Why universities must partner with tech
Universities have a choice — partner with industry, or watch their best minds disappear. Swallowing their pride and partnering with industry is a better option than irrelevance.
The University of Virginia’s provost, Tom Katsouleas, once told me that less than one percent, by his estimates, of basic research is commercialized and that there may be as few as one near-term commercialization for every $10 million invested in fundamental research. This is an awful waste, especially when America is undergoing a reinvention in which entire industries are being wiped out and new ones created.
大学にも選択肢はある。産学共同か、あるいは自らの良心を捨て去るのか。プライドを飲み込み、時流を見誤るより産業界と手を組む方がいい。
Virginia大学学長Tom Katsouleasは以前こう語っていた。彼の予想では商業化される基礎研究は1％以下で、短期で商業化されるのは、基礎研究費１千万ドル毎にわずか１つあるだけだと。これは多大な経費の無駄である。特に、アメリカにおいて産業界全体で古い産業が消え、新しいものが生まれる改革が進行している時代には。
大学は選択を持っている－－産業とパートナーになるか、もしくは大学の最高精神が消えるのを見とどけるか。プライドを呑みこんで、産業とパートナーを組むことは、見当違いよりはよい選択である。
ヴァージニア大学長のトム・カトレーズは、かつて私に語ったことがあるが、 彼の見積り では、基礎研究の1パーセント未満だけが商業化されているにすぎないのであり、基礎研究に投資された1000万ドルのすべてはわずか一つの短期的な商業化にすぎない、ということだ。これはアメリカにおいて、全体の産業が一掃され、新しいものが作り出されている場合は、特に、ひどい無駄である。
Corporate executives have no idea what to do to survive this tsunami of technology disruption; even the innovation models they were trained on, such as Clayton Christensen’s The Innovator’s Dilemma, have become defunct. The competition no longer comes from within an industry; it comes from elsewhere, and not having domain experts in fields such as synthetic biology, nanotechnology, and robotics, most companies have no idea how to respond to these new threats.
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Universities, though, do have the experts. As a result of decades of government investment in basic research — in fields such as computing, medicine, sensors, artificial intelligence, digital manufacturing, robotics, nanomaterials, and synthetic biology — they have an abundance of talent and intellectual property. This is a goldmine for industry. Businesses that are under siege or are trying to expand into new markets usually look to buy startups or form partnerships with research universities. And some simply take what they need; what better place is there to acquire intellectual property and talent than the universities, after all?
Uber wanted to urgently build self-driving cars, so it lured away more than 40 researchers from Carnegie Mellon University in January this year. Being nice or ethical didn’t matter to Uber; it took what it wanted and then came back to the university with a relatively small consolation prize: $5.5 million for a robotics faculty chair and three fellowships. Apple was found guilty of incorporating unlicensed microchip technology from University of Wisconsin–Madison into its iPhones and iPads — and was ordered to pay more than $234 million in damages. We will see much more of this in the next few years. If universities don’t cooperate, businesses will take whatever they can get — because they are desperate.
In order to keep its researchers, academia will need to put aside its historical aversion to working with industry.
Universities are better off forming industry partnerships to jointly develop technology, as Stanford and MIT did in accepting $50 million from Toyota for research in A.I. and autonomous-driving technology. Several months after being raided by Uber, Carnegie Mellon University also agreed to partner with Google to turn its campus into a living laboratory for Internet-connected sensors and gadgets. Companies such as Toyota have been blindsided by technologies emerging from other industries; visionaries such as Google have realized they can’t do everything on their own. So this is a win–win strategy.
大学は、StanfordやMITが人工知能や自動運転技術の研究にToyotaから5,000万米ドルを受け取って提携を結んだように、共同で技術を開発するために業界と提携した方が有利である。Uberに襲撃されて数ヶ月後、Carnegie Mellon UniversityもGoogleと提携を結び、インターネット接続のセンサーやガジェット用にキャンパスをリビングラボとして開放した。Toyotaのような企業は、他の業界から出てくる技術に不意打ちを食らい、Googleのような明確なビジョンを持った企業は、自分達だけですべてのことはできないと悟った。だからこれは双方に有利な戦略である。
スタンフォード大学とMITが、AIとオートノマス・ドライビング技術の研究のために、トヨタから5000万ドルを受け入れることを決断したように、大学は、共同で技術を開発するために、業界とパートナーシップを形成するほうがよいのだ。Uberによって襲撃された数ヶ月後に、カーネギーメロン大学もまた、キャンパスをセンサーやガジェットがインターネットに接続された生き生きとした実験室にするためにGoogleとの提携に合意した。トヨタのような企業は、他の産業からの新技術によって不意打ちされきた―— Googleなどの明確なビジョンを持った企業は、彼らが自分ですべてを行うことはできないことを実現してきた。ここにはWin-Winの戦略があるのだ。
A huge opportunity exists to teach businesses about emerging technologies and have them fund research-commercialization efforts — if universities seriously rethink their traditional ideals of academic freedom and the sanctity of the industry–academia division. Such partnerships can make up for the declining government funding of academic research. And it doesn’t have to be a Faustian bargain. Both partners can benefit if the partnerships are structured in a meaningful way, as the partnership between Google and Carnegie Mellon is. After all, Google didn’t hire away university researchers; it funded research and testing on campus.
Stanford University figured this out long ago. (Disclosure: I am a fellow at Stanford’s Rock Center for Corporate Governance.) Its faculty members are encouraged to work closely with industry, and these collaborations have led to innovation on a grand scale in Silicon Valley, with the formation of companies such as Google, Hewlett–Packard, and Cisco Systems. This, in turn, has led to an endowment of more than $20 billion through the donations that its billionaire alumni have given to it.
The opportunity now is to use the goldmine of knowledge and talent in our universities to accelerate the American reinvention. Both universities and industry will gain — in a big way.
Vivek Wadhwa is a fellow at Rock Center for Corporate Governance at Stanford University, director of research at Center for Entrepreneurship and Research Commercialization at Duke, and distinguished fellow at Singularity University. His past appointments include Harvard Law School, University of California Berkeley, and Emory University.
Vivek Wadhwa氏はStanford UniversityのRock Center for Corporate Governanceの特別研究員で、DukeのCenter for Entrepreneurship and Research Commercializationの研究委員長であり、またSingularity Universityの特別評議員である。同氏の過去の役職には、Harvard Law School、 University of California Berkeley、およびEmory Universityがある。
