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University autonomy, IP legislation and academic patenting: Italy, 1996-2006

University autonomy, IP legislation and academic patenting: Italy, 1996-2006. Francesco Lissoni 1,2 , Michele Pezzoni 2,3 , Bianca Potì 4 , Sandra Romagnosi 5

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University autonomy, IP legislation and academic patenting: Italy, 1996-2006

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  1. University autonomy, IP legislation and academic patenting: Italy, 1996-2006 Francesco Lissoni1,2, Michele Pezzoni2,3, Bianca Potì4, Sandra Romagnosi5 1 GREThA – Université Bordeaux IV - France2 CRIOS– Università "L. Bocconi", Milan - Italy 3Dept of Economics, Università Milano-Bicocca - Italy 4CERIS-CNR, Rome - Italy5Parco ScientificoUniversità "Tor Vergata", Rome - ItalyAPE-INV Final Conference Paris, 3-4 / 9 / 2013

  2. Motivation & Research Questions • Contribute to recent literature on academic patenting in Italy (Europe) by: • What/Any trend in academic patenting? • Weight of academic patenting on total domestic patenting • Ownership: Universities’ share of IP over academic inventions (vs individuals’, PROs’, and business companies’ share) • Exploring links between (1) and two policy changes: • The granting of autonomy to universities (incl. financial autonomy), in 1989 (effective kick-off: 1995) • The introduction of the professor privilege, in 2001

  3. Reasons for focusing on universities’ autonomy • Policy: widespread diffusion of autonomy-granting/enhancing reforms in all Europe (e.g. “loiPecresse” in France, 2007); large universities’ quest for more autonomy (e.g. EUA’s report, 2009) • Scholarly research - in sociology: “entrepreneurial university” (Clark, 1993); in economics: autonomy&competition perfomance link (Aghion et al., 2009) •  Increasing emphasis on “third mission”: is it materializing? (weight of academic patenting) •  Decrease of “block grant” funding  project funding & technology transfer as additional sources of revenues: do universities look at IPRs as a source of revenue? •  Changes in academic profession’s status (from civil servants to university employees): are universities seizing professors’ IPR assets?

  4. Reasons for focusing on the professor privilege • Policy: • wave of abolitions in German-speaking and Scandinavian countries since 2000  inefficient legal institution, standing in the way of commercialization of academic research results • BUT Italy has introduced it in 2001  incentive-setting justification BUT contradiction with autonomy granting to universities • Scholarly research – some recent advocacy for the privilege (Kenney, 2009)

  5. Conclusions /1 A. The absolute number of academic patents has increased, but (i) their weight on total patenting by domestic inventors has not the share of university-owned acad. patents has increased B. The probability to observe an academic patent depends on: - the technology considered - the science-intensity of research, - and the characteristics of the local innovation system After controlling for these determinants: (iii) the conditional probability to observe an academic patent has declined over time.

  6. Conclusions /2 C. The rise of university ownership is explained by: (iv) the increasing share of public vs. private R&D the increased autonomy of Italian universities introduction of explicit IP regulations D. The introduction of the professor privilege in 2001 had no impact at all on either trends  opposed and defeated by universities, thanks to their newly gained autonomy

  7. Methodology for data collection Name disambiguation of inventors (EPO patent applications)  free inventor database: http://www.ape-inv.disco.unimib.it Professor-inventor name matching: 3 professors’ cohorts  inventors 1996-2006 [academic patent  patent with at least 1 academic inventors] Filtering of false matches by: (i) automatic criteria (ii) past surveys (iii) ongoing survey (iv) probability estimates of no-responses

  8. University autonomy in Italy: a quick look * * * The professor privilege in Italy: an even quicker look

  9. University autonomy • L.168/1989: basic principles and creation of ad-hoc Ministry • Several laws/decrees 1990-1996. • Financial autonomy • Key block grant: FFO ("FondodiFinanziamentoOrdinario"): starts at 90% of all revenues  automatic decline • Universities become free to collect other revenues  great heterogeneity • No systematic tie with university-industry technology transfer policy • (for a while) GERD grows faster than BERD • (Epidemic) diffusionof IP regulations (IP_STATUTE) and TTOs at the university-level • Little correlationbetween the twodiffusionprocesses

  10. Weightof block funds (FFO) and public fundsforscientificreserach on ItalianUniversities’ totale revenues(sources: AQUAMETH, CNSVU)

  11. Diffusionof IPR statutes and TechTransferOffices in ItalianUniversities(sources: ownelaboration on NETVAL survey; CNSVU survey)

  12. The professor privilege • Introduced in 2001 • Unsolicited, indeed resisted by universities (unsuccessfully at legal level; possibly successfully at IP regulation level) • Reformed in 2005 (abolished for research co-sponsored by industry)

  13. Econometric Analysis • 2-step Heckman Probit • STEP1: probability of an Italian patent to be academic, 1996-2006 as a function of: • - time (year dummies) • - patent characteristics (IPC class, NPL backward citations, nr inventors) • regional innovation system: BERD/GDP; universities’ and PROs’ share of R&D • regional university system: diffusion of university IP statutes and TTO; weight of FFO over total revenues; •  Estimate of academic patenting trend, conditional on changing environment

  14. STEP2: probability of an academic patent to be owned by the inventor’s university, 1996-2006 as a function of: • - time(year dummies) • - patent characteristics & regional innovation system • university’s characteristics: • - fixed effect (dummies) • - time-variant: • - adoption of IP statute • - TTO opening • - weight of FFO over total revenues (FFO_RATIO); • Estimate of ownership trend, as a function of increasing autonomy & conditional on changing environment • Similar estimates for individual & business ownership

  15. KEY RESULTS • STEP1 (probability of an Italian patent to be academic) • - negative trend after controlling for patent characteristics (less-than expected composition effect) • - “classic” results for patent characteristics • Positive effect of both BERD/GDP (demand side) and universities’ share of R&D (supply side) • No effect of FFO_RATIO

  16. KEY RESULTS • STEP2 (probability of university ownership) • - positive trend after all controls ( unexplained trend) • - “classic” results for patent characteristics • Positive effect of universities’ share of R&D (supply side) • No effect of FFO_RATIO • Positive effect of IP statute adoption vs no effect of TTO opening

  17. Furtherresearch • 1) The value of academic patents, by type of ownership • Lower? Lissoni and Montobbio (2013) + role of universities in weaker regions • Higher? Learningeffect & increasedautonomy ( seeFlemish case) • 2) Changesofproperty and marketsforpatents • 3) Lessonsforevaluationexercise (e.g. ANVUR)  Whichpatents do count? Whichpatentsshallwecount? • University-owned patents are a (non-representative?) subset ofallacademicpatents • Counting university-owned patentsmay generate perverse incentives in favourofpatentfiling / aggressive stancestowards business sponsors & faculty • Useof public data suchas PatStat / APE-INV

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