WHY AUSTRALIA FAILS TO EXPLOIT PUBLICLY FUNDED R&D

NOTES AND REFERENCES

1. As an illustration, in New South Wales the Technology Development Board has been charged with the responsibility for assisting government bodies to commercialise their activities, and to interact with business in joint commercial endeavours. The State Treasury has promulgated a draft policy, freeing up government departments to actively participate in commercial activities without the usual limitations of staff ceilings and policy limitations (Financial Management Arrangements for Commercial Activities in Departments, NSW Treasury, December 1987, Draft Cabinet Minute) which is still under consideration by the Interdepartmental Committee on Royalty Payments to Public Sector Innovators.

2. M. Birt and G. Werskey, ‘Making the connections’, Univation, 4, 1, 1989, p.5. See also ‘Development of High-New Technology Companies in NSW’, New South Wales Science & Technology Council, October 1983, p.16.

3. See for instance the other examples referred to in OECD, Industry and University: New Forms of Co-operation and Communication, OECD, Paris, 1984, pp.17-33 and D. Nelkin and R. Nelson, ‘Commentary: university-industry alliances, Science Technology and Human Values, 12, 1, 1987, pp.65–74.

4. In line with agreements and confidentiality, the interviews and organisations involved are not specified. It is also the desire of the author to avoid acrimonious debate about specific instances when the important issue is one of broader policy.

5. Simulation Society of Australia/International Association for Mathematics and Computers in Simulation Biennial Conference on Modelling and Simulation, 25-27 September 1989, Canberra ACTS; South Australian Institute of Technilogy, Association of Chemical Engineers Conference, 1985; and C.S.I.R.O. management conferences 1985 and 1986. At each a discussion paper was presented, criticisms invited, and submissions or responses invited. In the main the theses presented in this paper were accepted as intuitively valid by those who made comment to the author.

6. For example, the CSIRO made its first attempts by establishing Sirotech as an intermediation arm, then followed this up with a series of consultancies and reports leading to restructuring of the organisation. Other organisations such as ANSTO and the State Electricity Commission of Victoria have re-emphasised commercial application in their internal operations and instituted commercial planning. Many of the universities have instituted commercial linkages through organisations such as Unisearch, Anutech, and Uniquest. This type of strategy/structure approach is virtually universal in the approach of Australian academic, scientific and government bodies to increased commercial responsibility. The recent Vice-Chancellors’ papers on the subject treats the issue largely in a structural sense, with little attention to the critical issues of altering the behaviour of the individual (Univation, op. cit).

7. As illustration of this approach, the following are typical of the types of reward systems in use. The Australian National University has a policy of revenue sharing from courses and consulting, and the University Patents Policy provides for 20 per cent of the revenue achieved from licensing to be provided to the inventor(s), after the deduction of a range of direct and overhead expenditures from the receipts. The University of New South Wales exemplifies a more ad hoc approach with the sharing being apparently more discretionary in nature. Most other Universities in Australia have patents policies along a continuum between these two points. The New South Wales State Government has proposed a policy (refer fn. 1) allowing government departments to retain the funds they gather from commercial activities, and permitting a share in these funds to be provided to the individuals engaged in these commercial activities. Research organistions such as the CSIRO and ANSTO also provide some forms of profit sharing incentive to individual researchers (Source: personal interviews).

8. OECD, op. cit., p.12.

9. Shaping the Future — A Strategy for CSIRO, CSIRO, September 1985.

10. In the 1988 Annual Report of ANSTO it was reported that the newly minted mission of that organisation placed commercial technology development at the head of its purposes.

11. Effected by Elcom, the NSW public electricity authority.

12. For example, the sale of the Australian developed SCATS traffic management system to China.

13. Effected by the NSW Totalizator Agency Board.

14. D. Turner and P. Martin, unpublished comissioned study. November 1988.

15. Though recent publicity material emerging from CSIRO is encouraging in its reflection of an apparent increase in successful licenses and joint research ventures. It also ought to be noted that collaborative research centres are important avenues for commencing change in the cultures of both the scientific and commercial communities.

16. op.ct.

17. OECD, op.fit., p.58.

18. Thomas Peters and Robert Waterman, In Search of Excellence, Harper & Row. New York, 1982, pp.202–209.

19. Attitudes to commercialisation are often not conducive to the success of structural initiatives. A researcher at a public scientific conference recently stated that he chose his particular field of erudite learning specifically because he did not wish to contribute to making rapacious and unethical business men more wealthy. It was agreed by those present that this form of anti-commerce attitude was not uncommon among scientists.

20. H. C. Coombes, Science and Technology — For what Purpose Australian Academy of Science, 1979, p.22.

21. See, for example, F. A. Dubinaskas ‘The culture chasm: scientists and managers in genetic engineering firms’, Technology Review, 16, 4, 88, no 4 May/June 1985, pp.25-30, 74 which provides an expansion of these issues, with, particular attention to the ways in which cultural gaps are generated, through the nature of the education of scientists and business people. He also highlights some attempts made within commercial organisations to overcome some of the resultant problems.

22. Turner and Martin, op. cit.

23. See J. E. Kolm, ‘Science and technology transfer to Australia: benefits, costs and problems — the chemical industry’, in H. C. Coombes, op. cit., p.22.

24. OECD, op. cit., p.20.

25. The validity of a situational approach to evaluating behavioural factors, and in designing effective intervention strategies, is well based in psychological theory. B.F. Skinner and the contingency theorists are noted for their work on the ways in which behaviour is modified through the influence of the environment on the animal. Accepting that the application of such findings to complex human behaviours must be considered subject to a number of ethical and technical reservations, this work at least provides an indication of the need to consider how the environment of the scientist, the researcher and the bureaucrat can form the approach they are likely to take to linking with commerce. See B.F Skinner, Beyond Freedom & Dignity, Penguin, New York, 1971, pp.92-3Y.

26. The example of 3M corporation, together with various of the spinoff companies from MIT forming the core computer and biotechnology industries, serve well to illustrate the legitimacy and potential of a commercial involvement for the American scientist.

27. See ‘The access of Australian manufacturing industry to information about new technology’, Carmel Maguire, Bulletin of LASIE Australia Company Ltd, 15, 1, July/August 1984, pp.15-22, which highlights clearly that the Australian corporate sector is not attuned to formal searching of opportunities from within the publicly funded research community.

28. Adrienne Clark, ‘Issues in Applying University-based research’, in Science, technology and the economy, University of New South Wales, Occasional Paper No.11, 1986, p.12.

29. ibid, p.11.

30. Maguire, op.cit., refers to the study ‘Attitudes to new technology — an international survey’, MORI, PA Technology, London, 1984.