What Patent Data Reveal about Universities: The Case of Belgium

In recent years, there has been a surge in patenting by Belgian universities. It appears that this increase can be attributed to growth of biotechnology, where there is a greater propensity to patent, to a desire on the part of universities to enhance commercialization through technology transfer offices (TTOs), and to effective collaboration between universities and government-sponsored research centers. Our qualitative analysis reveals that patent statistics could be a misleading indicator of an individual university's technological productivity, since many inventions are developed at universities, yet applied by other institutions.