This module is a selection from a larger module on the Academic / Industrial Interface.
Author:
Dr. Manuel Panar
University of Delaware
103 Brown Lab
Newark DE 19716
email panar@udel.edu
Before talking about the pitfalls in trying to sell an idea to
industry, it is important to recognize what happens between
concept and commercialization. Many of the difficulties are not
understandable without an appreciation of the time and expense
involved in converting creativity to innovation. This is probably
the greatest source of communication problems between academia
and industry.
This process is independent of whether the discovery comes from
an academic lab or from the company's own research lab. An
understanding of the process, and of the economics of the
process, helps make it easier to work through the difficulties in
transferring technology.
We start, as always, with an idea and a lab demonstration. Ideas without the demonstration are of little value and get little attention. At this stage very little money is being spent, although in today's economy, the expense of a scientist, students and technicians may be considered anything but negligible. Nevertheless, we are talking about sums of under a hundred thousand in the academic world, and three times that in industry, given typical industrial overhead. The stage at which a good idea has been demonstrated in the lab is the point at which a true scientist is most enthusiastic. From here on, it's downhill all the way from a scientific interest point of view.
The next stage, which often requires a small group of
scientifically oriented staff, but could conceivably be done by
an individual, is to do enough work to be able to make a
preliminary evaluation of the technical potential of the idea.
Goals of this work include deciding if the initial experiment is
close enough to the optimum form of the invention: Patenting an
invention without covering the optimum form of the idea may alert
all the competition to a new concept without resulting in
protection. This work may be an exciting extension of the
original idea, or, as is often the case, a very dull, but very
necessary, effort to obtain patent examples of every form in
which the concept may work. In either case, the work must be
done.
We are talking here about an activity which is on the borders of
normal academic interest. Although it could be done by an
individual, it would probably take all his or her time for an
extended period. This is usually not something an academic
researcher wants to contemplate. It is a laboratory process, and
the costs are increased only to the extent that more technicians
or further staff are required to do the job in a realistic time
span. However, both the added staff and the time away from
looking for further new concepts may be problems in the academic
world.
Up to this point we may have been in an area which the
academic researcher could possibly take part. From here on,
however, we are in the realm of industry or an unusually highly
specialized academic activity, usually associated with a partly
independent research foundation.
It is this stage, and its related expense, with which the
academic researcher is usually least familiar. It is frequently
assumed that the value of a patent is directly related to the
potential market value of the product. This assumption ignores
the low probability of a idea surviving through development to
become commercial. It also ignores the multimillion dollar
expense and size of staff to carry it through successfully.
The next stage, commercialization can go to the hundreds of
millions of dollars if a new plant is required. This stage
represents a major commitment requiring approval at the top level
of the corporation. The investment is permanent, provided of
course that the product can be sold at a profit. Even after this
expenditure the product can fail because of marketing problems,
not necessarily technical ones, which were not seen during
development.
This brief overview only begins to give an idea of the
development and commercialization process. In industry, newly
hired synthetic chemists are usually given as many opportunities
as possible to visit manufacturing sites. The response is
predictable. No matter how much one may have read about the
capacity of the plant, seeing the contrast between the laboratory
apparatus a new polymer was made in, and the multi-story plant to
which the invention will have to be transferred does not fail to
make an impression. A failed experiment in the plant can mean
anything from several tons of waste, to shutting down the plant
for days to chisel out polymer which solidified in the wrong
vessel. We will later summarize the forces which can make it
difficult to get new ideas applied. This is one of them, but keep
in mind that one must not condemn a plant manager for being
cautious about new ideas.
Table of Contents
© Manuel Panar 1996