Every advanced country has research institutes, situated operationally between university research departments on the one hand and mission-oriented governmental and industrial laboratories on the other. The genesis of these institutes are as varied as their purposes, but there are some general factors lying behind their existence: the recognition of the need for research capabilities over and above those available in traditional university departments or in mission-oriented laboratories; the opportunity for individuals to devote full time to research; and importantly for our purpose, to facilitate multidisciplinary research programs unconstrained by traditional disciplinary boundaries. In many cases, needed research programs were judged to be too large for universities to manage properly, or for individual industries to support, or elaborate pieces of equipment or other facilities were needed. Whatever the reasons, there exists today in all advanced countries what might be called peripheral research systems, being neither wholly within any of the more traditional academic, governmental, or industrial sectors.

Such peripheral systems of research institutes present obvious dangers—unless wisely established and managed—they can become closed universes, self-contained, and noninteracting with the broader scientific community. They can be set up with too much central control and governmental administrative procedures. On the other hand, too little care in management of the institute, particularly locally, can result in research programs of less than adequate effectiveness and insufficient exploitation of opportunities. The setting up of research institutes also tends to be a lengthy business, and once set up they often seem to be immortal—there is thus the danger that “when the need arises they are not there, when the need has disappeared they still go on.” If research institutes are deemed necessary, therefore, they must have built-in flexibility and adaptability of management and programs, they must work synergistically with the greater scientific community and, in particular, there must be effective personal contacts among scientists in the research institutes and those in other pertinent institutions, departments, and disciplines. The most direct way of achieving these objectives is to site research institutes at universities and to use fully the opportunities for joint staff appointments, personnel exchanges, and joint research and education programs between the institute and the parent university. This also facilitates involvement of first-rate scientists at the universities.

Though needs for research institutes are widely recognized, different countries adopt different approaches. Some of these (for France, Germany, and the U.K.) have been documented recently. ¹² “In Germany the financing and committees of the peripheral institutes (i.e. the Max Planck Institutes) are independent of the DFG; the Research Councils in the U.K. and the CNRS in

France combine the functions of aiding the universities and of running their own laboratories (like the NSF), and their financing and committees are common to the two functions. In the U.K., moreover, research is organized by sectors (there are five Research Councils, four of which are concerned mainly with oriented research), whereas the CNRS in France and the DFG and the MPG in Germany are each responsible, in their own sphere, for the whole of fundamental research.” Yet “methods of organization and financing do not yet seem to have succeeded in adjusting research to the new performance expected of it…. Specifically, it is the individualistic conception of research which has colored the whole system and governed the trend of university and peripheral research in each of the three countries. The result is that comparable behavior is found in dissimilar contexts.” Despite a diversity of approaches in the three European countries “university research centers have rarely succeeded in conducting multidisciplinary research, and even more rarely than the peripheral centers.” The materials field, however, should offer potent opportunities and needs for such multidisciplinary approaches and institutes. These needs for institutes include not only adding to the reservoir of knowledge about materials but also to effect coupling and knowledge transfer between research and engineering, between universities and industries, and, increasingly, between science and society.

Large industrial companies generally support in-house nearly all the R&D they feel they need, and in most cases, proportionately much more R&D then do small companies. The latter, even when highly entrepreneurial, usually put most of their effort into product differentiation and development, engineering and marketing; if they need inputs of a more research type, they usually depend on the larger industrial centers of excellence (from which they have often spun-off or with which they are cross-licensed) and on expertise in the universities. In most countries, there are R&D institutes set up principally to serve the smaller or more backward or developing industries which, for various reasons, feel unable to support adequate efforts of their own.

Various types of institute are described below.

The most obvious example in this category is nuclear energy, a technological field that did not exist prior to World War II and for which there was no suitable industrial base. Furthermore, and importantly, such development programs are inherently of long duration and commercially risky; it is generally accepted that these factors make a field appropriate for largescale and long-term governmental sponsorship. Thus, we see national laboratories such as Harwell in the U.K., Saclay in France, and Jülich in Germany, established to carry out R&D programs aimed at innovating nuclearenergy technology. They are, by and large, successful at achieving their technical objectives, but there are often problems in transferring the technology into a suitable industrial and commercial framework. If such laboratories are set up under governmental auspices, it appears necessary to adopt a working partnership with industry right from the start in order to ease the subsequent technology transfer process.

Defense and aerospace are prime examples of such institutes. Such institutes have many impressive technological achievements to their credit and these achievements, even if their cost-effectiveness can sometimes be questioned, were no doubt greatly facilitated by the steadiness of governmental support and the virtual certainty of a customer. In the civilian area, there exist many government-funded laboratories carrying out R&D in areas of national concern which may not have an appropriate industrial or commercial base (e.g. highways, pollution control) or are in state-owned and operated service or industrial areas (e.g. railways, electric power, coalmining).

There are several varieties of such institute. In the U.K. there are, for example, the National Physical Laboratory, the National Engineering Laboratory, and the Warren Spring (Chemical Engineering) Laboratories. The first performs activities rather similar to those of the National Bureau of Standards in the U.S. All three are primarily for serving the needs of industry through R&D programs, particularly in the application of techniques and discoveries to design, production, quality control, and distribution.

In France the laboratories of the CNRS, whose primary function is to promote the progress of science, tend to emphasize more basic areas of research, while the more applied institutions tend to be associated with various technical ministries. Government-managed institutes specifically aimed at enhancing civilian industries are for the most part conspicuously absent.

In Germany, government-funded research establishments oriented towards industry are mainly diffused and scattered among Federal and Lander Ministries and Departments for support. Some applied research institutes are organized and supported rather like the Max Planck Institutes (the latter tending to be more basic-research oriented) and often have close associations with universities.

Japan has a quite extensive array of government-funded laboratories. Those most relevant to the materials field are listed in Table 8.42. Many of these come under MITI, the Ministry of International Trade and Industry, which takes a leading role in coordinating governmental and industrial R&D programs. It is perhaps worth repeating that essentially no R&D in industry itself is supported by the government.

In Canada, which by and large does not have large industrial research laboratories, the National Research Council through its various establishments undertakes widespread R&D services for industry as well as for the Federal Government.

In France, Germany and the U.K., the governments help to finance research associations whose aim is to enable firms in the various sectors to carry out cooperative research which they could not have undertaken separately. These institutions are usually quite small and collectively they account for a very small percentage of national expenditures on R&D. “Apart from a few outstanding exceptions, the research associations have not had all the success hoped for: the conservatism of certain sectors of industry has often prevented them from undertaking more fundamental longer-term research than individual firms; they have thus been obliged to confine themselves to relatively short-term applied research which is too frequently of marginal significance because important subjects are ruled out by competition between the member firsm. Governments have so far been unable or unwilling to intervene directly to remedy this state of affairs.” ¹³

In the U.K. specialized research associations are now available for about 50 percent of British industry. These are listed in Tables 8.43A and 8.43B (government-industry supported) and in Table 8.44 (totally industry supported). Some of these laboratories are sited alongside relevant university departments (e.g. the Glass Research Association and the Glass Technology Department at Sheffield University).

A novel venture to diversify the activities and develop a partially-supporting contract research base has been under way for some time at Harwell, the central R&D establishment of the U.K. Atomic Energy Authority. The principal purpose was to develop commercial spin-offs for expertise, techniques, and equipment resulting from their main nuclear energy program. Among the activities developed at Harwell under this policy are some which are particularly relevant to the materials field, such as a national center for nondestructive testing and another for ceramics. The commercialization program, perhaps viewed suspiciously at first by industry as a curious use for the tax-payer’s money, appears to have been reasonably successful; a persistent problem, though, is finding areas of R&D which need tackling, which are potentially profitable and yet are not already being addressed by industry, or which industry regards as research which should be contracted to them. Furthermore, there is some danger of it being rather dispiriting to the talented scientists and engineers of a great establishment having to “hawk their wares and services” and undertake “odd-jobbing”. One cannot help feel that a national asset such as Harwell functions best when coupled to an important national mission—recent world-wide developments in the energy field suggest, for example, a renewed, broadened, and continuing role that the establishment could play which would be central and vital to the national interest.

In France there are a number of institutes and programs, often associated with universities, that are sponsored by the CNRS (which is similar in its functions to the NSF). Germany is known for its privately-operated, though government-aided, Max Planck Institutes and the DFG programs. In the U.K. one finds institutes or programs operated by the Research Councils. All of these agencies have responsibility for identifying national science research needs and responding by supporting individuals in universities, multiinvestigator research programs, and even research facilities.

In recent years all of these agencies have been placing increased emphasis on applied research in the national interest. Much sound new knowledge undoubtedly results, but it is difficult to assess what direct impact their programs have had on the technical competitiveness of industry. However, like the interdisciplinary materials science centers supported by the NSF, they are undoubtedly enhancing the educational level of scientists and engineers who pass through them into industry, and thereby they contribute indirectly to industrial technological prowess.

It should be noted that the U.S. appears to have led the way in the successful establishment of government-financed, interdisciplinary materials science centers and perhaps also in government, mission-oriented laboratories associated with universities. Notable among the latter are the Lincoln and Stark Draper Laboratories at M.I.T., Livermore at Berkeley, and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory at California Institute of Technology.

“With comparatively slender resources, without any spectacular political mobilization and often even without any deliberate effort, the five countries (Belgium, Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland) have succeeded in creating a climate conducive to innovation based on the spontaneous initiative of individuals and groups….” “These countries do indeed seem in many respects to have achieved the degree of technological drive which is still being sought by other countries whose structures have often proved a difficult obstacle to innovation”. ¹⁴

It is instructive to quote further from the same source: “For the most part, the scientific and technological systems in the five countries have traditionally tended to respond to economic imperatives….” “Industrial scientific activity is therefore the essential objective and purpose of traditional research policies….” “At the service of economic growth, research in the five countries is therefore mainly centered in industries and the universities, the part played by the State being more unobtrusive and less direct than in such countries as France and the U.K. The State’s task is not so much to lay down the major options or stimulate large-scale developments, but to guarantee a favorable context for exchanges between the economy and the universities, which has always been a necessary condition for cross-fertilization”.

“With regard to industry, the dominating fact is the concentration of all industrial, and to some degree even all national R&D in a very few hands….” “(This) situation was not the result of any deliberate governmental plan or strategy in the field of research, but resulted indirectly from the workings of a liberal economic system”.

In the larger European countries the research system is characterized by two features: (1) basic institutional financing of universities and some specific projects, and (2) the system of university and peripheral institutions. The smaller countries display only the first of these characteristics. There is a virtually total absence of a peripheral sector. Instead, and perhaps because of their small-country status, research scientists make exceptional efforts to keep in good contact with the rest of the world. In a sense, industry is the peripheral sector; it fosters contacts between isolated research workers and highly differentiated disciplines and is an instrument for opening up new sectors.

Space does not permit delving more deeply into the causes of the success of the smaller industrial countries in enhancing technology, but it does appear that there are many lessions to be learned by the U.S., particularly regarding effective coupling between universities and industry.

Government Research Establishment—Harwell, A Case History Harwell makes an interesting case history of a governmental research establishment having to adjust its activities in keeping with changes in national goals.

As of 1969, Harwell employed about 5500 staff of whom about 1200 were qualified scientists and engineers. It spends about 15 million on R&D, the major part of which is directed at the nuclear power program.

Until the 1950’s the main task was to establish the scientific background required for the design and construction of production plants for fissile material; this led to the setting up of production facilities elsewhere. Next, work was started on developing nuclear reactors as producers of economic power. This grew and led to the creation of a new establishment for reactor development. Similarly, Harwell’s early work on plasma physics and fusion led to the formation of the Culham Laboratory. Work on high energy physics, which also started at Harwell, was transferred out of Harwell into the Rutherford Laboratory (operated by the SRC) in 1961. As a result of all these changes, Harwell emerged as primarily a materials R&D establishment, but one experienced at rapidly transforming scientific knowledge into technology. In this connection, Harwell has found that a coordinated, multidisciplinary attack on problems is vital if the development is to succeed both technically and economically.

As a result of the nuclear program, Harwell became equipped with an excellent range of resources—physical, intellectual, and motivational—capable of application to other technologies. At the same time, the technical success of the nuclear program has diminished the need for a research push in this direction. So, with national priorities turning to improving the efficiency of industry, it was natural for Harwell to consider ways in which at least some of its resources could be redeployed.

Harwell began such redeployment at a time when, to the public at large, the glamour seemed to be wearing off R&D as a prerequisite for economic growth and innovation, and attention was turning to marketing problems. Could Harwell turn itself, therefore, towards market-oriented R&D? As the evidence of the previous changes at Harwell shows, it is not difficult to change emphasis or orientation in such a multidisciplinary and multipurpose laboratory. It is more difficult to bring about change in a single-disciplinary, single-objective laboratory: such laboratories have many attractions but it is difficult to know what to do when their objective or mission has been achieved.

It was natural for Harwell to look for areas where its special expertise in nuclear technology might couple most effectively with industrial R&D problems. This was regarded as “missionary” work work, e.g., showing where isotopes, radiation and other nuclear tools could be used in industry. But this was too vague an objective for Harwell. It was decided, instead, that each project should be chosen to give an identifiable, economic benefit and, whenever possible, pursued in partnership with an industrial company, i.e., Harwell should be mission-oriented.

In 1965, an Act was passed which enabled Harwell to undertake work in nonnuclear fields. As a result, Harwell extended its nonnuclear program in, for example, ceramics, quality control, and computer software. However, all new activities of this sort had to meet a number of criteria designed to establish clearly that Harwell is an appropriate center for such work and that the work is desirable.

Some of the projects Harwell undertakes are of a national-benefit type, to develop a new technology, e.g. high-temperature fuel cells, or for purely social reasons, e.g. atmospheric pollution. But for most projects, the commercial aspects are extremely important, e.g. the desalination program. There is also an independent Program Analysis Unit which analyses the national benefit to be gained from each proposed program.

A second general point is that, for each program, only one industrial partner is sought out. If Harwell were to work with several firms in any specific program, then inevitably the final market would have to be divided among them, the incentive to each firm would be diluted correspondingly, and the probability of true commercial success would be sharply reduced. Furthermore, the firms would then be obliged to compete primarily with each other instead of with foreign competitors.

Harwell has learned from experience that it is essential to assess the eventual market for each program. And to improve the market emphasis in the R&D program, Harwell finds that as soon as a program is well launched it is effective to have the program directly under the control of the relevant industrial partner. This insures that the R&D is properly oriented, that there is an efficient two-way flow of information, and the not-invented-here factor is minimized. An example of such a program is the sol-gel method of preparing oxide powders of closely controlled crystallinity, particle size, and shape. Another concerns a production process for the refractory bricks used to line steel furnaces. It has been found particularly effective to form joint teams of Harwell and industrial personnel working either at Harwell or in the industry as appropriate. This is particularly useful for effecting technology transfer.

Another example of a materials program in which Harwell was involved is carbon fibers for fiber-reinforced materials. This program illustrates the synergistic effect of research being carried out in the same place and, in many cases, by the same people. Harwell was originally interested in graphite as a moderator in gas-cooled reactors and this led them naturally into carbon fibers. They are examining a range of possible uses for carbon fibers in the atomic energy field. Thus, a laboratory like Harwell can have a large number of objectives without fragmenting the whole. It is the scientific content of the research which links all the projects together.

Increasingly Harwell now finds industry bringing its ideas and problems to them, demonstrating the acceptance of Harwell’s role by the industrial community after an initial, somewhat suspicious period. There are also examples of coupling with universities as well as industry where Harwell has, in essence, developed the ideas of university people, collaborating closely with them, and then made the appropriate connection with industry.

Regarding the costs of R&D performed at Harwell, auditing has shown these to be rather similar to those of industrial partners. One substantial advantage of a large laboratory like Harwell is its ability to construct sizeable pilot plants quickly. But the main advantage is the synergistic effect of all its activities and the ability to bring wide ranges of disciplines and techniques to bear on a specific project.

Max Planck Institutes: The majority of the 53 Max Planck Institutes are devoted to fundamental research, particularly in the natural sciences, although some institutes do embrace applied research as well. Research in the institutes is complementary to that in the universities, and the organization can be compared in some ways to the laboratories operated by the Research Councils in Great Britain, the CNRS in France, and the Academy of Sciences in the U.S.S.R. Institutes are built around highly qualified and productive scientists as directors; when a new director has to be appointed, the Max Planck Society reassesses whether continuance of the institute in its current or a different research field is justified. Sometimes it is concluded that the institute should be handed over to a neighboring university, particularly if no suitably qualified successor can be found for the directorship.

The purposes of the Max Planck Society are:

The Max Planck Society is subsidized by the Federal and State Governments which share equally in the cost (which, for 1970, was 320 million DM) of supporting the institutes. These subsidies are not earmarked by the government for specific research projects but can be allocated by the Society as it sees fit. There are also private donations.

The sizes of the institutes vary greatly, depending on their research areas. The numbers of personnel range from very few to several hundred. In 1969 the Society employed 7000 personnel of whom 1750 were scientists.

The Directors and Scientific Members are free to choose their scientific research topics and to manage them as they wish. All that is required is a simple annual accounting by the Director to the Society. There is no fixed form for the internal organization of an institute; it can be adapted to varying requirements at any time. It is claimed that one advantage of this internal flexibility is a close interdisciplinary cooperation.

Those institutes wholly involved in various aspects of materials science and engineering include: Metallurgy (Stuttgart); Iron and Steel (Düsseldorf); and Solid State Physics (Stuttgart). Other institutes partly involved in MSE include: Chemistry (Mainz); Physical Chemistry (Göttingen); Inorganic Chemistry (Frankfurt); the Fritz-Haber-Institut (Berlin-Dahlem), and Spectroscopy (Gottingen).

The fact that a Solid State Institute (Stuttgart) was recently formed indicates the importance attached by the Max Planck Society to this field. Together with the large and well-known Metals Institute this represents a major concentration in materials science at Stuttgart.

Organized somewhat similarly to the Max Planck Institutes but devoted more to applied science is the recently-formed Fraunhofer Gesellschaft for Applied Solid State Physics at Freiburg where solid-state electronics is emphasized. There is also an Institute for Ceramics at Würzburg.

With the shift in emphasis from nuclear physics towards materials in Germany, the well-known nuclear installation at Julich has recently established an enlarged solid-state laboratory whose activities are coordinated with those in materials science at Stuttgart by a joint council.

A summary of the research specialties in the metals field at various German institutes and universities is given in Table 8.45.

Coupling Science and Technology: ¹⁵ The view is now generally accepted in the U.S.S.R. that research, development, and production must be brought more closely together. A variety of organizational forms are the subject of active experiment. Of particular interest are:

It appears that the traditional Soviet form of research organization, with a large research institute and attendant design bureaux in each industry separated from the production factories, is partly being replaced by a variety of arrangements of kinds familiar in the West and particularly in the U.S.: the large industrial firm with its own complete R&D facilities; the university with its attendant research facilities working closely with industry; the contract-research firm; and the civil engineering company. But all this is being done cautiously and gradually, with the object of retaining the economies of scale and the ability to concentrate effort on major objectives which are a prominent feature of Soviet R&D organization. What emerges in the next decade or so is likely to be an interesting combination of traditional Soviet and Western arrangements.

While Soviet administrators are devising means of bringing research and production more closely together, there is much less certainty about the way to provide an organic connection between innovation and the industrial or individual consumer of new products. Two proposals have now received general acceptance.

The first is that industrial research establishments and design bureaux, or any new forms of R&D organizations which are created, must be financed not by direct grants but by some form of contract funds being provided to the user of the research and not directly to the research institute. It is felt, however, partly as a result of the experiments with contract research since 1962, that dependence on individual enterprises for finance would narrow and subdivide the activities of research institutes; the agreed solution is, therefore, that most contracts should be made with ministries or other large organizations rather than with individual enterprises.

The second agreed proposal is that in any field no one research institute should have a monopoly and that an element of competition between R&D organizations responsible for new products and processes is desirable.

The intention seems to be that the ministry in which the research organization is located should be responsible for awarding contracts or choosing between alternative proposals. The main consumers of new products may be represented on the committee which makes the decision, but the administrative responsibility will apparently rest with the ministry producing the new product. Moreover, the competition between R&D organizations will only be taken to the mock-up or at most the prototype state—commercial production of a new product will apparently then be transferred to a single production firm. The argument for this mode is that, while there is a case for “conscious duplication” of R&D concerning new products, there is no case for the losses in economies of scale which would result from the duplication of expensive production facilities.

These proposals are intended to provide strong incentives for invention and for the carry-over of invention into practical forms. The measures so far undertaken to encourage the commercial production of new products are primarily designed to compensate industrial enterprises for losses due to the introduction of new products and processes, e.g. through the special Funds for the Assimilation of New Technology in each ministry, rather than to provide positive incentives to innovate. Numerous proposals have been made to enlarge the scope of these arrangements; some authors have suggested that the initial costs should be met, as is usual in the West, from profits and bank loans, and thus be treated in effect as an investment cost.

Such arrangements are, however, difficult to introduce successfully at present, because industrial prices are unsatisfactory. Prices of new products, which like other prices are usually fixed centrally by the State, do not provide an adequate margin, either in the short or in the longer term, for initial costs to be met. A number of Soviet specialists have instead proposed that prices for new products should be fixed by negotiation between producer and consumer, so that what amounts to a limited market for new products would be introduced.

Together with economic incentives for research establishments and factories, strenuous efforts have been made to introduce individual economic incentives, both to R&D staff and to production personnel, which are similarly intended to encourage rapid application of research results. These range from special lump-sums promised in advance to leading scientists and designers for the prompt fulfillment of major projects, to bonuses to factory workers for successfully-completed prototypes. Attempts are being made to relate the size of the bonus to the economic return received from the research project or the new product.

Paradoxically, therefore, Soviet government leaders and administrators appear prepared to rely to a greater extent on the economic calculus and on the desire of enterprises and individuals to maximize their earnings in their planned economy than many Western Ministers of Science and Technology would be prepared to propose even in their own largely private-enterprise economies. The recent Soviet stress on automatic economic incentives provides a healthy corrective to past emphasis on detailed administrative control from the center; but is is unlikely to provide a complete solution to Soviet problems. Our knowledge of the mainsprings of innovation is limited; but it seems certain that successful innovations in the West cannot be explained entirely in terms of the higher profit-margins obtainable from innovation. Innovation often emerges in a competitive context: the innovating firm is driven by the need to forestall its rivals and to maintain its share of the market. In a modified form, this often also applies in the case of governmentally-financed R&D, where competitive bidding for contracts encourages innovation by industrial firms.

Soviet efforts in the next few years to measure and reward the economic return on R&D are likely to be relevant and interesting to Western countries. In the latter, it is commonly held among most makers of science policy that the spur of competition no longer operates everywhere in innovating activity, and that therefore new economic relationships between government and industry, and new methods of governmental management of research, must be devised.

Some doubt also exists about the feasibility of Soviet proposals to rely on personal economic incentives tied to the return on particular new products and processes. Western experience would seem to indicate that it is unwise to tie personal earnings too closely to the fate of particular projects. But here again experience in the West as well as in the U.S.S.R. is somewhat limited.

Cooperative Research in the Materials Field—Internationally and Nationally: There are many similarities in the materials research interests of the four Scandinavian countries, but national pride works against efforts to pool research or to form one big institute in the interests of greater efficiency. Any new cooperative venture has to take into account the materials research activities that already exist as well as the geographic distribution of materials-related activities (the trend is toward greater geographical spreading of industry).

Thus, each country probably has to support one or more centers of excellence in materials research. This must necessarily involve a degree of specialization to avoid undue overlap, and for the same reason, cooperation at the management level is needed.

In addition, to facilitate the transfer of research information to user organizations the latter must have comparable expertise and must therefore conduct some of their own research.

For several years, a group of Danish scientists sought support among several of the smaller European countries (e.g., Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Luxemburg, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Sweden) for setting up an interdisciplinary organization for graduate education and research in materials. They noted that few European institutes were organized to cover the broader field of materials research, whereas in the U.S. there was a concerted effort to establish materials research at the universities. It was proposed that such a center could serve as an important supplement to the existing university systems and might represent innovation in advanced education and research. Staff and students in such a center might acquire a broad understanding of the interrelationship between science and human, welfare; they could benefit from association with scientists from many different disciplines; and a rich environment for creative ability should result.

In the proposal, five research divisions were suggested—Materials Preparation, Structure and Morphology, Electron Physics, Studies of Dislocations and Corrosion Problems, and Materials Theory. Emphasis was to be on fundamental research but with an openmindedness towards practical applications.

It was visualized that the administrative organization might be patterned after that at CERN. An essential feature was that the center would be located close to an existing or prospective university and in or near a major city.

To conclude, although the Danish government has supported the proposal, widespread agreement from other governments has not been forthcoming.

All the Scandinavian countries are attempting to stimulate and create new industry, but government-university-industry cooperation is most evident in Norway and Finland. The technical university plays a role in Denmark and a lesser role in Sweden.

Norway: SINTEF, the Engineering Research Foundation at the Technical University in Trondheim, employs 475 full-time people (200 professionals). It is an integral part of the Technical University (which employs 1100 including 544 faculty members). SINTEF employs many of the faculty members on a parttime consulting basis. Electronics and computer application comprise 60% of the technical effort, the remainder being largely in chemistry, metallurgy, hydraulics, and tool and production engineering.

Some new venture firms have been formed as a result of work in the Automatic Control Division—one of these companies produces computerized typesetting systems. An interesting feature is that product development goes on in the university laboratories on behalf of the private company.

A similar close-working relation is found near Oslo—a company formed in 1965 to produce integrated circuits and semiconductor devices that was spun-off from the university-industrial research institute combination. Again one finds prototype development and production being carried on in the academic institute. Another new company that resulted from this interaction produces medical instrumentation. The university-institute arrangement has also made valuable contributions to the shipbuilding industry (computer-controlled flame cutting of steel plate) and the electric power industry (explosive joining of electric power lines). Risk capital for all these ventures stems from existing industries and the government.

Finland: At Helsinki the State Center for Industrial Research is located on the campus of the University of Technology. Some of the laboratory heads at the Center are professors at the University and some of the University laboratories are used for industrial research, some product development and even some manufacture of products for sale. Spinoff companies are encouraged, and much of the early work of such a new company continues in the University laboratories. The laboratory does, of course, serve its primary purpose of research and educational functions and has several candidates working on their Ph.D. thesis.

Denmark; The Technical University has led to some spinoff firms. For example, the Laboratory for Semiconductor Components has generated a company aiming to exploit ion-implantation techniques and is making semiconductor counters and pressure transducers. Another spinoff company from the same laboratory produces chemical reactors for the oxidation and doping of silicon.

Sweden; The role of the technical university in Sweden is rather different from that in the other Scandinavian countries. Strong technical departments are building up at the Royal Institute of Technology which reports directly to the Swedish Board for Technical Development. Sweden’s posture therefore appears rather traditional, maybe because Sweden is larger and more heavily industrialized than the other Scandinavian countries. Thus, the larger firms may be able to afford more of their own research (e.g. Volvo and Saab—automobiles and aircraft; SKF—ball bearings; ASEA—Sweden’s counterpart to General Electric; and L.M.Ericsson—the world’s second largest telephone manufacturer).

The Size of Industrial Research and Development Organizations

In the mid-sixties, the OECD gathered data ¹⁶ on R&D efforts as a function of size of firm in various countries. Among the findings:

The OECD study goes on to observe that:

In a recent detailed study* of factors determining success or failure in innovation in the chemical and scientific instrunent industries, it was concluded that the most important size factor was the size of the project team at the peak of the R&D effort rather than the size of the firm or the size of the R&D department. Clearly, large firms can support more above-critical-size R&D projects than smaller ones; they thereby avoid “putting all their eggs in one basket” and, in addition, with a larger diversity of product interest there is more likelihood that any given R&D project will find an outlet somewhere in the range of product interests. Furthermore, with the increasing complexity and sophistication of science and engineering, it is likely that the full innovation process, from R&D to successful commercialization, will increasingly be concentrated in the larger companies in the future.