Patenting Public‐Funded Research for Technology Transfer: A Conceptual–Empirical Synthesis of US Evidence and Lessons for India

Abstract

India's post‐independence technology policies relied heavily on public‐funded research for indigenous technological capacity building and technology development. However, public‐funded research has failed to adequately contribute to India's industrial catch‐up. India is now contemplating a new legislation similar to the US Bayh–Dole Act 1980, to energize public‐funded research for effective technology transfer. The Bayh–Dole Act was passed in the United States in 1980 in response to the growing concern over the fact that federally funded inventions in the United States were not reaching the market place. The act allowed universities to retain patent rights over inventions arising out of federally funded research and to license those patents exclusively or non‐exclusively at their discretion. In this paper, we present a critical review of the US experience after the Bayh–Dole Act and argue that the evidence is far from being unambiguous. We discuss the debate surrounding the act—the extent to which it was successful in achieving its objectives, the unintended consequences, if any, and more generally, the effectiveness of intellectual property rights as a vehicle of technology transfer from universities. The paper presents an Indian perspective against the backdrop of the US experience in an attempt to draw concrete lessons for India.

University research and knowledge transfer: A dynamic view of ambidexterity in british universities

“…The Bayh-Dole Act of 1980 in the US was a pioneering step in formalising knowledge transfer through the IP driven routessuch as patents, licenses and spin outs -referred to as "research commercialisation" in the literature (Perkmann et.al., 2013;Thursby and Thursby, 2002). A large number of countries followed this model, and whether directly or indirectly, influenced the spread of KTOs in universities across many countries (Bercovitz et.al., 2001;Ray and Saha, 2011). Although not subjected to a similar legislation, universities in the UK followed this pattern as well and started establishing KTOs, which became the organisational sub-units acting as the interface between researchers and users of research.…”

Estimating Factors Affecting Technical Efficiency in Indian Manufacturing Sector

“…Thus, there is a barrier to create technological platforms in Indian research institutions. TTOs are helpful for a smooth transfer of technology and commercialization from research academia to existing industries (BayhDole25, 2006;Stephen, 2010;Ray & Saha, 2010;Mysore, 2015;Chen, Patton & Kenney, 2016;Singh & Ashraf, 2019). Moreover, TTOs would be useful to create a market for existing industries to buy technologies and innovation discover by research organizations.…”

Promoting a Second-Tier Protection Regime for Innovation of Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises in South Asia

“…664 Moreover, despite the fact that India's post-independence technology policies relied heavily on publicly funded research for indigenous technological capacity building and technology development, such publicly funded research has failed to adequately contribute to India's industrial catch up. 665 It is certainly true that India has made some impressive strides since its independence in some areas such as Information Technology (IT), pharmaceuticals, and the agro-chemical industrial sector etc. Most commentators, however, argue that despite India's rapid economic progress and technological proficiency, it has failed to produce any real innovation on its own soil.…”