Patenting by European universities on the rise
High concentrations of academic patents at some universities and in some countries
European universities are behind more than 10% of all patent applications filed at the EPO from within Europe. However, wide variations in patterns of ownership and commercialisation are much in evidence.
Europe’s universities are becoming increasingly vibrant workshops for many inventions in recent decades. Amongst European applicants to the European Patent Office (EPO), they were responsible for over 10% of patent applications in 2019 (up from around 6% in 2000). The growing role that universities play in patenting and commercialising inventions is revealed in a study published by the EPO’s Observatory on Patents and Technology, in collaboration with the Fraunhofer Institute for Systems and Innovation Research (Fraunhofer ISI). The study is based on data from over 1 200 universities and their knowledge transfer offices (KTOs) over twenty years (2000 to 2020).
“Europe has a longstanding tradition of academic excellence, but we sometimes struggle to turn research into commercial success,” said EPO President, António Campinos. “This study sheds light on academic inventiveness across Europe to further inform policies and strategies. By leveraging patents through licensing, collaboration or spin-outs, universities can amplify their impact, driving both market and social value. As the recent Draghi report underscores, there is still significant work to be done to achieve a single market for research and technology in Europe, since our study reveals that 10% of startups with academic patents now move to the US”.
Direct university ownership of patent applications is increasing
The study investigated “academic patents”, namely applications originating at universities or their KTOs and which have one or more named inventors who are academic researchers. Such applications can either be filed in the name of the university itself and/or their KTO (“direct academic patents”); or be filed in the name of the researcher(s), their spin-out, their sponsor or some other company (“indirect academic patents”). The proportion of direct academic patents has risen from 20% in 2000 to 45% in 2019. However, the different regulations with regards to ownership and management of IP at the national as well as university level leads to wide variations in how often a university itself is the applicant. This in turn leads to variations in the strategies and partners chosen to bring to market innovations from university labs.
High concentrations of academic patents at some universities and in some countries
The landscape is dominated by a handful of patent-active universities (5%), which between them are responsible for half of all academic patents to the EPO including, for example, the University of Grenoble Alpes, Technical University of Munich, University of Oxford, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich, University of Copenhagen, and Polytechnic University of Milan, among others. Larger countries with well-established industries (e.g. France, German, UK, Italy) account for significant numbers of academic patents in absolute terms. However, applicants in countries with lower overall numbers of patent applications to the EPO tend to file relatively high proportions of academic patents.
Teamwork shapes national innovation landscapes – but Europe remains fragmented
The study also reveals the high degree to which universities co-operate with each other or with public research organisations (PROs), research hospitals, industry, or SMEs, with a large number of academic patents filed jointly. The strong role of large PROs as co-applicants in France, for example, is much in evidence. What is also clear is that very few of these co-operations are trans-national, pointing to the persistent fragmentation of the EU’s single market when it comes to research and innovation.
Last month’s report on the future of European competitiveness by Mario Draghi, former President of the European Central Bank, points to the lack of connected innovation clusters across countries and sectors – spanning both private industry and universities – as a key obstacle in the innovation pipeline. The recent creation of the Unitary Patent marks a concrete step towards addressing these challenges, complementing other EU initiatives to promote industry-academia collaboration and provide financial support for science-based startups.
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