overhead recovery of P.10,000 per day.

Desired Price/Participant = Total Cost/ No. of Expected Participants

2. Comparison with two benchmarks

a. Pre-set price based on a standard 4-hour or 8-hour seminar.

b. Prevailing market prices of similar seminars offered by other reputable

institutions.


65

The desired price per participant is adjusted to make it more attractive

to the target market, i.e. a subsidized rate for government/people’s

organization, or a higher rate for corporate clients.

F. Distribution of surplus

The annual budget of the Graduate School of Business (GBS) covers

all its programmes and projects in the school including the Centre for

Continuing Education (CEC). Whatever surplus is realized by the Centre

forms part of the revenue of the AGSB.

At the end of the fiscal year, the university practices a ‘sharing policy’

on surpluses generated by school units wherein 70 per cent is retained

by the unit, and 30 per cent goes to the General Fund of the university.

The 70 per cent retained surplus may be used by AGSB for the

development of new academic programmes, improvement of facilities,

and the financing of special projects (subject to the approval of the

university’s VP for Finance and Treasurer).

Section 2: Response to Question 2

A. Problems encountered with the financial management of

CCE

1. Conflict between the structured financial management system of the

university and the entrepreneurial approach to financial management

of a unit, like CCE, that is expected to earn a surplus. This has resulted

in some misunderstanding in the treatment of revenues and expenses.

2. Big variance between budget and actual performance. Projected

revenues were usually not realized while budgeted expenses were

overshot.


66

3. Reported income and expenses at the start did not reflect the true

financial picture of its financial operations. For example, these were

expenses charged to a ‘restricted’ fund other than the approved budget

for the Centre. This has led to an inadvertent overstatement of the

surplus.

4. As a consequence of No. 3 above, control over operations during its

initial stages was weak.

5. Resistance by CCE to the share imposed by Central Administration on

its net income (surplus).

6. The present structure of the Centre is such that the Director is the only

person who knows, manages, and controls the operations. As the

Centre grows in terms of revenues and staffing, this type of structure

will be a major hindrance to the long-term revenue growth of the Centre.

Furthermore, this type of structure will not be conducive to the

implementation of proper financial controls within the Centre.

B. Lessons from the experiences of Ateneo’s CCE

(Critical success factors for an improved financial management for

similar projects)

1. At inception, Central Administration and the business unit must

together plan the financial operations of the new venture. Both will

therefore become partners rather than adversaries in the successful

implementation of the new project. As partners, both units must have

a continuing dialogue on the problems encountered so that appropriate

solutions can be worked out together, thereby eliminating finger

pointing on the ‘who’, ‘what’, ‘why’ and ‘how’ of the problems encountered.

2. Doing a more thorough market research before launching a new project

can minimize the big negative variance between actual performance

and budget. Understanding the market better will certainly lead to a


67

better understanding of the potential revenues to be derived from the

said market.

3. The Director and staff of new school units should be given the proper

orientation on how to record income and expenses. This way, one can

avoid or at least minimize the possibility of understating or overstating

revenues or expenses.

4. Financial controls must be in place at inception. These financial

controls must not only be based on existing systems and procedures

– they must also reflect the entrepreneurial nature of the new venture.

Hence, these systems and procedures must be the result of an

interactive discussion between Central Administration and the new

school unit.

5. The share of Central Administration in the surplus must be explained

at inception instead of a situation where a project director learns about

the allocation ‘after the fact’. Education and communication are still

very effective tactics in managing resistance to change.

6. A new school unit that is expected to provide the university with a

surplus must be run by a competent multidisciplinary manager who

has an entrepreneurial mind. At inception, it is recognized that this

manager must think and act like an entrepreneur where the operations

of the centre is highly centralized and therefore revolves around the

Director. As the new school unit moves into the growth stage, the

Director must begin to decentralize and train potential successors to

assure the long-term viability of the project. In the particular case of the

CCE, that time is now. All other new school units in a similar situation

must recognize the need to make this transition.

7. The self-sufficiency and continuing net income (surplus) of a unit like

the CCE can allow the possibility of a different pricing strategy. The use


68

of marginal cost pricing where the incremental variable cost only is

used as the basis is now possible. As a way of improving revenues and

more importantly penetrating the SME market, marginal cost pricing

can now be used. This is possible because fixed costs are already

covered by previous transactions. This idea is being put forward

because the SME market had been an elusive one because a single

price for services (continuing education, research, consultancy, etc.)

using full cost pricing is a major deterrent to the penetration of this

market. We recognize that this is not the only solution. We know that

other marketing issues will have to be addressed before we can implant

marginal cost pricing for SMEs.


69


the submission from Ateneo de Manila University (AMU), Philippines.

Comments on the Group’s SubmissionComments on the Group’s SubmissionComments on the Group’s SubmissionComments on the Group’s SubmissionComments on the Group’s Submissionby Bikas C. Sanyal




Ateneo de Manila University (AMU)Ateneo de Manila University (AMU)Ateneo de Manila University (AMU)Ateneo de Manila University (AMU)Ateneo de Manila University (AMU)Manila, PhilippinesManila, PhilippinesManila, PhilippinesManila, PhilippinesManila, Philippines

Thank you for your submission of the case study on university-industry partnership focusing on the Centre for Continuing Education(CCE) which was set up to respond to need for leadership andmanagement skills of the industry. The following are my comments.

1. A combination of credit awarding and non-degree programmesmake your Centre more attractive to the clients.

2. Your choice of fields serving industries with high growth potentialalso contributes to the popularity of your programme.

3. However, the Director being the only person who controls theentire programme without sharing information with others maycreate problems in the future.

4. The decreasing trend of the net income should be a point of concern.

5. In the determination of price per participant it is expected that theuse of space and other facilities be taken into account along withall the variable and incidental costs.


70

6. The comparison with two benchmarks for setting the fees perparticipant and the differential pricing system for different targetgroups are good examples to follow.

7. The sharing of the surplus with 70 per cent for the Centre and 30per cent for the university is close to the common practice. Sinceit is a regular programme of the university and since the tasksform regular duties of the staff, the use of the surplus for thedevelopment of the Centre is quite reasonable.

8. As the entrepreneurial spirit is new it will take some time for theuniversity to adjust to this culture.

9. Transparency in management and in the costing of programmeshas to be given importance to make the programme have sustainablesuccess.

10. The lessons learned from your experience and reported in yourstudy are useful.


71


the case studies and the on-line discussion.

The financial management of university-industry partnerships:

a synthesis of the case studies

and the on-line discussion

by Bikas C. Sanyal






1. Introduction

Twelve out of the fifteen universities participating in the distance

education course submitted their group responses (mini case studies)

by the time that the selection for the studies was made for the on-line

discussion. Two more responses were received later.

The task that had been given to each group consisted of describing

one particular type of university-industry partnership conducted in their

university (such as contract research, consultancies, continuous

professional development, etc.) which had proved to be successful

financially. Alternatively, they could choose an unsuccessful case and

share their experience on how to avoid problems. Specifically, they were

asked to describe the process of developing the partnership, its

management structure, the amount of generated income and its share of

the total income generated by the university and of the total university

budget, the basis for determining the price of the product/service, the

distribution of the surplus and the use made of it, the problems


72

encountered in financial management and the ways they were overcome

and, finally, to list the success factors.

Seven of the universities wrote their case studies exclusively on

continuous professional development programmes, four of them wrote

on research contracts and consultancy services, two reported on a

combination of research and training, and one university submitted two

case studies – one on setting up a Technology Business Incubator, and

the other on a ‘continuous professional development programme’.

Keeping in view the focus of Module 3 on the financial management

of university-industry partnerships, the variety of the programmes, their

stages of development within the universities and the information given

in the case studies, we selected three case studies for in-depth comments

and questions.

The synthesis of the contents of the case studies and the results of

the on-line discussion are presented below.

Conclusion: The most popular type of university-industry partnership

selected by the university groups as the subject of their mini case studies

was continuous professional development.

2. The process of development

In respect of the process of development of the activity several modes

were observed:

First and most common, was the university’s own objective to

contribute to societal development, the initiative coming from the

university or the faculty. In these case studies one observed supply-

driven programmes where industries or entrepreneurs were approached

to invest in order to develop the partnership in training or research. The


73

importance of the programme and the cost is negotiated between the

sponsor and the university before the programme is launched. In one

case study, while both the university and the industry were offering

training, the former was doing so at cost (tailor-made for the industries’

staff and with proper credits) whereas the latter was doing so in lieu of

services received from the university’s staff and students. The process

of development of the partnership at two of the universities raised

questions in the on-line discussion which demonstrated that ‘industry-

wide recognition’ of some faculty and their ideas are strongly behind

such partnerships.

The second mode was demand driven where agencies or enterprises

approached the institution for co-operation. One of these demand-driven

case studies involved a start-up company and the process of developing

a partnership included the submission and subsequent oral defence of

the proposal to a steering committee consisting of the university and an

independent foundation – the partial financier of the activity. The criteria

for the co-operation were the proponent’s technical and managerial track

record, marketing and financial resources and ability to network with the

university’s scientists.

The third category of activities has been developed through the

initiative of bilateral or international aid agencies. The process has involved

the benevolent intention of the aid agency and the expressed need of

the institution to set up a partnership with industry through the supply of

better equipped manpower in a specialized competence.

The fourth category has been the initiative taken by an interface set

up within a university to promote partnership with industry. The interface

submits proposals explaining details of the training, target groups and

budget required to the industry for approval before the activity is initiated.


74

Conclusion: The initiative in the process of developing a partnership

mostly comes from the university and in some cases income has not

yet been the reason for such a partnership. In establishing a partnership,

checking the track record of the partner is important from the point of

financial management. The reputation of the faculty members and their

connections with industry help the process of developing a partnership.

3. Management structure

In respect of the management structure, especially of finance, most

of the activities reported in the case studies were under the central

administration. However, one of the universities reported that its selected

activity had only recently moved from the direct control of an external

interface (foundation) to the university’s central administration. The activity

of another university, although run by the central administration, is

franchised to another agency but its programmes are vetted by the

university. And a third university reported that although its research activity

is administered centrally, its training activity is administered by an external

interface.

The next popular management structure is departmental. In one

university, although the activity is affiliated departmentally it is in fact

managed by a steering committee constituted of the university and

industry representatives in equal number and supervised by a Board of

five experts appointed with the mutual agreement of the university and

the industry. This management structure raised questions in the on-line

discussion – its autonomous status, clear-cut contractual arrangements

with the industrial partner and the transparent relationship between the

two give the partnership its strength. And given the size of the government

contribution to this partnership, one university suggested the inclusion

of the Government in the management structure to make the partnership

tripartite.


75

One university reported that its selected activity is managed by an

internal interface. Another said that the management structure has

recently changed from the department to an external interface

(foundation).

Conclusion: The above shows that the financial management of

university-industry partnerships is still dominated by the central

administration. However, managerial autonomy and transparency in the

relationship may make such partnerships more effective.

4. Income generated

In respect of the income generated, the situation is extremely diverse

among those universities reporting. Two of them are running at a loss,

two are running on a no-loss, no-income basis, two did not know their

income yet, one did not report and the others reported a surplus.

Among the reporting universities, gross revenue varied from

US$ 11,645 to US$ 591,000 for the latest year reported. This, of course,

depends upon the type of activity reported and does not in any way

reflect the performance of the activity.

The nature of the loss reported in one case was quite confusing.

Lack of transparency in accounting procedures did not allow verification

of the exact nature and extent of the loss reported. The reason for the

loss is attributed to the lack of competence of the management (central

administration). The same reason is also given for the loss in a second

case study where the ‘franchise’ of the programme did not pay the

university its due because of lack of clarity at the negotiating stage.

Interestingly, in both cases management is in the hands of the central

administration.


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Financially, the most successful programme appears to be a foreign

language programme of one university, bringing in US$ 270,000 against

the university’s total income of US$ 160,751 (excluding the income from

the foreign language programme). Although the activity of at least one

other university appears to be a promising partnership financially, overall

it is clear that income from university-industry partnerships still remains

quite low among our group of universities at less than 3 per cent of total

income.

Conclusion: The continuous professional development programmes

are the least risky partnerships. Financial loss has only been in those

cases where the managerial structure was centrally dominated.

5. Determining the price

The basis for determining the price also varies between the types of

activity and between the universities.

In respect of training activities, in some cases only operating expenses

are charged. In others, actual costs based on specified parameters

(preparation of training materials, lecturers’ fees, all staff costs, office

expenses, use of facilities and equipment) are added to an institutional

fee – the profit margin or mark up in most cases ranging from 15 to

30 per cent and in others to a variable negotiated amount. The cost

parameters are sometimes based on market rates in similar institutions.

In the training activities of two universities, a flat rate is charged. In one

university, the institutional fee and the overhead varies from government

to corporate clients, the former being charged less.

In respect of research activities, one university in the group, in spite

of having norms for staff, operational, office and overhead costs, would

sometimes “take a project which might generate a deficit in order to be

known to the clients”.


77

This university also reported that it “could not charge the full price for

a project because of the fierce competition with other research centres”.

The situation provoked an interesting on-line discussion – suggestions

were made for aggressive marketing efforts for client information and for

product/service differentiation to face competition with other centres.

The suggestions also included a plea for the autonomy of the university

and for additional incentives for the researchers through teaching

assignments. For a university-industry partnership to be successful it

was argued that “a proactive manager will have to prove the capabilities

of his unit for a profitable operation first”.

For the remaining universities in the group, one of them uses a formula

for determining the price. Another “has developed a comprehensive list

of prices for the services it markets” – for consultancies it charges an

institutional fee of 15-30 per cent in addition to the actual costs. A third

university charges a ‘cheap’ rent of US$ 300 per month to support infant

technology start-up companies. A fourth university charges actual costs

plus sometimes a surplus for its partnership. And a fifth university does

not yet have a policy of determining the price since the product is not

yet commercially developed.

Conclusion: In determining the price of products/services, universities

are increasingly becoming conscious about not only cost recovery but

also about a profit margin. Market prices of similar activities are taken

into consideration as well. Differential pricing, keeping in view the target

group, is also practised. Norms and formulae are emerging as the basis

for pricing the product/service.

6. Distribution of the surplus

In respect of the distribution of the surplus created and its use, one

observes wide variations as well as a pattern.


78

In most of the centrally-administered activities the surplus (including

the institutional fee and the overhead) is taken by the university. In some

cases the surplus is used for staff development and the purchase of

equipment for the unit. The surplus of one university’s activity is used for

the development of its Technology Business Incubator (TBI). In another,

although the activity is running at a loss because of a managerial problem,

the university is supposed to receive 30 per cent of the gross income,

the rest to be received by the franchise.

Among the activities managed departmentally and having a surplus,

one university has an interesting arrangement – although its gross

revenues are taken by the university, the university can, on application,

receive part of the surplus for development of its facilities. A second

university keeps all of its surplus for itself for its own rainy days and for

the development of its facilities. In a third university, 70 per cent of the

surplus of the selected activity goes to the unit running it and the rest

goes to the university fund (the amount given to the unit is used for the

development of new programmes, improvement of facilities and funding

special projects with the approval of the university). And in a fourth

university, 50 per cent of the surplus of the activity is given to the partner

industry, 30 per cent is given to the university and the rest goes to the

researchers as special incentives.

The surplus of another university’s activity, managed by an internal

interface, goes to the interface (and the staff may get some bonus at the

end of the year). The surplus of the training activity of another university,

managed by an external interface, also goes to the interface for the

development of its facilities. Three other universities in the group do not

have any surplus.

Conclusion: The distribution of the surplus from the university-industry

partnership programmes follows a pattern. For the centrally-administered

programmes, the surplus is in most cases taken by the university. For


79

the activities administered by departments, the surplus is in most cases

shared between the university and the unit operating it – the researchers

and the staff get a share in some cases. For activities managed by

interfaces, the surplus is taken by the interface. In most cases, whatever

the managerial structure, a part of the surplus is used for the development

of research and training facilities.

7. Problems encountered

The following is the list of the problems encountered by the groups in

the financial management of university-industry partnership.

• Too much centralization and lengthy bureaucracy.

• Lack of transparency in accounting procedures.

• Dissatisfaction of the operating unit in sharing the surplus with central

administration.

• Lack of proactive programmes including marketing of products/

services available, lack of information about the needs of the industry

and lack of knowledge of the benefits and availability of partnership

programmes among the SMEs.

• Lack of skills in financial management.

• Lack of funds.

• Lack of incentives for researchers and resource persons for training

programmes.

• Differences in the missions, the organizational structures and practices

of the university and the industrial sector.

• Late or non-payment of fees.

• Difficulty in precisely estimating costs leading to cost overrun.


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8. Success factors

The following is the list of success factors suggested by the

universities. (Please note that they are mostly related to the problems

given above).

• Decentralized financial management and reduced bureaucracy.

• Rationalized reward system and distribution of surplus among different

actors.

• Transparent accounting procedure and managerial style.

• Involvement of government institutions in providing facilities and

resources.

• Establishment of networks with industries.

• Aggressive marketing of programmes.

• Having highly competent faculty with recognition by the industrial

sector.

• Availability of trained staff in financial management.

• Professionalization of the management of the partnership.

• Establishment of a legal mechanism for fair terms of co-operation and

protection of rights.

9. Conclusion

To conclude the synthesis I would like to add that if development of

partnerships with industry is becoming an essential function of the

universities of the 21st century, the financial management of such

partnerships has to be given due importance. In this, the following points

should be kept in mind:

• No partnership can survive with inefficient and untrained managerial

staff.

• Traditional financial structures need significant adaptation to fit with

the new industrial environment.


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• Universities will have to design a strategy in which financial devolution

to department/research centres does not strip them of their strategic

role.

• Universities will have to set out, for each activity, targets for the

delivery of specified services in financial terms, compatible with the

aims of the partnership expressed in quantitative terms.

• Universities will have to indicate how progress in financial terms will

be monitored and from what quantitative baseline and how conflicts of

interest will be resolved.

• The traditional importance of academic excellence makes it difficult

for a university to inculcate an enterprise culture at the beginning. A

fair reward system and a special financial investment in staff

development with emphasis on entrepreneurship and management

can facilitate the development of that culture.

• For financially successful university-partnership two facts are to be

remembered. First, not all partnerships will bring profits. Universities

should be ready to take risks – one has to look into aggregate benefits.

Second, its financial management approach should be ‘missionary’

and not ‘mercenary’ – the approach and procedures should be based

on strict business ethics.

5. Module 4 – Staff management of university-industrypartnerships

In ‘Weeks 9 and 10’ of the course the attention of the participants

was focused on Module 4 – ‘Staff management of university-industry

partnerships’. This Module tackles three major issues related to the

topic, i.e. Part I: employment conditions and staff development to

enhance university-industry partnerships; Part II: incentive schemes

to motivate staff to engage in university-industry partnerships; and

Part III: a discussion of university policies to prevent conflicts of

interests.


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Participants were asked to read the module individually and then

select with their group of colleagues one of the two following sets

of questions for the preparation of a submission of three to four

pages:

The majority of the university groups made submissions based

on the first set of questions – a typical group submission (from Ewha

Womans University (EWU), Republic of Korea) is reprinted on the

following pages. The other university groups made submissions on

the second set of questions – again, a typical group submission (from

the University of the Philippines (UP) – Diliman) is reprinted.

Either (i) What incentives exist in your university to motivatestaff to engage in university-industry partnerships? Whichincentives would need to be put in place to create a moreentrepreneurial climate? What lessons can you learn from the caseexperiences presented in Module 4?

Or (ii) What types of conflicts of interests has your universityexperienced in university-industry partnerships? What policiesare in place in your institution to prevent conflicts of interest?Which of the case experiences presented in Module 4 are relevantfor your university to develop its existing set of policies?


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Ewha Womans University

Seoul, Republic of Korea

Sung Ku Kim (Group Co-ordinator), Yoon Suk Suh,

Kilhyon Kim, Insung Jung and Eun Hee Ha

Staff management of

university-industry partnerships

Incentives to motivate the university staff

A. Incentive schemes at Ewha

Ewha has encouraged its members to collaborate with private firms,

public foundations or the government, as long as those collaborations

support Ewha’s primary role in teaching, research and public service

missions. With its strong academic background, Ewha has rather slowly

developed its incentive schemes to motivate its staff to develop university-

industry partnerships. Ewha’s incentive schemes will be described

according to three types of incentives presented in Module 4.

1. Financial incentives

Financial incentives can be given to the researcher/staff member who

obtained outside funds from private firms. Those incentives include a

certain portion of generated income from intellectual property rights, project

surpluses, honorarium, or a salary addition. Most of these financial

incentives are not yet institutionalized and thus each researcher needs


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to negotiate his/her incentives with the university or with the firms before

signing a contract.

A salary complement, as a form of financial incentives, is not yet

allowed at Ewha. Generally speaking, university culture in Korea has not

tolerated salary differences due to reasons other than working years

(years of experiences). As the universities become more competitive in

attracting students and receiving funding from outside, we see changes

in this culture. Ewha is beginning to offer a salary addition when recruiting

outstanding scholars from outside.

Staff members at Ewha who received the grants from industries,

government, or foundations are usually provided with an honorarium based

on a monthly rate of their work, which is usually small. Moreover, a faculty

which receives a grant above US$ 80,000 per year may be provided with

financial rewards of between US$ 2,000 and US$ 5,000. In addition, those

who publish articles in one of the internationally-indexed journals receive

monetary compensations upon publication, apart from the other material

incentives listed above.

In addition to these financial incentives, Ewha is planning to introduce

a new type of incentive, which aims to promote active involvement of

faculty members in the development of university-industry linkages. A

total of 20 per cent of any income generated from the commercialization

of intellectual property or of project surpluses will be provided to the

faculty member who is involved in a project with industries.

2. Incentives linked to promotion systems

Ewha has been recognizing the importance of developing university-

industry partnerships. However, not much weight in its promotion system

has been given for activities of its staff in collaborating with private firms.

The current promotion criteria are listed below.


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To be eligible for the evaluation for promotion:

• Minimum 100 per cent of journal publication per year.

i. If a staff member publishes an article in one of the SCI/SSCI

journals, he or she gets 100 per cent of its grade. Different

percentages are given to the article depending on the quality of the

journals.

ii. If he/she is a co-author of the article, he/she gets 50 per cent or less

depending on the number of authors.

• 100 per cent of teaching, social services and receiving research funds.

i. The faculty member who received a grant from outside of more than

US$ 17,000 per year can get 10 per cent credit maximum.

ii. But since most faculty members can satisfy the 100 per cent

requirement from their teaching and other social services, not much

effort is given to the development of university-industry linkages.

3. Material incentives

This is the most popular type of incentives at Ewha (as well as in

most universities in the Republic of Korea). Staff members at Ewha who

receive grants from industries, government, or foundations are usually

provided with financial support for laboratory facilities and materials, or

computers, or travel expenses. They can also hire research assistants

from the graduate students in their departments and post-doctoral

researchers.

B. Incentives needed to create a more entrepreneurial

climate

As described above, a salary addition is not a popular type of incentive

scheme at Ewha for those staff members who have contributed to fostering

university-industry partnerships. And even though Ewha provides other

types of financial incentives, the amount of those incentives is not


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attractive, in most cases, to most of the faculty members. In addition,

our promotion system does not take the faculty’s contribution to the

development of university-industry linkages seriously into account. In

this regard, we feel that Ewha needs to review the present incentive

schemes and develop other incentives in order to create a more

entrepreneurial climate. The list below suggests two such incentives that

may encourage university-industry linkages.

1. Giving more credit to the receipt of research or development funds from

external sources in faculty promotion criteria. Our current promotion

system gives a maximum of 10 per cent credit (out of 200 per cent) to

the faculty member who received external funds. We feel that this

percentage needs to be doubled (up to 20 per cent) and that receiving

external funds should be separately evaluated from teaching or public

services.

2. Providing a substantial amount of financial incentives. Currently,

Ewha provides financial incentives as a symbolic recognition for the

faculty member’s contribution to the development of university-industry

linkages. We feel that in order to encourage its staff members to be

involved in collaboration in projects with industry, the university needs

to adjust the amount of financial incentives depending on the size of the

research grant. The case of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJ)

seems to provide a guideline for our new financial incentive system.

C. Lessons from the cases in Module 4

The case of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem seems to provide the

most detailed criteria for providing academic faculty with financial

incentives. The percentages for salary addition seem to be high from our

standard but in general HUJ’s criteria provide a useful guideline for Ewha’s

financial tool. However, it would be difficult in our culture to apply the


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HUJ’s case to our salary system. Instead, HUJ’s rule can be applied to

other financial reward systems.

The UNAM case provides useful lessons for Ewha if we need to undergo

the change process in our incentive schemes. Before making any changes

in our promotion and other incentive systems, we need to make an effort

to share with faculty members the value of university-industry partnerships

for the development of Ewha.


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the submission from Ewha Womans University, Republic of Korea.





Ewha WEwha WEwha WEwha WEwha Womans Universityomans Universityomans Universityomans Universityomans UniversitySeoul, Republic of KoreaSeoul, Republic of KoreaSeoul, Republic of KoreaSeoul, Republic of KoreaSeoul, Republic of Korea

1. As is the case of several of the participating universities, your grouphas chosen to focus mainly on some issues related to incentives forthis assignment. In Module 4 and in comments made earlier, it wasalready pointed out that incentives are indeed one of the major toolsto transform the culture of a higher education institution from beingtraditionally academic to entrepreneurial. Incentives are the mostimportant and certainly the most effective tool to steer humanbehaviour in a creative and non-coercive environment – the typicalsituation in universities.

2. The type and mix of incentives to be put in place in a universitydepends very much on the conception that the university has aboutthe place of university-industry linkages, in particular if they areconsidered to be part of the mainstream activities or supplementarywork to other mainstream activities. Under the latter conception,financial incentives will not be the main mechanism for themotivation of staff and other ones, perhaps material or immaterial,will be preferred. In your university, the former conception seems tobe prevailing: university-industry linkages cause supplementary


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work and – however desirable the work may be – staff need to berewarded for it.

3. In your submission, you point out that financial incentives may begranted to staff on a case by case basis, but that they are not yetinstitutionalized. This would also be difficult, because a salarycomplement is not yet allowed at Ewha Women’s University, Iassume because of the prevailing university culture which treats allacademics in the same fashion, at least in terms of salary structures.You mention, however, that this is in the process of being changedat least when it comes to offer competitive recruitment. By the way,this is also currently the case in my own country, the FederalRepublic of Germany, where academic staff in universities are civilservants, but where universities have recently been allowed to offermerit-related pay. I am sure that it is only a matter of time beforeuniversities (both public and private) in the Republic of Korea maybe entitled to offer salary complements to their staff. It is obviouslythe market, both for good and for bad, which drives universitiesinternationally in similar directions.

4. Your university is currently planning to put in place a mechanismwhereby 20 per cent of any income generated from thecommercialization of intellectual property rights (IPR) will go thestaff involved in the project with industry. This is already a ratherbold step, I think in the right direction. The issue of benefits fromincome generated through IPR relates also to the broader issue ofwhether a university should favour policies which facilitate thecreation of spin offs to market IPR or whether they should go forlicensing arrangements. I think that a university takes less risk ofany potential multiple conflicts of interest if it gives a clearpreference to licensing. The policy of granting a part of the incometo the inventors (and their collaborators) is in line with such abroader policy of commercialization of income.


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5. Your university is giving some weight to performance in university-industry projects in its promotion system. You point out howeverthat this is not very competitive in relation to other activities suchas research in particular and even teaching which weigh much morein the current promotion system. Revising the promotion system togive more recognition to applied research might not be easilyacceptable in a traditional academic environment. And changingthe criteria for evaluation requires a capacity to evaluate appliedresearch. Here, publications count less than the development ofprototypes and rigorous testing procedures.

6. In addition to creating financial incentives and operating changes inthe promotion system, the putting in place of material or immaterialincentives is also a powerful tool that is already applied at EwhaWomen’s University. In general, creating visibility for achievementsin university-industry linkages, such as in public speeches made byhigh-level university officials, is in any case a desirable practice anddemonstrates that the university managers care about andappreciate such involvement. Material incentives such as the onesmentioned by you have the advantage of being flexible but they alsohave the disadvantage of being less transparent than financialincentives. They are most commonly not based on university-widerules but are allocated at the discretion of university administrators.As a consequence, they may create bad feelings among those whocannot benefit from them.

7. I agree with your analysis of what needs to be changed to create amore entrepreneurial climate in the university, i.e. more financialincentives and a greater weight for performance in university-industry projects in decisions over promotions. I agree also that it isbetter to go slowly because it will not be possible to change theuniversity culture from one day to the next. However, this processwill need determined university-wide leadership, which will need todrive the discussions and the process forward.


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The following submission (from the University of the Philippines

(UP) – Diliman) is typical of the submissions from those university

groups that made submissions on the second set of questions.






University of the Philippines – Diliman

Diliman, Quezon City, Philippines

Edward V. Deveza (Group Co-ordinator), Edison Cruz,

Maria Sagrario R. Simbulan and Reuben Campos

Staff management


Conflicts of interest

A. What types of conflicts of interests has your university

experienced in university-industry partnerships?

1. Ownership of research results/by-products

• Collaboration between industry and university-based researchers may

give rise to research ownership conflicts if no clear-cut policy is laid out

before the research study commences.

• There may also be situations where the university administration may

lay claim to the ownership of the research results.

• Equity issues between the university and the researcher, between the

university and industry partners.


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2. Publication of research results (related to ownership andintellectual property rights)

• Timing of publication of research results – this refers to those research

projects with potential for patentability. Generally, publication of

research results will be asked to be delayed until the patent application

is filed. Also, in cases where the research is funded by outside entities,

the publication is subject to review by the sponsoring companies/

entities in order to ensure the protection of their proprietary information,

thereby causing a delay in publication.

• Where to publish – under the auspices of the university or ISI refereed

journals for the researcher to receive a monetary incentive. Publication

in non-ISI journals is not encouraged and does not count towards any

monetary reward. Less points for promotion are awarded for publications

in non-ISI journals.

• Assignment of rights – the university, the researcher and/or the

publisher may have differing ideas of sharing. In order to avoid

unnecessary conflict in decision-making, sometimes a policy requiring

automatic assignment of copyright to the university causes a lot of

protests from researchers. Their main argument centres on their right

to determine where and when to publish, which is lost when the

university has the sole right to decide on the matter by virtue of that

automatic assignment.

3. Career and promotion-related issues

• Publication of research in ISI-refereed journals provides a researcher

with both monetary and promotion-related incentives.

• A researcher whose research does not get published in an ISI journal

will only get minimal promotion-related incentives with no monetary

award.

• There are other equally important professional journals that are not ISI-

refereed which may be bypassed by the researchers because of the


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monetary and promotion-related incentives given by the university.

This situation limits the exposure and dissemination of research

results to an equally important audience – those in industry.

4. Balance between outside consultancies and institutionalcommitment

• The university encourages outside consultancies (also called ‘extension

activities’) but only as a component of the total university commitment

of each faculty member. The other two components are teaching and

research.

• As of now, there is no clear-cut policy regarding the amount of time a

faculty member or researcher can spend on outside consultancies or

extension work.

• However, the financial incentives related to outside consultancies are

very attractive and may result in the deterioration of the quality of

teaching or in the amount of time spent on university commitments.

The challenge is in finding the right balance between personal

economic and career-related concerns and professional commitments

to the university.

5. Research fund generation: incentives

• There is no real incentive for researchers to actively solicit and

generate research funds as the amount of the grant received does not

result in additional pay or honorarium for the researcher, mainly

because of existing government auditing rules.

6. Use of graduate student research

• There is no clear policy in the determination of authorship for joint

publications resulting from a research study. A graduate student

involved in a research study may make a major contribution but the

attribution of the credit may not reflect this.


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B. What policies are in place in your institution to prevent

conflicts of interest?

• The establishment of a Technology Licensing Office (TLO) to resolve

issues relating to conflicts of interest and intellectual property rights

(IPR). TLO is the unit of the university implementing appropriate IPR

policies and guidelines on conflicts of interest.

• The policy requiring the researcher to submit disclosure forms to the

TLO will cause an early evaluation of their research projects. The

potential for patentability will be discussed early on, thus avoiding the

conflict of the timing of the publication and the required application for

patents. [Remember that we also have to consider the rule of first to

file in patent applications, so both the timing of publication as well as

that of patent application should be addressed by the same unit (TLO)].

C. Which of the case experiences presented in Module 4 are

relevant for your university to develop its existing set of

policies?

• Clear-cut policies on the ownership of research results and publication.

The university’s Technology Licensing Office (TLO), acting as its

technology transfer unit, is quite similar to the way YISSUM at HUJ

implements its policy on publication (except for the fact that TLO is part

of the university organizational structure, so that final decision on the

resolution of conflict of interest belongs to the President of the

university).

• Clear-cut policies on the financial incentives related to research grant

generation. The university still has to address this issue in the light of

the fact that what is in place is a series of very restrictive rules and

regulations of the government’s auditing units which have jurisdiction

on state universities such as ours. Some form of legislation (like the

Bayh-Dole Act) needs to be enacted in order to provide the correct


95

environment for the formulation of policies giving financial incentives

related to research grants.

• Clear-cut policies on the amount of time spent on outside consultancies

and extension work vis-à-vis teaching and research commitments.

Again, the UP group thinks that the HUJ policy on outside consultancies

is a good model to emulate. Right now, outside consultancies exist in

a limited way (20 per cent or one day per week) in some units of the

university but there really is a need for the university to formulate

policies on outside consultancies for all its units.


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the submission from the University of the Philippines (UP), Diliman.





University of the Philippines (UP) – DilimanUniversity of the Philippines (UP) – DilimanUniversity of the Philippines (UP) – DilimanUniversity of the Philippines (UP) – DilimanUniversity of the Philippines (UP) – DilimanDiliman, Quezon City, Philippines

1. Your group has chosen to address the set of questions related toconflicts of interest. This in itself shows that university-industrypartnerships have reached a certain level, which makes you moreconcerned with potential drawbacks rather than with theirdevelopment.

2. In your presentation, you also raise the issue of conflicts of interestfrom a diversity of angles. You seem to be particularly concernedwith (i) the issue of ownership of research results and by-products,(ii) confidentiality issues and their impact on publications and (iii)balance between outside consultancies and possible diversion ofenergy and commitment.

3. It seems that it is in particular the diversion of energy from traditionalteaching tasks to consultancies which is problematic. In my opinion itwould be wise to start thinking about developing a clear policyframework for conflicts of interest which need to be addressed in themedium-term at least. The whole area of conflicts of interest is


97

‘politically dense’, in the sense that as soon as questions are statedexplicitly, a large number have to be addressed. In other words,addressing one type of conflict of interest triggers off other areas.

4. Instead of mentioning how individual institutions have addressed thiscomplex area of conflicts of interest, I would rather present to you a‘checklist’ of questions to be addressed by policy making in this domain:

(i) Have measures such as the following been established towards theprotection of the core functions of the university?

• Are there rules on outside engagements and conflicts of loyalty?• Are there measures to protect the interests of students with respect

to:– teaching guidance and mentoring;– faculty time spent on teaching v. supplementing income by

outside activities;– protection of student research from being invaded by professors’

outside business commitments;– systems for monitoring the quality and integrity of teaching?

• Are there measures to protect the interest of faculty:– rules for managers and administrators so that they will not find

themselves in conflicts of loyalty in the triangle between faculty,university and industry;

– agreed-upon criteria for promotion and the extent to which theyshould reflect the outside commitments that the universityencourages;

– agreed-upon guidelines for the distribution of income generatedfrom licenses and from overheads?

• Are measures taken to protect research and the research agenda:– rules on rights to publish (or how long publications may be

withheld at a maximum to maintain confidentiality);– rules on the protection of open communication within and among

departments;


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– explicit institutional policies about the mix of basic v. strategicand applied research;

– clear guidelines on patents and secrecy v. publicity and opencommunication;

– clear guidelines on generated income regarding which parts areredistributed to research funds to provide seed money for furtherresearch activity?

(ii) Are measures taken to ease out potential internal conflicts• to protect fields without strong industry-ties (e.g. humanities

relative to medicine and computer science);• to ensure the balance between administration and faculty;• to ensure the balance between faculty and students?

5. As already underlined, not making choices explicit, does not meanthat they are not made – it only means that they are made tacitlyand implicitly, unstated and unspoken.

6. I think that your suggestion to focus initially on policies regardingthe ownership of research results and publications, on financialincentives related to research grant generation and on consultancywork are reasonable.

7. I think it is worthwhile to emphasize also that a policy frameworkis only a starting point but that you will need to think, also, abouta structure for implementing it. I also think that your TechnologyLicensing Office (TLO) should be the focal point for theimplementation of such policy decisions, similar to the interfacefunction played by YISSUM at HUJ. When it comes to issues relatedto diversion of energy, it will be necessary to draw on a decentralizedmanagement structure and to involve heads of departments to makesure that traditional academic activities are not neglected.


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the submissions for the Assignment for Module 4.



by Michaela Martin


for Eastern Asian Universities

on ‘The management of university-industry partnerships’



1. A total of 14 universities in our group have so far made a submission

on this assignment. The majority of institutions have chosen either

exclusively, or partially, the topic of incentives which underlines the

importance of this issue as a major device for creating an

entrepreneurial climate in a university. Others have devoted themselves

entirely, or partially to an analysis of possible or already existing

conflicts of interests.

2. The first question of the assignment related to incentives was to

describe the available incentive systems in place. According to the

content of Module 4, universities tend to distinguish between

financial incentives, material incentives and promotion systems

which take into account commitment to university-industry linkages.

3. Only in a few of our universities do university-wide rules exist for

incentives, which are applied across the board. Such a university-

wide framework has the advantage of transparency, which is of

course needed to signal to all staff that university-industry linkages

are desirable. But university-wide rules – for example, for attracting

contracts with industry – have the shortcoming that some basic units


100

have a greater potential, than others, to have access to them. For

instance, funds for applied research contracts from industry are not

available to the same extent for Faculties of Humanities and the

Social Sciences (FHSS). Most universities mention, however, that

due to a high level of autonomy of the individual faculties, decisions

over incentive structures are taken directly by the faculties or even

specific centres which develop their policies in the domain.

4. With regard to the types of incentives applied, several of our

universities mention that they have put in place financial incentives.

These incentives generally comprise a fixed share (in some cases

to be determined by a central university authority or the interface

management) of the total cost of a service (continuing education,

consultancy or research). Where commercialization of research

plays some role (such as through licensing), inventors usually take

a fixed share in it. But systems are most commonly in a stage of

development.

5. It seems that no university of the group already applies direct salary

increases for those staff who are able to attract contracts. Institutions

mention that their staff statutes do not allow them to apply such

measures.

6. With regard to promotion systems, about half of the universities in our

group mention that they have the possibility of taking into account a

commitment to university-industry partnerships. In some cases, a

weighting system – similar to the one applied by BITS Pilani (India)

– is thought of in the participating universities. Community services

or applied research is, however, generally weighted much lower than

traditional activities such as authoring publications and in some

cases achievements in the teaching domain. The other half of the

institutions mention that their promotion system remains traditional


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and does not at all, or only at the margin, take account of performance

in university-industry linkages.

7. Material incentives form another group in this respect. They are used

by nearly all universities and cover a wide range of different devices,

such as access to equipment purchase, refurbishment of space,

travel grants, and professional development opportunities. Material

incentives tend to be put in place in situations in which, by culture or

by rule, other incentives are more difficult to set up. They have the

advantage of being flexible in their use, but also have the inconvenience

of lacking transparency because their allocation is made by the

personal choice of high-level university administrators. As a

consequence, such incentive systems have a lower potential to

transform the prevailing university culture while creating possible

internal conflicts.

8. Some institutions mention that among the material incentives they

allow their staff to buy out teaching duties in exchange for work in

contract research with industry. For some staff, such research is

more attractive and professionally rewarding than teaching, and thus

functions as an incentive. It has to be kept in mind, however, that it

is often those staff with experience in contract research who have a

highly valuable experience to communicate to the students. Cutting

them off, temporarily or structurally from teaching would certainly

have an adverse impact on the quality of teaching in a higher

education institution.

9. One category of incentives should not be forgotten, that is ‘immaterial

incentives’. Such immaterial incentives may consist of public

acknowledgement of the desirability of commitment to university-

industry partnerships or public mentioning of achievements in this

domain. Some universities have created special mechanisms such

as official letters of appreciation by high-level officials. Although


102

immaterial appreciation is desirable and necessary, one should not

expect that this would be able to replace other categories of

incentives in the long run.

10. However, Incentives do not only apply to academic staff, but to

university administrators as well. Universities of the group tend to be

relatively silent about incentives put in place to motivate professional

administrators of university-industry linkages, such as interface

managers. As part of prevailing incentive systems; interfaces should

be left with sufficient administrative autonomy to put in place

supplementary financial or material incentives for their employees.

Since interfaces operate usually closer to the market, they need staff

who are able to work under pressure to keep deadlines and whose

services (both administrative or substantive) are competitive. As a

consequence, employment conditions need to be competitive with

those applied in the market.

11. Several universities started their assignment by pointing to the fact

that, “yes incentives have been put in place”, in particular for

academic staff, but that the reason why those staff members are

committed to university-industry linkages is more because of intrinsic

professional motivation. This is certainly true, particularly in the

environment of the university where motivation systems are widely

of an intrinsic nature. This point of view really forms the baseline in

the discussion and any other incentive system (financial or otherwise)

usually reinforces already existing intrinsic motivation, but will not

fundamentally change it.

12. Finally, the point should be made that although incentive systems are

an excellent device to reinforce desirable behaviour, they may also

produce unintended effects. Higher education institutions should try

to anticipate such unintended effects as much as possible, but will

not be able to prevent them entirely. They are often also confronted


103

with dilemmas – in order to maintain the most dynamic and ‘marketable’

staff within the universities they have to widen the framework of

outside activities. This makes them lose their staff partially, but at

least not entirely.

13. With respect to conflicts of interest, the most frequently encountered

ones by institutions are diversion of energy and commitment due to

private consultancies. It appears that, at present, there is no

framework in most universities for conducting consultancies and

they are tolerated also by decision-makers at the institutional level,

partly because they, themselves, are able to benefit from a loose

framework in this respect.

14. In order, however, to protect the interest of students, who themselves

also increasingly act as customers given the fact that many are fee

paying, it will be more and more important to put in place rules and

structures to protect the mainstream activities of higher education

institutions, above all undergraduate teaching. An implicit rule in

most higher education institutions is the fact that outside activities

are tolerated (or even encouraged), if university staff manage to

comply with their other duties. Such an assumption implies however

the availability of a control system whereby someone is in charge of

judging whether academic activities are neglected or not.

15. Another type of conflict of interest mentioned by one university is the

decision as to whom intellectual property rights (IPR) should be

granted in the case of contract research for industry. It seems that

universities are too frequently giving away the right to exploit IPR to

industry, or to their staff, because they are not well equipped to

submit requests for patenting and to commercialize IPR later on.

When contract research reaches a certain level of intensity, institutions

will have to reflect on what policies are appropriate to ensure

legitimate income.


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16. Other types of conflict of interest might arise when there is an

institutional policy for university-industry linkages and administrators

take a lead in this. The interest of researchers is not necessarily the

same as that of administrators. To give an example, researchers

tend to be in favour of low overhead provisions (since they may be

an obstacle in the negotiation of contracts with industry) whereas

administrators might want to maximize the financial return for the

institution. Here again, clear general guidelines can help to minimize

the level of conflicts in each case.

17. Another type of conflict of interest, hardly addressed however in the

submissions of the group, is the one between disciplines. Some

academic fields (e.g. humanities relative to medicine and computer

science) have a lower potential for co-operation, whereas others have

not. Universities need also to develop guidelines for protecting those

academic fields not having strong ties with industry to ensure the

internal balance of discipline, to minimize the level of internal conflict

and fragmentation, and to maintain the idea of the “university”. The

difficulties in changing promotion systems when it comes to open

them up to more applied work, among them university-industry

linkages, demonstrates that the desirability of these linkages has not

yet reached a consensus within institutions. Any policy in this

domain has yet to overcome much internal resistance and thus

requires a good portion of political will and determination.


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6. Module 5 - Developing an action project to strengthen co-operation with industry

In the final part of the course (‘Weeks 11 and 12’) the participants

were asked to read Module 5 and then work on their own proposal

for a specific action plan, that they might undertake in their

university, to improve co-operation with the industry.

Module 5 outlines the importance of three types of linkages, their

benefits and potential for collaboration. It describes different steps

involved in developing a project in a particular field and raises

important issues to formulate a project. Part I outlines the various

steps to ‘get things started’ to operate strategic changes. Part II gives

the participants the opportunity to choose a project in one of the

three areas of (1) continuing education, (2) undergraduate education

and (3) R&D. Part III describes strategic planning issues critical to

the successful development of a project. And Part IV is aimed at

making the best use of transnational projects and partnerships.

Participants were asked to develop their group’s project in one of

the three areas and were provided with the following outlines for

each of the areas:

A proposal to develop new continuing education programmes

should (a) assess the market potential, (b) identify ways to enterthe market, (c) look at ways to sustain the client base and respondto clients’ needs for f lexibility, (d) address the question ofaccreditation, and (e) assess the initial level of activity in this fieldin the university.


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The participants were informed that each group proposal should

have a section on how it will deal with important strategic planning

issues that are critical for the successful development of the project in

terms of work organization, staff contracts and conditions of services,

business planning procedures and specialist/physical resources. Finally,

the participants were asked to provide some ideas of possibilities to

take the proposal into a collaborative venture at the international

level.

A typical group submission, from the Universiti Kebangsaan

Malaysia (UKM) is reprinted on the following pages.

A proposal to improve the undergraduate curriculum shouldexplain (a) the reasons for the need of change, and (b) the needfor collaboration; it should (c) describe the current situation interms of student placements in industry and identify newpossibilities, (d) look at university commitment and reactions fromteaching colleagues, students and industry, and (e) assess the initiallevel of student placement in the university.

A proposal seeking to increase the amount of collaborative

research with industry (R&D) should (a) explain how prioritiesare balanced at Departmental/Faculty level and how resources canbe allocated between various functions, (b) assess researchstrengths, (c) identify market needs at regional, national andinternational level; it should (d) look at how to promotecollaboration through support structures and researchers’mobility, and (e) assess the initial level of R&D programmes in theuniversity.


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Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM)

Bangi, Malaysia

Aminah Abdullah (Group Co-ordinator), Ja’afar Bin Sahari

Abdul Razak Daud, Zarina Shukur and Mohd Ashari Idris

A proposal for an action project in food quality research

A. Introduction

Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM) has been identified as one of

Malaysia’s three Research Universities by the Ministry of Education,

based upon the number of researchers and their active participation in

research supported by the Malaysian Government, the private sector

and international agencies. The support of the top management of the

university is indicated by the existence of the Research Management

Unit (with its Innovation and Instrumentation Divisions) as well as the

restructuring of ‘UKM Holding Sdn. Bhd’ (a business arm of the University),

both of which provide essential tools and infrastructure to strengthen and

formalize the university-industry partnership.

The emphasis on the commercialization of research findings by the

university and grants provider, namely the Ministry of Science, Technology

and Environment through the Intensification of Research in Priority Areas

(IRPA) mechanism, has provided a strong impetus for UKM to establish

links with industries. UKM also has been awarded a special status by

the Malaysian Government – this implies that UKM is entitled to a set of


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financial incentives such as 100 per cent Investment Tax Allowance (ITA)

and non-financial incentives such as intellectual property protection.

Thus the group feels that a strategic plan or a proposal which seeks

to increase the amount of collaborative research with industry (R&D) is

timely and of benefit to assist UKM sustain its Research University status.

B. Reasons for partnership with industry

In UKM, most research activities are geared towards applied research.

This is in line with the government policy of granting research to universities

and research institutions based on research output with a potential for

commercialization. Like any other academics institutions, the role of

UKM’s academic staff can be divided into three main categories –

teaching, research, and community services. However, research activities

which lead to a publication is considered to be the most important factor

in terms of promotion and career development of academic staff.

During the Seventh Malaysia Plan (1995-2000), UKM obtained

approximately RM 70 million (approximately US$ 18.4 million) in research

grants, indicating that the university has a strong foundation in research

activities with respect to manpower and infrastructures capability. A total

of 350 research projects have benefited from the grants which mainly

focus on Biotechnology, Advanced Materials, Information-Communication

Technology, Medical Sciences, Agroindustry, Manufacturing as well as

Social Sciences such as Urbanization and Environmental Impact. The

establishment of Unit Penyelidikan Kualiti Makanan (UNIPEQ) (Food

Quality Research Unit) is another example indicating that a group of

academic staff in UKM has the ability to form and manage a research

entity that survives on income from projects and consultancy work with

industries.


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UKM’s management staff at all levels (from the top level to the Head

of the Programme) has shown very positive support to the idea of

developing a partnership with industries. UKM’s management recognizes

the contribution of faculty members bringing in money through research

grants to the university by taking this into account in the promotional

exercise. The university has provided a venue to assist research groups

in terms of research proposal preparation and evaluation, research

progress monitoring and fund management by establishing a Centre for

Research Management. UKM also promotes a Lead Scholar concept

whereby a senior scholar, normally a Professor or Associate Professor,

will formulate and lead a research group. He or she will be responsible

for co-ordinating research activities as well as obtaining funds from local

or international sources.

However, to increase the support and involvement of academic staff,

UKM’s management should formulate a friendlier environment towards

research. This should be done by providing more space for research

laboratories and equipment, and increasing the number and level of

support staff (such as more qualified research officers to assist in

conducting research as well as operating the related equipment).

Currently, as the majority of laboratory support staff are not university

graduates, their capabilities are limited.

UKM’s leaders realize the importance of university-industry

partnerships but the initiative to develop them is to rely mainly on

individuals or groups of academic staff. Nonetheless, a basic infrastructure

such as a building has been set up by UKM to attract industries to carry

out research in UKM. The UKM-MTDC Smart Technology Centre, for

example, was established by UKM to promote research with industries

with the aim to commercialize research products.


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C. Choosing a project: Research and Development (R&D)

1. Resources allocation

Table 1. Allocation of staff time to various functions

Undergraduate Postgraduate Fundamental Applied Administrationteaching teaching research research (%)

(%) (%) (%) (%)

Teaching faculty 30-50 0-15 30-40 0-25

Independent research - 0-10 60-70 0-20faculty

Research assistants 5-10 90-95 -

Technicians 70-90 10-30 -

Secretaries - - - - 100

Table 2. Allocation of funds, equipment and space to variousfunctions

Undergraduate Postgraduate Fundamental Applied Administrationteaching teaching research research (%)

(%) (%) (%) (%)

University funding 7 1 92

Other funding - 20 75 5

Laboratory space 90 10 -

Other space 60 - 40

Equipment 80 20 -

Table 1 shows the estimated times allocated by different levels of

UKM staff to different tasks as a percentage of their annual working

time. The time allocated for research by university teachers, namely 30-

40 per cent of their annual working time, can be considered adequate as

research activities are also supported by research assistants whose time

spent is around 90 per cent.


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Although the time allocated by staff is acceptable in the conduct of

research, the allocation of funds, equipment and space for research

purposes by the university, as shown in Table 2, is small. Most of the

research funding come from other resources such as the National Science

Foundation (NSF), the Intensification of Research in Priority Areas (IRPA)

grant of the Ministry of Science, Technology and Environment (MSTE),

the Toray Foundation (TF), etc.

UKM funding for administration seems very high – 92 per cent. That is

because a large amount of money has to be spent on salaries. It is

rather difficult to contemplate any new research venture with industry

with the present allocation unless the university or industry provides some

additional funding.

2. Assessing the research strength

UKM has several centres of excellence/expertise. Six of them, listed

in Table 3, show a very high potential for collaborative projects with industry.

Table 3. UKM’s Centres of excellence/expertise

Centres of excellence/expertise Potential for collaborative project

Food quality research 5 – High demand

Microelectronics 5 – High demand

Courseware development 5 – High demand

Gene research (Genomic and Biotechnology) 5 – High demand

Malay World and Civilization (ATMA) 5 – High demand

Environment and Development (LESTARI) 5 – High demand

Note: Scale 1 is poor, scale 5 is excellent – high industrial demand.

The major industrial sectors that can be served by UKM are food,

electronics, natural products, ICT and health industries. Many research

groups, especially in centres of excellence, have already developed strong


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contacts with industries with a good potential for collaborative projects.

For some areas, such as microelectronics and food technology, further

development for collaborative projects is very possible if the research

groups in UKM and the related industries can form a task force to design

the projects. However, there are some constraints in materializing this –

issues like confidentiality, intellectual property rights, software copyright

and the unwillingness of industry to put money in at an early stage of a

project are common. In order to overcome this, an understanding between

the university and industry must be developed. The terms of reference

related to the project must be properly discussed and agreed upon by

both parties.

In the previous section, we mentioned that research is almost fully

funded from other sources. It is necessary for UKM to redistribute its

funding to support the cost of launching an initiative for a collaborative

project. The minimum resources required to launch an initiative is less

than 30 per cent of the overall resources for the research project.


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3. Potential benefits for industries and UKM

Table 4. Benefits for industries

Benefits Comments

Free or low-cost technical support Available.for R&D projects frompostgraduate students.

Access to university laboratory Available with a negotiable price.equipment to recruit researchers.

Attracting better skills to industries. Possible, through short-term attachmentof academic staff to industries. Shortcourses organized by UKM and offeringjobs to good graduates.

Having information from Possible, through seminars and specialuniversities on international talks by UKM staff.developments.

Table 5. Benefits for UKM

Benefits Comments

Become interested in economic Commercialization of research productsresults of its research. is emphasized in applied researchconducted in UKM.

Leads to consulting in industries. UKM encourages its academic staff toundertake consultancy works

Gradual learning leading to further Possible. There is a non-paid leavemobility to industries and new scheme for UKM staff intending to holdpositions for UKM personnel at the positions in industries for a certaininterface level between UKM and period of time.industries, in scientific, technologicaland industrial agencies.

Benefits to the postgraduate Currently practiced by UKM throughcurriculum: increased relevance of appointment of senior officers fromtaught courses and opportunities for industries to sit in assessmentproject work. committees for postgraduate curricula.

Improved opportunities for future Yes.employment for students.


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Access to equipment from industries. Available.

Availability of senior technical staff Very rare for teaching but quitefor teaching and supervision of common for supervision of projects.projects.

4. An R&D programme – food quality research

A strong commitment from UKM leaders is expected because UKM

has already established a company called ‘UKM Pakarunding Sdn. Bhd.’

to deal with industries on collaborative projects. An initial loan has been

provided by UKM to start the project. In addition, we can secure funding

from a Strategic Research Grant from the Malaysian Ministry of Science,

Technology and Environment (MSTE). A proposal related to the project

has to be submitted to the Ministry for approval. The chance to secure

the grant is good since UKM and the Ministry put great emphasis on

collaboration with industry for the grant application.

The ‘Food Quality Research Unit’ (UNIPEQ) is a unit offering a wide

spectrum of services for small and medium-size food industries. UNIPEQ

engages consultants from the university’s academic staff specialising in

various fields related to food science and technology, nutrition, chemistry,

microbiology and marketing. Currently, there are ten active consultants

serving UNIPEQ. Also, UNIPEQ has a team of full-time technical staff to

ensure prompt and reliable services.

UNIPEQ was initiated by a group of academic staff from the Department

of Food Science (DFS) to set up a ‘business entity’ within the Department.

Its sole purpose is to have a link with the food industries locally and

abroad. The proposal was accepted and received favourable support from

the top management of the university. Thus a sizeable amount of financial

support was given in the form of a loan to strengthen UNIPEQ. This

financial support enables UNIPEQ to equip its laboratories with state-of-

the-art instrumentation to carry out reliable and accurate analytical

services. The priority activity of UNIPEQ is to assist food industries,


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particularly the small and medium-size food industries, with respect to

training, analytical services and R&D.

As the local food industry seeks new markets, manufactures need to

upgrade the skills of their workforce to enable the smooth adoption of

new technologies, to keep abreast of new developments in nutritional

labelling compliances and adoption of internationally recognized food

safety and quality control systems. The whole food industry, including

the service sector, needs to comply with government expectations in

term of the hygienic policies and procedures, food hygiene training for all

food handlers and prescribed food safety systems in all categories of the

food industry. The courses offered can be in the form of in-house training,

attachment to UNIPEQ or public workshops and seminars. These training

programmes will lead to greater collaboration with industries and mutual

benefit between the university and industry.

Food analysis services remain the top income earner for UNIPEQ.

Facing stiff competition from other private research laboratories, UNIPEQ

has succeeded in maintaining business from past customers while

attracting new customers to its services. In 2000, UNIPEQ provided food

analyses for 80 different food companies. Food analysis services will

continue to play a significant role when manufacturers are required to

provide consumers with product information labels, particularly nutritional

food labelling. This ruling, coupled with the growing awareness by the

public concerning cleanliness, the quality level and health related to food

consumption, will result in greater demand for information obtained

through food analysis.

One of the key factors in the food analysis trade is pricing strategy.

UNIPEQ has revised its service rate in order to stay competitive. UNIPEQ

is now concentrating on efforts to increase the number of long-term service

contracts rather than on smaller more infrequent customers. This will


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enable UNIPEQ to plan its laboratory analysis work more effectively in

order to maintain an economical and efficient operation.

UNIPEQ is committed towards improving its services and to gain

recognition as a laboratory of distinction through competent and

professional staff members, and an exceptional laboratory practice

system.

UKM can offer the relevant academic expertise to help the industry

solve their problems. We can expect a very positive support from research

colleagues if there are some incentives available. They can make

themselves available in terms of timing and location for the programme

because the number of man-hours to be allocated by team members

has been agreed upon earlier and stated in the project proposal. It is part

of the annual appraisal of the staff and they normally abide by it.

About 10 per cent of UKM academic staff are professors who excel in

their own fields and can contribute to administer the programme. UKM

also has a lead scholar scheme whereby a senior staff member will lead

a research project related to his/her field. The costs of development can

be obtained from the university’s development fund as well as from other

government agencies and partner industries. There might, however, be a

clash between the demand of the programme and the demand of the

university on colleagues’ time. Therefore the research colleagues will

have to spend their extra time for the programme. As recognition for their

effort, the consultants should be given some form of financial rewards

commensurate with their contribution to any particular projects. The

consultants can be invited and given payment on a project basis.


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the submission from Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia.

Comments on the Group’s SubmissionComments on the Group’s SubmissionComments on the Group’s SubmissionComments on the Group’s SubmissionComments on the Group’s Submissionby Nadine Burquel




Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM)Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM)Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM)Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM)Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM)Bangi, MalaysiaBangi, MalaysiaBangi, MalaysiaBangi, MalaysiaBangi, Malaysia

A proposal for an action project in food quality researchA proposal for an action project in food quality researchA proposal for an action project in food quality researchA proposal for an action project in food quality researchA proposal for an action project in food quality research

The taskThe taskThe taskThe taskThe task

Under the Assignment for Module 5 you were asked to outline anaction project to operate a major strategic change in your university,the size of which would depend on your own current situation.

You were asked to give the reasons/motivations behind your planneduniversity-industry partnership, to outline your action project, toidentify your strengths in relation to market needs, to explain howyou were planning ‘to get things started’ and finally to draft yourproposal in one of the three proposed areas of continuing education,R&D or undergraduate studies, following additional guidelines providedin Module 5.

Analysis and commentsAnalysis and commentsAnalysis and commentsAnalysis and commentsAnalysis and comments

The economic development of any country requires a high level ofresearch whose results can be applied to industrial development andcontribute to industrial work and competitiveness. While universities


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want to make the results of their research public, industry will keep itsresults confidential until it has secured their possible application andcommercialization. Malaysia as a country, and universities as one of theeconomic actors in the country, has well understood this. Your assignmentis an excellent example of the flexibility demonstrated by your universityto contribute to economic growth.

You describe the research strategy at your university and structuresin place to support this strategy. Your proposal is an action project toincrease collaborative research with industry in the field of foodresearch. As the Food Quality Research Unit (UNIPEQ) was set up byacademic staff as a research entity functioning on project andconsultancy income for work with industry, you can easily expand.

You operate in a highly favourable environment both at the nationallevel in Malaysia and at the institutional level in your university.With the Government (Ministry of Science, Technology andEnvironment) placing a strong emphasis on commercialization ofresearch findings, and on work in partnership with industry, andoffering both financial (100 per cent investment tax allowance) andnon-financial (intellectual property protection) incentives to do so, youhave significant opportunities for development. The universityleadership also strongly supports partnerships with the private sectorand has put in place the appropriate infrastructures to develop thesepartnerships. These are, for example, a centre for research management(which assists academic staff with monitoring research progress,preparing research proposals, and locating funding), a holding company(as the business arm of the university) or the Smart Technology Centre.You also mention the UKM Pakarunding Sdn. Bhd, a companyestablished to deal with industries on collaborative projects anduniversity development funds, which is a powerful tool to launch newinitiatives.


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You have clearly identified your centres of excellence (food qualityresearch, microelectronics, courseware development) for which yousee high demand and potential of collaborative projects with industryin the food, electronics, natural products, ICT and health sectors. Itwould be interesting to have more information about the R&D policiesof these industries and about the level of foreign investment in Malaysiaand potentialities for R&D in that respect (i.e. adapting internationalproducts to the local market).

Research groups in these disciplines already have strong contactswith industry so it will be fairly easy to increase the amount of research.You are right to point to a number of potential difficulties in terms ofintellectual property, software copyright, and confidentiality. Thesehave to be carefully managed for the partnership with industry to besuccessful.

The time of academic staff is spent on teaching, research andcommunity services. There is a good balance between the proportionof time spent on all tasks. However, as in most universities, promotionand career development is always based on research results andpublications. Staff is given financial incentives to work on researchcontracts. Despite the facilities at your disposal, which I havesummarized above, you still believe that more space and equipmentshould be made available for research purposes. You also identifydifficulties in clashes between the demands of large research contractsand colleagues’ time required for core activities.

Joint R&D projects have benefits for both the university andindustry. They do require a careful specification of purposes, outcomesand levels of commitment. As long as academic expertise of theuniversity and technological orientation of the industry have been wellmatched, both in content and strength, collaboration will be successfulwith systematic project planning and management.


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You have identified very clearly the benefits of co-operation forindustry which has access to free or low cost technical support forR&D projects, access to the university laboratory and equipment andthe opportunity to attract better skills and to have information fromuniversities on international developments.

For the university, benefits are in commercialization of researchresults, consulting opportunities for staff and student placements inindustry and to improve the curriculum in order to make it morerelevant to the needs of industry.

What an excellent example of an entrepreneurial university!


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the submissions for the Assignment for Module 5 – a proposal for an

action project.



by Nadine Burquel

IIEP/ESMU Distance education course





The Assignment for Module 5 specified that each participating

university should work on a concrete action project that it might undertake

to increase co-operation with industry, in a particular sector where this

co-operation might take place. Module 5 was about addressing important

issues with a view to formulating such a project. The participating

universities made very good use of the approach, checklists and

questions proposed in the Module.

The universities, which have participated in the course, ranged from

big, to much smaller ones. Some were created a few years ago; others

are long-established institutions; they are located in different economic

contexts which determine the size of the action project it is possible to

develop in the short- and medium-term. Some are located in industrialized

regions, others in more rural ones; some national governments are strongly

supportive and provide a range of incentives to promote co-operation

with the private sector. In some cases the law does (or does not) allow

universities to set up companies.


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With these differences in mind, all activities/partnerships with industry

have reached different degrees of development. A wide diversity of

projects was submitted by the group in the field of undergraduate

education, continuing education and R&D. Some universities submitted

more modest projects; others are at a more advanced level with well-

developed organizational and structural arrangements in place, or about

to be set up, to support the university’s strategic aim to co-operate with

the private sector.

Some universities have long lists of what they will/should do, but the

economic reality does not yet make it possible to develop such activities.

Some submissions were therefore of a more general nature, but with a

clear identification of the reasons why partnerships with the private sector

should be developed, an analysis of objectives and a list of possible

activities. Over time, these proposals will need to be translated into

concrete action plans so that strategies can be fully implemented.

It seems that in most cases the university leadership and individual

professors are fully supporting all initiatives taken to increase their

collaboration with industry. The university benefits from opportunities for

staff exchange, student placements, consulting, contract research and

better understanding of the needs of the private sector. Enterprises will

gain access to free or low-cost technical support for R&D projects, access

to university laboratory equipment to recruit researchers; they can attract

better skills to industries and have information from universities on

international developments.

Student placements are a very useful ‘tool’ for reaching out to

enterprises. They are an excellent way to make the curriculum more

practically oriented, to have access to enterprises and understand more

about their needs. They often lead to future activities in the field of

continuing education and R&D.


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In many proposals, small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) have

been recognized as important economic factors, which do need a lot of

advice/training to remain competitive. A number of universities have

understood the need to work with them.

A clear analysis of market needs and opportunities in the market are

vital before launching any new initiative. Some universities need to make

a much more thorough analysis of these needs/opportunities.

The question of intellectual property rights (IPR) and patenting was

addressed in several proposals. The ESMU Office has recently carried

out some research to look at various ways in which universities have

dealt with the issue. We have found five different Models:

• In Model 1, the university owns the IPR. An internal office advises on

contract research terms and informs enterprises about funding

opportunities. An external office deals with IPR issues around university-

enterprise relationships.

• In Model 2, the university owns the IPR, but has a separate Foundation

to deal with IPR issues. It is the Foundation which studies the

commercial potential of the invention. In case the invention is not

considered worthwhile of investment for protection, the IPR goes back

to the researcher. Otherwise some arrangement is made between the

researcher and the Foundation to divide the proceeds.

• In Model 3, the researcher owns the IPR. An internal office takes care

of contract research and consultancies. Incubators are established to

nurture the inventions in spin-off companies. A possible drawback can

be the lack of communication between IPR holders and eventual

licensees.


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• In Model 4, the researcher owns the IPR. A company wholly owned by

the university is established for the commercialization aspects of the

inventions.

• In Model 5, the university owns the IPR and sets up a company to

manage all the knowledge transfer process with an extensive use of

expertise and advice from the Board of Governors.

Fairly little mention was made of opportunities for international

partnerships or international funding for new activities. It would be worth

exploring these. International aid programmes can be the main trigger to

start university-industry partnerships, and rebuild the economy, in cases

where neither local government, nor the private sector, is yet in a position

to initiative any development. The Asia-Link programme can also provide

some opportunities for projects in the field of university-enterprise co-

operation in co-operation with European universities – see http://

europa.eu.int/comm/europaid/projects/asia-link/index“en.htm. Joint

training programmes, R&D, and student exchanges may be increased

through international co-operation and projects involving universities and

industry from other countries. A good starting point would be to look at

existing international programmes in which the university is involved

and analyze how these can increase.

Important issues were raised in all proposals, which are key to

successful project development in the field of university-industry

partnership in terms of:

• Financial arrangements. It is essential to cost and price adequately

and aim for full cost recovery. If projects are to be viable in the long

term, all direct costs should be clearly calculated, including costs of

personnel, equipment and university overheads. In parallel, you

should determine the price that will be charged; additional income for

the university should be produced.

http://europa.eu.int/comm/europaid/projects/asia-link/index%E2%80%9Cen.htm

http://europa.eu.int/comm/europaid/projects/asia-link/index%E2%80%9Cen.htm


125

• Staffing: contracts, conditions of service, staff reallocation. How

much staff time will be involved in new projects? Will staff give time

voluntarily under existing contracts and receive ad hoc payments for

services rendered? Will staff time be reallocated? Will new staff be

appointed to deliver services? All these questions need to be carefully

addressed.

• Nature of organizational support for the partnership. Depending

on the size of the projects, some organizational changes might need

to be made in the university. It will be important to have a business plan

with clear targets of what will be achieved over what period of time.

What is the support of the university leadership? Will there be an

informal group working on the project or a more formal project

structure? More elaborated arrangements in the form of a new

programme co-ordinator or setting up new structures might be

necessary.

• Business planning procedures: establishing short and long term

objectives. As far as specialist administration and physical resources

for new major projects are concerned, as activities grow, short-term

new administrative staff or even a long-term business plan with a

specialist administration and resources, to meet the demands of the

projects, may be needed.

To conclude, I would like to refer to some examples of entrepreneurial

universities in Europe, which may provide interesting examples of

partnerships with the private sector. These are outlined in the book of

Burton Clark, ‘Creating Entrepreneurial Universities: Organizational

Pathways of Transformation’, published by Pergamon in New York, 1998.

The book describes how five European universities have been transformed

to become more flexible and contributed to economic development in

their region.


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You may also wish to browse the site of the European Consortium of

Innovative Universities (ECIU) http://www.eciu.org, and the sites of some

European universities very active in the field of co-operation with the

private sector, e.g. the University of Limerick in Ireland which has

developed a very successful co-operative student placement programme

(http://www.ul.ie), the University of Strathclyde in the UK

(www.strath.ac.uk), the University of Twente in the Netherlands (http://

www.utwente.nl/uk/) and the Catholic University of Louvain in Belgium

(http://www.ucl.ac.be/en/intro.html) – an excellent example of research

management and commercialization of university activities which has

materialized into a very successful science park.

As far as adaptation of the undergraduate curriculum is concerned,

you may find some interesting ideas in the ‘problem-based learning’

approach developed by some European universities, for example at the

University of Maastricht in the Netherlands (http://www.unimaas.nl/

default.asp?taal=en) or the University of Aalborg in Denmark (http://

www.auc.dk/english/index.htm). Problem-based learning (PBL) is an

instructional method that challenges students to ‘learn to learn’, working

co-operatively in groups to seek solutions to real problems. These

problems are used to engage students’ curiosity and initiate learning the

subject matter. PBL prepares students to think critically and analytically,

and to find and use appropriate learning resources. It seems to be very

effective.

My final recommendation would be to look at these and other examples

to see how other universities have dealt with concerns similar to yours,

but to adopt strategies and structures which are most appropriate in

your own case. No example of ‘good practice’ can simply be transferred

from one country to another, but lessons can be learnt from success

stories and failures, and ideas can be adapted.

http://www.eciu.org

http://www.ul.ie

http://www.strath.ac.uk

http://www.utwente.nl/uk

http://www.utwente.nl/uk

http://www.ucl.ac.be/en/intro.html

http://www.unimaas.nl/default.asp?taal=en

http://www.unimaas.nl/default.asp?taal=en

http://www.auc.dk/english/index.htm

http://www.auc.dk/english/index.htm

127

SECTION III. EVALUATION OF THE DISTANCE EDUCATIONCOURSE

The last item of the course was an in-depth evaluation by the

participants. Such an evaluation is particularly important since distance

education courses are still a relatively new training activity at IIEP

and the instructional design of this course is still subject to change.

Evaluation was made of (i) the attainment of the course objectives,

(ii) the participants’ expectations, (iii) the course organization, design

and content, and (iv) communications.

As a basis for the participants’ evaluation, a 5-page questionnaire

was sent at the end of the course to each participant. The

questionnaire contained 20 multiple-choice questions, each of them

having provision for adding individual comments by the respondents.

A total of 63 of the 67 participants submitted filled-in evaluation

questionnaires by the final deadline, i.e. a response rate of 94 per

cent – a clear indication of the interest and motivation of the

participants. The replies to the multiple-choice questions gave the

course team at IIEP/ESMU a comprehensive input on the functioning

of the course from the perspective of the participants. The

participants provided a total of 621 comments and suggestions, many

of them very detailed and informative.

1. Attainment of the objectives – participants’ expectations

Almost all of the respondents thought that the four basic objectives

of the course (set out in Section 1, Sub-section E of this report) were

attained (“very well” or “well”).


128

Not surprisingly, by far the most frequent personal expectation

was “to learn more about university-industry partnerships”. 87 per

cent considered that their personal expectations had been met “very

much” or “much”. Typical comments were:

“The course has given me more than I expected. It gives a holistic

look at the linkage, such as the structure, finance, and incentives.”

“I was pleased to learn that a lot of universities, not just those in

our part of the world, have managed to cope with resource

deficiencies. The examples presented in the coursework hold a

lot of lessons and have allowed me and my team members to

compare and validate some of the practices within the university

as they relate to university-industry relationships.”

“Before the course, I thought of university-industry partnerships

as something that we, as academicians, must do to fulfil our duty.

I had no idea that the interfaces involve the structure within the

organization, motivation and incentive, and the income that can

be generated for other purposes.”

“I learnt a lot from sharing of information and reading materials

provided. The models adopted by various universities by case

studies have given me an insight into policies and strategies for

establishing partnerships which are mutually beneficial to both

the university and industry.”

2. Course organization and schedule

The course was designed to require about five hours of work per

week and the Heads of the universities had been asked to ensure the

release time of the participants. However, the responses to the

evaluation questionnaire showed that although about half of the

Evaluation of the distance education course

129

respondents spent about the required amount of time (or more) on

the course, the other half spent less time than expected.

The main problem raised in the comments from respondents was

that their regular daily work did not allow them to spend more time

on the course. Although many of them had apparently been released

from their regular duties for an average of three to five hours per

week to undertake the activities related to the course, the reality was

that their work still needed to be done and that they thus had less

time than anticipated to devote to the course.

Concerning the overall schedule of the course, participants were

asked specifically whether the schedule allowed enough time for the

activities and tasks. Almost all of them (60 of the 63 respondents)

stated that the time was adequate. The timing of the course within

the academic year was deemed to be appropriate by 50 participants,

several of the others commenting that it might be preferable to hold

the course during a different period. However, part of the problem

here is clearly the different academic years of the countries in the

region:

“This course is offered during our summer months. I therefore

had a lot of time to spend on the course.”

“This course took place in the middle of the academic year. I found

it very difficult to concentrate on reading the modules.”

“I would suggest the course can be undertaken in June-September

when university activity is at a minimum.”

“Best time would be March to June.”

“It does not matter what time of the year since we are always busy

all the year round.”


130

A Guide was prepared for the course for the co-ordinators and

participants. It was intended to help overcome some of the problems

of distance learning by giving a clear overview of how the course

was organized and how it would proceed during the three months.

When asked about the guide, all of the participants said that they had

found it “very useful” or “useful”.

3. Course design

1. Individual reading and reflection

62 of the 63 respondents stated that the tasks assigned in the

course contributed to the process of reflection (“very much” or

“much”).

“Based on the information we gathered as a result of the

assignments we were able to make an in-depth deliberation about

our own systems and structures.”

“It led me to think of relevant (but not so obvious) issues which

have escaped me before this.”

2. Group work

Nearly all of the respondents found the group work to be either

“very useful” (40 participants) or “useful” (21 participants). Typical

comments were:

“Group work is necessary since many of the insights on the topics

learnt resulted from group discussions.”

“Group work not only helped us consolidate our ideas/responses

to the assignments and present results of investigation but it also


131

gave us the opportunity to foster camaraderie, interpersonal

relationships, and team spirit among all of us.”

“The sharing of experiences and new ideas has given me a new

dimension in running my Centre.”

However, participants mentioned some problems:

“Due to the fact that my group consisted of persons from different

Faculties and Departments, we had some difficulty in finding a

suitable time for meetings.”

“Somehow (our) group, dynamic as a whole, did not progress as

well as it should do despite the availability of various channels of

communication. Most likely it was due to the already heavy

commitments/workload of some of the group members.”

3. Interaction with the IIEP/ESMU course team

Participants reported positively on the feedback from the course

team at IIEP/ESMU, all of them considering that it was either “very

useful” or “useful”. Typical observations were:

“I found the comments incisive yet encouraging. Since I don’t have

any experience in this area, the comments really expanded my

thinking.”

“I am very pleased at the speed at which the feedbacks was

provided. It’s something I should emulate in my work.”

“The comments gave meaningful insights to the work submitted

and enhanced what the group has discussed.”


132

“The feedback helped me to look at issues more critically and

they provided alternative views for strategies adopted. This

contributed to better understanding and a contribution for future

strategies.”

4. Interaction with other universities

Interaction among the different groups within universities was

essentially organized through an on-line debate on short case studies,

which had been prepared by the groups on the financial management

of one project in the domain of university-industry partnerships.

Participants were asked to formulate questions on a selected case

study of their choice and address it to the group which had prepared

the study.

On this item, the responses were more diverse. Although 22 of

the respondents “very much” appreciated the interaction with course

participants in other universities and a further 27 “much” appreciated

it, the remaining 12 respondents did “not very much” appreciate it.

(Very much) “Reactions and comments given were interesting and

helpful.”

(Very much) “The interaction with other participants is very

useful – we were able to ask each other questions and this made

the problems clearer.”

(Very much) “Although I did not directly raise questions, reading

the comments made me realize that our concerns are happening

everywhere. This increased my confidence in addressing these

issues.”

(Much) “The internet is really wonderful in this respect.”


133

(Much) “Working experiences are not easy to share by writing.

Prefer discussing face-to-face.”

(Not very much) “It was good but not that active.”

(Not very much) “I just wish there was more of a chance to go on-

line and conduct synchronous discussions – using Netmeeting –

. and not just exchanges of e-mails. That would have allowed the

members of the class – my classmates! – to interact more actively

with each other.”

(Not very much) “Some groups are not so enthusiastic in asking

or answering questions in the session of group discussion. So, the

advantage that we can get from sharing knowledge is little.”

4. Course content

1. Relation of course to professional goals

Although 57 of the respondents considered that the course content

to be either “very much” or “much” related to their professional goals,

the 6 remaining respondents thought that it was “not very much”

related. The comments included:

(Very much) “The course greatly affirms my contention that it is

only through connectivity/linkages with industries and other

educational institutions that a university/individuals can survive

the challenges and the demands of the 21st century.”

(Very much) “I am a practicing consultant to industry and the

content made me aware of ways to do this under more

institutional arrangements.”


134

(Very much) “It provided the framework for understanding what

I have done regarding the development of university-industry

links. And it also helped create new ideas and strategies.”

(Much) “Currently, our university is striving for academic and

financial survival. With the knowledge gained from the course I

believe that in future I can see my university smoothly go towards

university-industry partnership, so that it could sustain and

challenge its academic life in the region and the world.”

(Much) “I might not be involved too much on the interface with

industry in the past except to do it as part of our duty. I believe

this course has given me a new vision of how to systematically

interface with industry not only to fulfil my duty, but also for my

staff to actively participate in the interface through various

incentive schemes.”

(Not very much) “Managing university-industry partnerships

should be the goal of the School or Department (I belong to the

Finance and Accounting Department).

2. Suggestions for additional topics

Among the additional topics that the participants would have liked

to be covered were:

• How to build the partnership in the beginning;

• The best approach to establish university-industry linkages;

• Factors that contribute to success or failure of developing

university-industry partnerships;

• Introduce an input (or perhaps a module) from the industries/

companies that have successfully partnered universities;

• A sample of a university-industry Memorandum of Agreement;


135

• Have a much larger framework, covering not only university-

industry but all other sectors as well like university-government,

other universities, non-government organizations, public

organizations and international organizations;

• Technology transfer and mode of operations;

• Intellectual property policy or management at universities;

• Funding options;

• Policies on staff involved in university-industry relations;

• Technology pricing;

• Departmental autonomy in the context of university-industry

partnerships.

5. Communications

1. E-mail communication

Participants were asked whether they found e-mail an adequate

way to communicate with the course team and the other participants.

This was an extremely important question, given the dependence of

the course on this communication method and the comfort level of

the participants with its use.

The responses to the evaluation questionnaire were very positive

in that 45 of the respondents said that it was an “excellent” way to

communicate, and 15 said it was “good”. Only three respondents

thought it was “fair” and nobody said it was “poor”.

“There is no better way to communicate fast than by e-mail.”

“E-mail as a way to communicate with the IIEP/ESMU course team

and the other participants is excellent – it suits different level of

computer users, it is fast and convenient to everyone.”


136

“However, I found that e-mail communication has to be part of a

working culture in order for it to be efficient. A very good example

is the way it’s being used by the IIEP/ESMU course team. I hope

that such a high level of efficiency will evolve in more institutions.”

2. Technical problems

Participants were asked whether they had experienced any

technical problems with sending/ receiving e-mails and/or with

having access to the web site of the Course. The responses were

something of a surprise for the course team – about half of the

respondents had in fact experienced problems (29 of them “occasional

problems” and two of them “frequent problems”). The problems were

mostly due to the inadequate computer installations in several of the

participating universities.

“Our machine and server were not good enough. There were

frequent errors, which can delay our communication.”

“Unfortunately, system breakdown was a problem.”

“Problems due to my computer and my university’s computer

network.”

“Most of the technical problems were associated with server/

network access on my side.”

“There were occasional power outages at our end.”

3. Opinions on the web site of the course

A total of 56 of the respondents said that the web site of the course

was either “very useful” or “useful”. Six participants thought that it

was “not very useful” and one participant did not reply to this

question.


137

4. Visits to the web site

This question produced a very mixed response – 14 respondents

visited the web site “several times a week”, 29 visited the site “weekly”,

16 visited “monthly” and 4 “never” visited the site.

6. General comments

1. Experience of participating in a distance educationcourse

Participants were asked to comment on their experience of

participating in a distance education course. This question produced

an extremely positive response – 33 replied “excellent” and

29 “good”. Only 1 respondent judged the experience “poor”. Among

the comments were the following:

(Excellent) “It gives me the opportunity to widen my knowledge

on university-industry interactions without having to leave the

office.”

(Excellent) “With the advent of technology, similar on-line courses

are welcome. Students are not pressured to come to class at a

specified time and the participants just agree on a common time

to have face-to-face interactions when needed.”

(Excellent) “I have learned a lot, “visited” more countries without

leaving my place of work.”

(Excellent) “Very rewarding and highly stimulating. It provided

us with adequate knowledge, workplace skills, and learning

experiences in meeting future job needs, performance

requirements, and increased job responsibilities once we

formalize our partnerships with the industries.”


138

(Good) “Only complaint is that distance education does not give

me the opportunity to get to know my colleagues on a personal

level.”

(Poor) “It is difficult to control and manage the course.”

2. Strengthened institutional capacity building

In looking to the future, participants were asked whether they

felt that the course had contributed to their university’s capacity to

develop university-industry partnerships. The responses were

resoundingly positive, nearly all of the respondents (60) saying “very

much” or “much”. Only 3 participants thought “not very much”.

(Very much) “The course has contributed a lot to our institution’s

capacity to develop university-industry partnerships, especially

in creating our vision and mission statement which is of utmost

importance.”

(Very much) “The course gave new perspective about university-

industry partnership and good input to my institution in

developing this linkage. After this course, our group will make a

presentation about this course in front of the university’s

management so that the action plan will be done soon.”

(Very much) “After following this course we have a comparison

model with other universities to develop in our university.”

3. Suggestions for future courses

Finally, participants were asked to make suggestions to improve

further distance education courses organized by IIEP/ESMU. This

question produced a wide spectrum of replies as illustrated by the

following selection:


139

• Try to improve the enthusiasm of the groups in participating in the

group discussion.

• The course length and time are quite short. We would benefit from

a longer course.

• The views and experiences of industry that has been involved with

university-industry interactions would give a better understanding

to universities about how industry feels and what industry looks

for in such interactions.”

• Having completed the course, I have the feeling that the emphasis

on how to develop the linkages between university and industry

and make it sustainable is still not strong enough.

• It would be good if IIEP/ESMU could add some more reading

materials or attach a list of reference books or related web sites

other than the web site of the Course.

• Set out clearly to participating universities or agencies that should

be the co-ordinators. Sometimes co-ordinators are too busy to

keep track of what’s going on with group members thus making

distance learning less effective and very frustrating for those who

are really interested to get things done.

7. Final remarks

The evaluation has shown that the format of the distance

education course has been quite successful in meeting the needs of

the participants, and that (for about 95 per cent of them) it did achieve

its objective of contributing to institutional and national capacity

building.

In particular, working together as a group on issues, problems and

tasks provided the participants with a rare occasion for the joint

exploration of their institution’s problems and potential solutions

concerning university-industry partnerships. This has certainly


140

contributed to the development of an institutional vision for the

development of university-industry partnerships. The distance

education format thus offered a significant advantage compared with

face-to-face workshops and intensive courses in which only one or

possibly two participants from a particular institution are usually able

to participate.

The fact that the distance education course had a much longer

schedule compared with a typical IIEP face-to-face course meant that

the assignments set throughout the distance education course and

the written submissions from the groups provided an opportunity

for deeper reflection and insight on the course content.

As participants remained in their institutional setting, they usually

(but apparently not always in this course!) had ready access to

documentation and references that could be used to enhance their

responses and comments.

The course also allowed the establishment by the participants and

the course team of a wide-ranging documentation base on the

management of university-industry partnerships. This rich collection

of documents was made available to all participants on the IIEP/ESMU

Course web site.

The results of this evaluation will be used to review and if necessary

revise the instructional design of this distance education course. A

particular effort will be made to diversify the assignments attached

to each module and to improve the interaction among the different

university groups in order to allow for more “inter-learning”.

141

APPENDIX 1. LIST OF PARTICIPANTS

1. Cambodia: Royal University of Phnom Penh

Man Suos Head, English Department

Sok-Luong Chan Deputy Head, English Department

Hok Roth Deputy Head, English Department

Chandarith Neak Senior Lecturer, English

Department

2. China: Dalian University of Technology

Guo Dongming Vice-President of the University

Hui Xiaoli Vice-Director, Graduate School

Sun Wei Vice-Director, Division of Science

and Technology

Huang Bo Vice-General Manager, DUT LEASCI

Technologies Co. Ltd

Ding Zhengping Instructor, Management School

3. Indonesia: Atma Jaya Catholic University

M.M. Lanny W. Pandjaitan Lecturer, Electrical Engineering

Department

Vincentius Budi Kartadinata Head, Electric Machinery

Laboratory

Harjadi Gunawan Head, Mechanical Engineering

Department.

Petrus Ridaryanto Lecturer, Accounting Department

Rahmawati Lecturer in Marketing, Department

of Management

Efendi Lecturer in Management,

Department of Economics


142

4. Indonesia: University of Indonesia

Raldi Artono Koestoer Head, Heat Transfer Laboratory,

Faculty of Engineering

Boy Nurtjahyo Moch Lecturer, Faculty of Engineering

Hendro Prabowo Vice-Dean for Ventures & External

Relations, Faculty of Economy

Andri Syahreza Assistant to Vice-Dean for Ventures

& External Relations, Faculty of

Economy

5. Korea (Republic): Ewha Womans University

Sung Ku Kim Dean, Research Affairs

Yoon Suk Suh Dean of Business School

Kilhyoun Kim Chief Executive Officer,

NEMETECH

Insung Jung Director, Multimedia Education

Institute

Eun Hee Ha Associate Professor, Medical

School

6. Malaysia: Universiti Kebangsaan

Aminah Abdullah Deputy Dean, Research and

Graduate Study, Faculty of Science

and Technology

Ja’afar Bin Sahari Director, Advanced Engineering

Centre

Abdul Razak Daud Head, Materials Science

Programme, Faculty of Science and

Technology

Appendices

143

Zarina Shukur Industrial Training Coordinator,

Faculty of Information Science and

Technology

Mohd Ashari Idris Lecturer, Faculty of Business

Administration

7. Malaysia: Universiti Sains Malaysia

Wan Ahmad Kamil Mahmood Director, Corporate Development

Division

Mohamad Abdul Rahman University Registrar

Morshidi Sirat Professor of Urban Geography,

School of Humanities

Ahmad Hj Mohamad Associate Professor, School of

Distance Education

Yuserrie Zainuddin Lecturer, School of Management

8. Malaysia: University of Malaya

Muhamad Bin Zakaria Head, Technology Transfer &

Commercialization Department

Alias Daud Head, Research Development Unit

Marohaini Yusoff Head, Industrial Students’ Training

Unit

Jamaluddin Mohd Yunos Acting Director, Centre for

Continuing Education

9. Philippines: Ateneo de Manila University

Angelina T. Conel Assistant to the Vice-President for

Finance & Treasurer

Alberto L. Buenviaje Director for Internal Affairs

Venus C. Ibarra Chair, Finance & Accounting

Department


144

Temay G. Padero Assistant to the Vice-President for

Finance & Treasurer

Josefina Anna Musa-Rodriguez University Bursar

10. Philippines: De La Salle University Professional Schools Inc.

Paul Niño L. Meim Director of External Affairs,

College. of Computer Studies

Raymund Sison Dean, College of Computer Studies

Benito Teehankee Vice-Dean and Instructional

Technology Coordinator, Graduate

School of Business

11. Philippines: Polytechnic University of the Philippines

Milagrina A. Gomez Assistant to the Vice-President for

Academic Affairs

Norberto V. Caturay Executive Assistant to the

President

Theresita V. Atienza Dean, College of Science

Gisela May A. Albano Dean, College of Computer

Management and Information

Technology

Jessica B. Dalit Head, Instructional Media

Production, PUP Open University

12.Philippines: University of the Philippines - Diliman

Edward V. Deveza Technology Licensing Officer

Edison D. Cruz Director, Technology Management

Centre

Maria Sagrario R. Simbulan Deputy Director, Technology

Management Centre

Reuben T. Campos Computer Programmer III,

Computational Science Research

Centre

Appendices

145

13. Thailand: Assumption University

Bancha Saenghiran Vice-President for Academic

Affairs

Chamnong Jungthirapanich Dean, Graduate School of

Computer and Engineering

Management

Bancha Theerasatiankul Acting Dean, Faculty of Risk

Management and Industrial

Services

Kittiphan Techakittiroj Chairperson, Department of

Computer Engineering

Jirayut Poomontre Chairperson, Department of

Applied Statistics

14.Thailand: Suranaree University of Technology

Wut Dankittikul Head, Co-operative Education and

Career Development Project

Kasem Prabriputaloong Vice-Rector for Research and

Academic Services

Anant Oonsivilai Deputy Director, Technopolis

15.Viet-Nam: Cantho University

Le Quang Minh Rector of the University

Anh Tuan Nguyen Vice-Dean, College of Agriculture

Van Xe Do Head, Department of Sciences,

Graduate Studies, and

International Collaborations

Le Hoang Viet Director, Environmental

Engineering and Renewable

Energy Centre


146

APPENDIX 2. COURSE CALENDAR

Pre-course phase: Testing of communications, welcome andintroduction to the course

March 11-15 Testing e-mail communication.

Introduction of IIEP/ESMU team

and participants.

March 18-29 Preparation of institutional profiles and current

challenges in the management of university-

industry partnerships.

March 28 Group response 1

Groups e-mail institutional profiles.

Weeks 1 & 2 Module 1: Strategic management of university–industry partnerships

April 1-5 Individual task

Read Module 1 and prepare individual response

to Assignment 1.

April 8-12 Group task

Meeting to discuss Module 1 and to prepare

institutional response to Assignment 1.

April 11 Group response

Groups e-mail institutional response

on Assignment 1.

Weeks 3 & 4 Module 2: The management of interfaces

April 15 -19 Individual task

Read Module 2 and case study on YISSUM

Appendices

147

April 22-26 Group task

Meeting to discuss Module 2 and to prepare

group response for Assignment 2.

April 25 Group response

Groups e-mail their response to Assignment 2.

Weeks 5, 6, 7 & 8 Module 3: Financial management

April 29 – 3 May Individual task

Read Module 3 and reflect on appropriate

choice of mini case study.

May 6-10 Group task

Meeting to discuss Module 3 and prepare

collectively one mini case study from your

university.

May 9 Group response

Groups e-mail mini case study to the IIEP/ESMU.

May 13-24 On-line debate on a selected number of mini

case studies

Weeks 9 & 10 Module 4: Staff management

May 27-31 Individual task

Read Module 4 and reflect on questions of

Assignment 4.

June 3-7 Group task

Meeting to discuss questions of Assignment 4

and prepare collective answer.

June 6 Group response

Groups e-mail response to Assignment 4 to the

IIEP/ESMU


148

Weeks 11 & 12 Module 5: Action project

June 10-14 Individual task

Read Module 5 and reflect on questions of

Assignment 5

June 14 Group task

Meeting to select one area for an action project

and prepare project outline

June 24 Group response

Groups e-mail action project to IIEP/ESMU

July 5 IIEP/ESMU provide feedback on groups’ action

projects

Concluding Phase

July 1-5 Individual task

IIEP/ESMU e-mails individual questionnaires for

evaluation of the course.

July 5 Individual response

Individuals e-mail or fax evaluation form to IIEP/

ESMU.

IIEP publications and documents

More than 1,200 titles on all aspects of educational planning havebeen published by the International Institute for EducationalPlanning. A comprehensive catalogue is available in the followingsubject categories:

Educational planning and global issues

General studies – global/developmental issues

Administration and management of educationDecentralization – participation – distance education – school mapping – teachers

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Copies of the Catalogue may be obtained on request from: IIEP, Dissemination of Publications

[email protected]

Titles of new publications and abstracts may be consulted at thefollowing web site: http://www.unesco.org/iiep

mailto:[email protected]

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The International Institute for Educational Planning

The International Institute for Educational Planning (IIEP) is an internationalcentre for advanced training and research in the field of educational planning. It wasestablished by UNESCO in 1963 and is financed by UNESCO and by voluntarycontributions from Member States. In recent years the following Member States haveprovided voluntary contributions to the Institute: Denmark, Finland, Germany, Iceland,India, Ireland, Norway, Sweden and Switzerland.

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Designated Members:

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the management of university-industry partnerships in eastern asia

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