The Methodological Challenges of Commercialization of Research Products in Iranian Higher Education

Universities are looking for various methods to increase the source share of their private incomes such as research commercialization. Creating and expanding technological transfer offices in universities whose duty is to guide and facilitate the transmission of commercialized knowledge derived from different kinds of intellectual properties is a shifting policy in this respect. This research has been done in order to determine the viewpoints of faculty members and authorities of industry relation offices about commercialization methods and their possible barriers to be able to help planners to develop it well.In this cross-sectional survey study, activists in the field of technological transmission were interviewed. samples were selected based on proportional stratified sampling method and the views of relevant experienced specialists were used to design questions. The results clearly demonstrated that the authorities of industry relation offices evaluated the role of the offices in the process of commercialization more fundamental than that of faculty members. Additionally 78% of interviewees believed that commercialization success depends on the effective and active interaction of these offices with other relevant units in universities. From the respondent points of view, priorities of commercialization methods includes: joint research contracts (41%), development of commercial enterprises (27%), patents (22%) and providing consulting services (10%), respectively. Both challenges of inattentiveness to entrepreneurship culture and the contradiction between commercialization and traditional responsibilities of universities in the case of education and basic researches have been mentioned fairly equal.