N. 39, July - September 2008 
IP & RTD: Articles 

Commission Recommendation 2008/416/EC - Pressing Innovation at the Universities’ Agenda
Alicia Blaya
Senior Legal Advisor
Coordinator of the IPR-Helpdesk Info-Service
 
On 10 April, the European Commission adopted a Recommendation on the management of intellectual property in knowledge transfer activities along with a Code of Practice in the field for universities and other public research organisations (hereinafter PROs)1.

Strengthening university-industry relations and improving the transfer of research results to society is a hot topic that is evolving rapidly, but not steadily, in all countries. In Europe, this trend is driven by the commitments under the Lisbon Agenda 2000. Time is short, and in a university framework traditionally focused on basic research and academic publishing, adding a commercial edge is proving a real challenge. There is generally a good amount of willingness but also a lack of structured decisions, integrated policies and appropriate education and training.

The Commission Recommendation outlines 11 recommendations for Member States and a Code of Practice (Annex I) for PROs. A list of some best practices from public authorities (Annex II) closes the document.

According to the recommendations, Member States should first ensure that PROs define knowledge transfer as a strategic mission, encouraging them to follow policies in line with the Code of Practice. Among other actions, Member States should support PROs’ knowledge transfer capacity and steps to raise the awareness and skills of students. This seems to be a critical measure, which should touch on the inclusion of appropriate subjects in key careers, such as law, engineering, biotechnology or chemistry.

Dissemination of knowledge should be promoted, as well as cooperation to harmonise intellectual property ownership regimes. The latter, though interesting, may be difficult to achieve in the short term. An easier option might be publicising the differences that exist at the national level. This would surely facilitate intellectual property management in collaborative projects on a transnational scale2.

Member States are also asked to ensure equitable treatment (EU/non-EU participants) in international research projects, to designate a national contact point, make use of the best practices identified and inform the Commission of the measures taken in line with the Recommendation.

The Code of Practice addressed to PROs is based on 3 sets of principles for an internal intellectual property policy (IP policy), a complementary knowledge transfer policy (KT policy) and for collaborative and contract research.

According to the first set of principles, PROs are asked to develop an IP policy as part of their mission. This IP policy should be clear and should help identify, exploit and “where appropriate” protect the intellectual property generated. Staff should be given adequate incentives (including career promotion and merits) and should be adequately trained. Creation of coherent intellectual property portfolios should be promoted, as should pooling intellectual property between PROs. This set of principles also favours a wide dissemination of results and advises that delays related to intellectual property protection “should be kept to a minimum”. While this seems to take into account the inner feelings of many academics and scientists, if PROs should work with integrated policies and take well-planned decisions in knowledge transfer, messages related to protection-dissemination need to be carefully read, avoiding simplistic interpretations.

Indeed, within the second set of principles aiming for more ‘professionalised’ KT policies and actions, PROs are asked to “maximise” the socioeconomic impact of their results, consider “all types” of possible exploitation methods and partners and implement proper policies for licensing and the creation of spin-offs (which clearly demands expertise and careful assessment of protection-dissemination issues). Access to professional knowledge transfer counsel becomes a ‘must’ (which implies that if you do not have in-house experts, related services should be hired). An adequate sharing of the benefits within the institution should also be ensured. Finally, PROs are encouraged to better ‘sell themselves’; results should be publicised to attract the attention of industry for their exploitation.

When it comes to taking part in collaborative and contract research, PROs are advised, i.a., to clarify any intellectual property-related issues (ownership, access rights, etc) as soon as possible.

Finally, from the succinct list of best practices, working with model contracts and decision-making tools is something that could really help. Consultation with stakeholder groups, including industry, involvement of public funds to support knowledge transfer and related activities and the establishment of measures to monitor PROs’ progress are other practices identified.

The Recommendation is quite lacking in details, and knowing what is expected is not enough. PROs need to use practical tools to achieve those objectives. In this regard, several background documents and other documents contain ‘tangible’ references and tips to illustrate those working with knowledge transfer in PROs3. Also, to help the latter turn intentions into facts, services assisting PROs should develop a specialised and responsible assistance (it is not a question of ‘selling’ the intellectual property rights system but explaining it with an objective approach to facilitate PROs’ decisions). Decision-makers in PROs should also be realistic and act with care and proper analysis. Parameters should be adequately selected and appraised (e.g. it is not a question of ‘how many patents you have’ but ‘how many patents you exploit’; it is not a question of founding ‘x number of spin-offs a year’ but a question of supporting promising initiatives that can ‘survive’ in the marketplace). Any intellectual property and knowledge transfer-related decisions should be taken only after studying our own and genuine conditions and potential. This would help prevent a crazy race with runaway horses.





1. Commission Recommendation of 10 April 2008 on the management of intellectual property in knowledge transfer activities and Code of Practice for universities and other public research organisations.(«)


2. In this line, e.g. see the study “Monitoring and analysis of technology transfer and intellectual property regimes and their use", carried out under the EC Sixth Framework Programme for RTD, at: http://www.eutechnologytransfer.eu. For this to have a proper impact, an institutional effort to keep records visible and up-to-date is important. («)


3. See http://ec.europa.eu/invest-in-research/policy/ipr_en.htm#3, i.a.: Improving knowledge transfer between research institutions and industry across Europe, Communication from the European Commission, 2007 and Management of Intellectual Property in publicly-funded research organisations: Towards European Guidelines, Expert Group Report for the European Commission, 2004. Also, for licensing see: Exchanging Value. Negotiating Technology Licensing Agreements- A Training Manual (WIPO-ITC, 2005).(«)