The experiences and expectations expressed by both industry and university respondents in Australia show that cooperative links involve extremely complex personal and organisational networks. Recent studies suggest that industry-university links are not simply formal arrangements where industry learns from or benefits by university research and teaching, but are part of a dynamic process yielding a range of different but interrelated benefits for both sectors. There is also a significant element of academics benefiting from industry experience (e.g. in exposing postgraduate research students to commercial problems). The over-riding observation is that both formal and informal links are critical to successful modes and mechanisms of cooperation.

The case studies suggest that successful companies, as well as many universities and research institutions, are embracing alternatives to strategic management with alliances emerging as a central strategy in achieving competitive advantage. While these alliances are, in some cases, located in quite tightly structured forms such as university joint ventures or other such similar arrangements with industrial partners, they are often also emerging as loosely knit organisational networks largely unbound from their university and industrial antecedents. They are, or at least are becoming, new organisations with their own 'culture' and expectations.

Integration of Teaching, Research and Technical Cooperation

Three mechanisms for cooperation between the sectors stand out. Firstly, there are links through contractual arrangements between industrial enterprises and academic institutions or individual academics. Second, there are links that are built around contracts or grants supported through government programs or other intermediary funding agencies. Third, there are linking mechanisms that create new organisational forms involving both sectors as cooperative partners such as in joint ventures or cooperative centres like CRCs or BHP's Steel Processing and Products Institute.

With each mechanism links are maintained at two levels:

• on one level they are maintained through individual and generally unstructured relationships; and
• at another level they are maintained through formal institutional contractual agreements or management plans.

Figure 1 Examples of Unstructured and Structured Industry/University Links

This figure is available in print copy only.

The outstanding observation is that these should not be considered as independent linking mechanisms but rather more as necessary components for the development of knowledge-based systems. Such systems rely on the integration of appropriate technical training, advances in science and technology and marketing and business knowledge.

In most Australian government linking programs combinations of research, teaching and consulting links can be observed. Some programs such as the Key Centres for Teaching and Research are directed specifically toward combining teaching and research activities. But others such as the CRC program, although intended primarily to build research links, are now also contributing to both teaching and consulting cooperative activities. Research and Development Corporations integrate commissioned research, research training and the dissemination of research results.

Table 5 summarises the extent to which linking mechanisms transcend teaching, research and consulting and suggests that university and industry cooperation in Australia reflects a general trend toward supporting integrated knowledge systems. Such developments reflects the need for the development of integrated support mechanisms rather than compartmentalised research, training, consulting and development and commercialisation activities.

Table 5: Integration of Modes of University and Industry Cooperation and Delivery Mechanisms

Internationally, there is now strong evidence that transfers between academic research and private enterprise commercialisation of research are led by the movement of people and the establishment of broad-ranging personal networks. Collaboration provides an important and necessary stimulus to technological and organisational learning (Dodgson 1993). Industrial firms are increasing their investment in academic research and development in the United States, Germany and Japan, and the number of scientific and engineering papers co-authored by industry and academic contributors has grown significantly. The links that can be observed in the Australian case reflect an integration of teaching and research modes of cooperation.

Because of the complexity of activity in cooperative mechanisms and the wide range of potential industry groups, including government agencies, industry-university links are often developed in the Australian context through the activities of an intermediary. Often, and apparently increasingly, the commercial arms of universities are carrying out this 'brokerage' role, but a number of other semi-independent government agencies, notably the Research and Development Corporations, provide an effective channel for links with industry.

On the other hand, some industry intermediaries (some industry associations and university consulting companies) appear to have been overtaken by the growth of formal collaborative mechanisms, in particular the CRCs. There is little doubt that CRCs are now seen as the most important formal structure for collaborative research and research training in Australia, and increasingly for other industry related training too. However, it is important to emphasise that current cooperation mechanisms have evolved over at least a decade and a half during which there has been in place a wide variety of government incentives for cooperation (see Appendix 6). This evolution has affected the ways that universities manage industry relationships, which are now seen as part of the 'core business' of the university (see box).

The present study emphasises the importance of developing balanced inter-relationship between project-based funding and longer term funding programs that underpin a concentration of expertise and facilities. In some of the case studies this occurred through a combination of centre-based funding and contract money attracted directly from industry, or through a combination of industry and government funding. This 'centralised' focus was usually described by industry respondents as 'desirable' because it simplified their scanning and planning activities. For the universities, however, multi-disciplinary centres or institutes are providing significant administrative challenges.

Evolution of University-Industry Relationships

Phase 1: Individualistic - largely driven by the objectives of individual researchers and shaped by their network of industry contacts.

Phase 2: Managed through Controlled Entities - 'commercial aims' established by universities to manage and promote linkages with industry, and obtain commercial return on intellectual property; largely centralised, broker service, at arms length to mainstream university activities.

Phase 3: Core Business - major strategic consideration in university planning and management procedures; relationships negotiated at Vice-Chancellor level, but operations decentralised to Faculty, School or research group.

N.B. These phases are not necessarily successive, and can, in some circumstances, co-exist.

Regional Implications

In Australia, as elsewhere, there are important factors in the national environment that influence the way in which cooperation occurs. These include the nature and strength of the industries involved; the cooperative time-frame; the role of government or intermediaries; arrangements for intellectual property rights and the role of science and industry in driving the cooperative arrangements. However, in spite of these differences it is possible to observe a range of more general and important issues in patterns of cooperation. Some of these issues carry implications for future cross-border cooperation between the economies in the APEC region.

The present report reflects the intricate nature of research and educational links and the complexity of alliances and the 'intermediaries' that support them. Industry-university research links are interwoven within a wide complex of links that connect different firms and different universities to the knowledge-generation and innovation process. Although in different cases it appeared that either an industry or university partner provided the major initiative or driving force in establishing the link, the flow of ideas and benefits from the links was varied and in most cases complementary to the different objectives of individuals and institutions. At the same time, institutional support was providing an important but supplementary role rather than acting as a driving force-in some cases institutional intermediaries were perceived as actually inhibiting the process. The same applies to cooperative activities in the development and implementation of training.

Some features of university-industry cooperation are particular to Australia. Notable is the strong role played by the major government research agency CSIRO as a third arm of public sector-industry collaboration in research and research training. Co-location of cooperation, such as in science parks or technology incubators, appears less significant in Australia than in some countries. Certainly, some cooperative institutes are sited in these parks, but the motivation is more that of a 'neutral' territory, away from the parent organisations, than use of park facilities or synergies with the other tenants. This may be because of the generally good university and industrial technology infrastructure in Australia, and the availability of international class communications facilities. Networking is strongly favoured; co-location (with some exceptions) is not.

The task for government agencies and university managers is to recognise the need to provide a wide range of possible alternatives for supporting cooperative links with industrial enterprises. Financial incentives, project funding and cooperative institutional structures can all play an important part in developing knowledge systems. They can also support the information exchange which may assist in initiating links. Further, a variety of linking mechanisms are needed to respond to the different demands of different industries and size of firm.

Training, research and development and other consultancy services should no longer be considered and monitored as separate activities: they need to be managed as integrated components of knowledge systems. It follows therefore that there is a growing need to develop information systems to monitor and respond to the growing needs of university/industry knowledge systems. The very rapid uptake of the 'World Wide Web' by industry and universities in Australia is an example of this trend.

With the growing global activities of firms, science and education, there is a need to consider the development of international or regional 'networked' knowledge systems. International industrial cooperation among APEC member economies will increasingly be built around scientific cooperation, and international scientific cooperation will increasingly be built around industrial/business cooperation. In this context there is a growing demand for the training of 'knowledge system' managers to assist managers to integrate industrial, scientific and commercial imperatives, expectations and outcomes.

This suggests at least two areas where future scientific and industrial cooperation between APEC economies may be improved.

• Firstly, the existence of a regional database or clearing house on government support mechanisms for internationally focused industry/university cooperation will provide information that might promote cross-border cooperation.

For example, the Australian Research Council's Collaborative Research Grants, described in Chapter 5, are available for Australian universities collaborating with international industry partners. This program's potential for facilitating regional cooperation is not widely known in the region.

• Secondly, the APEC forum could provide an appropriate mechanism for developing regional training packages for managers of industry and university cooperation.

Such training could focus not only on the management of formalised structures but also strategies for promotion and developing informal links and converting such links into integrated knowledge systems.

Finally, it is clear that while there is ample evidence of a considerable blurring between the boundaries of teaching, research and consulting there is also evidence that the cross-border cooperation between APEC member economies treats the three activities as distinctly separate activities.

• There is now a good case within APEC for giving a high priority to regional technology management programs that seek to integrate, rather than differentiate between business, science and training objectives.