Universities and Fundamental Research: Reflections on the Growth of University-Industry Partnerships

The recent rise in university–industry partnerships hasstimulated an important public-policy debate regarding how theserelationships affect fundamental research. In this paper, weexamine the antecedents and consequences of policies to promoteuniversity–industry alliances. Although the preliminaryevidence appears to suggest that these partnerships have nothad a deleterious effect on the quantity and quality of basicresearch, some legitimate concerns have been raised about theseactivities that require additional analysis. We conclude thatadditional research is needed to provide a more accurate assessmentof the optimal level of commercialization.