Minerva

DOI 10.1007/s11024-017-9321-5

The Heterogeneity of the Academic Profession: The

Effect of Occupational Variables on University
Scientists’ Participation in Research
Commercialization

Adam Novotny1,2

 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2017

Abstract Do academics who commercialize their inventions have a different pro-

fessional character than those who do not? The author conducted a nationwide
survey in Hungary including 1,562 academics of hard sciences from 14 universities.
According to the cluster analysis based on their participation in research commer-
cialization (RC), university scholars can be divided into three distinct groups:
‘traditional faculty’ (56%), ‘market-oriented faculty’ (22%), and ‘academic entre-
preneurs’ (22%). Traditional faculty members typically do not participate in RC,
while, within the framework of the university, market-oriented academics are
engaged in RC the most frequently. Academic entrepreneurs, in addition to their
university positions, work for spin-off firms that commercialize research findings.
Multinomial logistic regressions revealed that university scientists in various
engineering fields, and especially in chemical technology, as well as in biotech-
nology and pharmaceutics have a considerably greater potential to engage in RC,
similar to scholars with industry work experience, high number of publications, and
professorial rank. Discipline, work experience, scientific performance, and aca-
demic rank seem to outweigh the effect of the university and its location on RC
behavior. These findings underscore the inherent diversity of the academic pro-
fession and question the necessity of implementing uniform RC policies such as the
Bayh–Dole model across universities, disciplines, and segments of university
scientists.

Keywords Research commercialization  Academic entrepreneurship 

Spin-off firm  Higher education  Bayh–Dole Act

& Adam Novotny

adam.novotny@nord.no; novotny.adam@uni-eszterhazy.hu
1
Business School, Nord University, Post box 1490, 8049 Bodø, Norway
2
Institute of Economic Science, Eszterházy Károly University, Egészségház u. 4, Eger 3300,
Hungary

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 A. Novotny

Introduction

This paper aims to contribute to a re-emerging trend in literature on the composition

of scientific and scholarly institutions, according to which university scientists are
not homogeneous in terms of professional character. To elucidate the notion of
professional character I use the definition of Tirri et al. (1999): ‘the manner of
conduct within an occupation, how members integrate their obligations with their
knowledge and skills.’ Hence, university scientists’ professional character is
reflected in how they manage their human capital to contribute to the three
university missions: teaching, research, and interactions with the society outside the
academic environments. Bucher and Strauss (1961) were perhaps the first who
suggested that professions are ‘loose amalgamations’ of distinctive groups, called
‘segments,’ which develop unique identities including values, objectives, and
interests. One of the most important bases for segmentation is related to the
disagreements about the missions and core activities of a certain profession, for
example, between theory and practice, and among teaching, public service, and
consulting in the case of engineers (Gispen 2002).
Why is it important to study the composition of the university sector and
academic faculty today? One of the major characteristics of the societal
development of higher education systems, putting the academic profession under
pressure, has been the diversification of tasks and functions (Teichler and Höhle
2013). The (new) third mission of universities, i.e. the commercialization of
research (RC) under the ethos of ‘academic capitalism’ have stimulated lively
debates about the function of universities and academics in society (Schuetze 2007).
In Europe, the economic role of higher education institutions has come to the
forefront of political and scientific discussions as a result of the Lisbon Strategy, a
pan-European development program aimed at making the EU ‘the most competitive
and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world’ (European Parliament 2000).
As part of the Lisbon Strategy, the EU encourages universities to improve their
relations with the local community and facilitate the transformation of scientific
knowledge into new products, services, and jobs (European Commission
2003, 2006). Pushed by the unsatisfactory economic performance and enthused
by the legendary success of some US university-industry collaborations (e.g. Silicon
Valley, Route 128), several European countries aim to incentivize the ‘marketiza-
tion’ of university research by adjusting intellectual property (IP) legislation to the
Bayh–Dole model (Mowery and Sampat 2005; Wright et al. 2007).1 European
countries that have changed their IP management practices on the influence of the
US example either moved away from the professors’ privilege (Denmark, Germany,
Austria, Norway, and Finland) or from the government ownership model (Poland,
Slovak Republic, Slovenia, and Hungary) (Geuna and Rossi 2011). These
transformations of IP management regimes often took place without consideration
1
The Bayh–Dole Act of 1980 created the legal framework for the collaboration of academic, government
and private organizations by allowing universities to retain and commercialize the rights (e.g. by licensing
them to a business) relating to the invention resulting from research activities carried out at the institution.
University technology transfer offices have been attributed a crucial role in matching university research
with industry needs (Brady et al. 2015).

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The Heterogeneity of the Academic Profession

of the traditions and special characteristics of national higher education systems and
those of the academic profession.
In this paper, I extend the discussions on implementing uniform science and
innovation policies in dissimilar institutional environments and university systems
to the level of the individual faculty member. Feldman and Desrochers (2004) point
out that the Bayh–Dole Act may have been harmful to one of the most important
strengths of the US innovation system, i.e. the diversity of higher education
institutions. I argue that there is a high degree of specialization and diversity within
the academic profession (the terms occupation and profession are used inter-
changeably in this paper) which necessitates the fine-tuning of higher education and
research policies by paying attention to the specificities (values, traditions, norms,
and behaviors) of the various subgroups within academic faculty. This paper
assesses the heterogeneity of university scholars by examining the effect of
occupational characteristics on RC behavior.
Hungary offers a special context for studying university-industry linkages, at
least for two important reasons. First, previous empirical studies mostly focus on
universities of North America and Western Europe, while we know much less about
the specificities of RC in other parts of the world (Rothaermel et al. 2007). In the
post-socialist (post-)transition economies of Eastern Europe, the patterns of RC
have been highly influenced by the unique characteristics and path-dependent
evolution of the institutional and organizational context of (academic) entrepreneur-
ship (Tchalakov et al. 2010). Second, the reform of the Hungarian innovation
system between 2003 and 2005 was intended to adapt to the American Bayh–Dole
model.2 The emulation of the US innovation policy took place in spite of the fact
that the American institutional system, including higher education, is fundamentally
different from that of Europe (Bonaccorsi and Daraio 2007; Powell et al. 2007;
Franzoni and Lissoni 2009), and especially that of Eastern Europe.
On the basis of the ‘process’ approach of occupations (Bucher and Strauss 1961),
the next section surveys the literature on the importance of identifying the segments
of academics on the basis of their behavior regarding the creation and application of
science. In the third section, I illustrate the research design, and in the fourth I
elaborate on the results of a questionnaire survey carried out among Hungarian
academics from 14 universities, with particular attention to the relationship between
RC and other occupational characteristics. I assume that scholars who engage in RC
more frequently have significantly different professional attributes including
research field (discipline), institutional affiliation, location, academic rank, scientific
performance, and work experience than scientists who participate in RC less
frequently. Finally, I summarize the results and draw some important conclusions. I
expect that the findings will contribute to a better understanding of the composition
of university faculty in general, and highlight the barriers and pitfalls of applying

2
The Law on Research and Technological Innovation, effective as of 2005, allows universities in
Hungary to retain title to inventions resulting from research activities pursued within the framework of
the university. A new law on innovation took effect in 2015, which grants university-born inventions to
the government; however, public research organizations may continue the practice of exercising the
ownership rights of these IPs in the name of the central state, e.g. by establishing spin-off firms and taking
equity positions in them.

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 A. Novotny

‘one size fits all’ research policies throughout countries, universities, and different
groups of scientists.

Literature Review

Some recent works (Agarwal and Ohyama 2013; Sauermann and Roach 2014) draw
attention to the contradiction that previous literature typically approached
academics as a homogenous community, whereas individual faculty members
differ in several ways regarding their attitudes and behaviors: there can be as much
diversity within the university sector as between university and industry. For
example, Owen-Smith and Powell (2001) identify four types of scientists based on
their views on academy-industry relations: ‘old-school,’ ‘new-school,’ ‘reluctant
Entrepreneurs,’ and ‘engaged traditionalists.’ In a more recent work, Provasi et al.
(2012) distinguish between two types of scholars: ‘pure’ academic scientists are
driven solely by the so-called Mertonian norms (Merton 1973), while entrepreneur-
ial scientists aim to satisfy market needs with their research. Based on interviews
with Hungarian spin-off founders, Varga and Erd} os (2010) differentiate ‘classic’
academic entrepreneurs from ‘unbalanced’ (who focus either on academia or the
firm), ‘impeded’ (by environmental factors), and ‘externally motivated’ (by grants,
the technology transfer office, etc.) ones.
Drawing on the process approach to professions, Bucher and Strauss (1961)
suggest that even major faculty segments (i.e. specialties) are not unified, and they
may contain further segments if we explore them in more detail. Researchers are not
independent seekers of truth, but so-called ‘quasi-academic scientists’ influenced in
their pursuit of research by occupational factors, organizational context, and the
national higher educational system (Ziman 1987). Early works on the fragmentation
of the academic profession highlighted the role of disciplinary characteristics,
including orientations toward research, teaching and publishing, reward structures,
conformity to the norms of science, etc. (Biglan 1973b; Smart and McLaughlin
1978; Braxton 1989). Clark (1987a: 42) explains the ‘niches’ of academics by their
‘dual memberships in institutions and subjects’; however, he also believes that there
are ‘shared understandings’ (e.g. commitment to subject, specialization) that hold
scientists together in one academic profession (Clark 1987b: 397). Some sciences
are apparently more market-oriented than others, therefore large universities with
autonomous faculties, typical of Europe, can easily ‘be forced to operate with an
entrepreneurial/traditional split in character’ (Clark 1998: 142).
‘Hard’ sciences (Biglan 1973a; Laird et al. 2008) generally result in IPs that are
more suitable for RC than findings in the social sciences or humanities. Fields with
more potential for applied research and experimental development enjoy stronger
governmental support, especially in light of modern higher education policies,
which intend to increase the economic return of publicly funded research (Ylijoki
2003). Biology, medical research, and engineering research together represent two-
thirds of university research and development (R&D) expenditures in the US (Britt
2012). While American universities were specialized by their primary research
interest (pure science vs. technology development) in the 19th century (Etzkowitz

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The Heterogeneity of the Academic Profession

2003), European countries have not distinguished institutions according to their

research direction. Moreover, they do not have consistent policies concerning which
universities are engaged in research and which are not (Bonaccorsi and Daraio
2007). The direction of research pursued by an academic in Europe is more of a
personal choice than an overall university strategy. As norms held by faculty
members develop within fields of the sciences and are disseminated through
publications, conferences, and informal meetings of the representatives of a given
field (Alpert 1985), I suppose that disciplines are more influential on academics’ RC
behavior than institutional affiliations.
Hypothesis 1. Research field (discipline) is a more significant predictor of
academics’ participation in RC than institutional affiliation (H1).
The spillover effects of knowledge accumulated in universities on the innova-
tiveness and economic development of regions have been extensively documented
in literature (e.g. Jaffe 1989; Acs, Audretsch and Feldman 1992; Anselin, Varga and
Acs 1997; Rodrı́guez-Pose and Crescenzi 2008). On the other hand, regions with
higher income per capita and stronger local clusters are likely to offer more
opportunities (better demand conditions, higher number of potential industry
partners, greater amount of industry funding, etc.) for academics to commercialize
their inventions (Sternberg 2014; Avnimelech and Feldman 2015).
Hypothesis 2. Academics at universities located in more developed regions have a
higher capability of participating in RC (H2).
Higher education institutions globally attribute more value to research and
publications in promotion decisions than to teaching and service (Moses 1986;
Allen 1988; McCaffrey, Nelles and Byrne 1989; Tien 2007), which can cause role
conflict in academics (Leslie 2002). As a result, individual levels of RC can largely
depend on the ability and willingness of scientists to integrate commercialization
with the traditional university missions. Whether the market orientation of research
threatens traditional academic norms and, in particular, the free dissemination of
research findings (the principles of ‘communalism’ and ‘disinterestedness’) is a
recurring issue in the literature (e.g. Blumenthal et al. 1997; Owen-Smith and
Powell 2001; Macfarlane and Cheng 2008; Shibayama 2012; Provasi et al. 2012).
Notwithstanding findings according to which academics engaged in RC are more
closed regarding their research results (Louis et al. 2001; Murray and Stern 2007),
some evidence supports the positive association between RC and publishing:
Academic entrepreneurs are more productive scientifically than their peers, and
their productivity does not decrease after they found a firm (Lowe and Gonzalez-
Brambila 2007). Patenting has a positive influence on publishing (Agrawal and
Henderson 2002; Renault 2006; Landry et al. 2007; Magerman et al. 2015), similar
to that of contract research (Van Looy et al. 2004). Ponomariov (2008), on the other
hand, finds that the higher the university’s academic prestige (citation index), the
less inclined researchers are to collaborate with industry. While companies are
primarily looking for cooperation with more prestigious universities, researchers at
these institutions prefer to devote energy to basic research and publication, which
directly enhance their reputation as scientists and give them greater job security.

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 A. Novotny

While previous findings seem to be inconclusive, I assume that scientifically

productive scholars have more opportunities and resources (human, financial, and
social) for RC.
Hypothesis 3. Academics with higher scientific (publishing) performance have
greater capabilities to engage in RC (H3).
Senior academics are not necessarily more research productive than their less
senior colleagues (Mishra and Smyth 2013), thus academic ranks may affect RC
behavior differently than publishing. In addition, while ranks in the university sector
are usually a positive function of age, age seems to correlate negatively with the
ability to raise funds from the market: institutes with more experienced researchers
are less able to attract external funds for research (Bonaccorsi and Daraio 2003).
Although scientists in more senior ranks would find it easier to gain legitimacy on
the market, they are probably less motivated to do so, since their academic status
provides them with higher job security and higher salary.
Hypothesis 4. Academics in more senior ranks are less likely to commercialize
their research findings (H4).
There is empirical evidence indicating that career experiences influence
individuals’ entrepreneurial behavior and success by determining their capacity to
access to information and ideas (Shane 2000; Klepper 2001). A relatively high
proportion (63%) of academics in Sweden and Ireland, for example, have some sort
of previous industrial or entrepreneurial experience, which positively influences
them in initiating their own business (Klofsten and Jones-Evans 2000). Spin-off
founders with industrial experience find it easier to attract external investment
(Clarysse and Moray 2004), and faculty members with private sector work
experience have a greater variety of network ties and social capital (Dietz and
Bozeman 2005).
Hypothesis 5. Industrial work experience increases the likeliness of engaging in
RC and mainly in spin-off foundation (H5).
In summary, I propose that academics who engage in RC relatively frequently
embody a different type of scholar (regarding discipline, geographic location,
scientific performance, academic rank, and previous industrial experience) from
those who are not likely to participate in it. There may be heterogeneity regarding
RC behavior even within seemingly homogeneous fields of study such as hard
sciences, where research findings are inherently more suitable for commercializa-
tion than in social sciences or humanities.

Method

There were 70 higher education institutions in Hungary, including 19 state-run and

7 non-state universities as well as 11 state-run and 33 non-state colleges (MNR
2010), at the time of the questionnaire survey (spring, 2009). Higher education
institutions called ‘university’ are generally larger in terms of the number of

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The Heterogeneity of the Academic Profession

academic faculty and students and more research oriented than institutions referred
to as ‘college,’ hence their RC potential is also greater. The primary population of
the survey consists of nearly eight thousand (7,948) full-time and part-time
academics, employed in teaching positions at a department in life sciences, natural
sciences, or engineering at a state-run university (Educational Authority 2009). In
addition to teaching positions, 1,780 staff members worked in higher education as
researchers, 1,685 of them at the 14 examined universities. About half of the
scholars in research positions belonged to the examined fields of sciences.
As previous studies mainly focused on senior academics, I included PhD students
in the population, and especially as they are responsible for a considerable share of
research at many universities (Bienkowska et al. 2016). The inclusion of PhD
students offers an insight into the life-cycle stages of academics, for instance, young
scientist are more prone to become engaged in newer (less developed) fields of
science than experienced scientists (Rappa and Debackere 1993). The sample
comprises 220 PhD students, who are 8.7% of the doctoral student population and
representative of them in terms of location (capital city versus countryside) and
gender.3
Faculty members’ e-mail addresses were collected with the help of university
technology transfer offices and departmental websites. The sample framework was
almost identical to the population. I administered the questionnaire online to 7,103
academics between May and August 2009. Following three rounds of e-mails, 1,605
respondents answered all the questions (333 responses were partial), so the response
rate is 23%. I sent the third reminder to academics whose university had been under-
represented in the sample after two rounds of e-mails. The response rate is sufficient
compared to similar online surveys in the US, where academics are more familiar
with the concept of RC.4 The standard deviation of response rates by universities
was relatively small (2.5%). I omitted those respondents from the sample who
officially work at a department of hard sciences, but indicated by their research
fields or job responsibilities do not closely belong to such disciplines. This
procedure resulted in a final sample of 1,562 academics.
Based on Klofsten and Jones-Evans (2000), I asked academics about their
participation in formal and less formal technology transfer mechanisms, namely
government financed R&D for firms, contract research, consulting, patenting, and
spinning out, as well as the intensity of direct contact between them and industry. I
also collected other occupational and demographic information from scientists on a
self-report basis. In spite of self-selection bias, the sample is highly representative of
Hungarian university faculty by academic rank, especially concerning teaching
positions, and fairly representative by geographical location, gender, and affiliation

3
The exact number of the population is not easy to determine for various reasons. For example, some
institutions in addition to ‘university faculties’ embrace faculties that are less research oriented and thus
have a ‘college faculty’ status; I excluded them from the sample. Besides, the Hungarian Educational
Authority does not publish data about academics hired in research positions in such detail as in the case of
teaching positions.
4
See, for example, Renault (2006): 14%; Ponomariov (2008): 38%; and Aldridge and Audretsch (2011):
36%.

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 A. Novotny

Table 1 The distribution of the sample and population by academic rank and affiliation (university
faculties of hard sciences)
Academic rank In the sample (%) In the population (%)

Teaching positions
Assistant lecturer 19.2 22.6
Senior lecturer 26.1 28.5
College associate professor 3.7 3.1
Associate professor 30.5 28.2
College professor 2.6 1.4
Professor 17.8 16.2
Share of women 24.4 30.2
Share of faculty located in Budapest 37.5 40.8
Research positions
Assistant research fellow 40.6 50.8
Research fellow 40.6 30.0
Senior research fellow 18.7 19.2
Share of women within research positions 34.8 33.4
PhD students
Share of women within PhD students 35.5 42.7
Share of PhD students located in Budapest 39.1 49.5
University affiliation
Budapest University of Technology & Economics 19.7 12.9
University of Pécs 12.3 15.6
University of Debrecen 12.2 11.8
Eötvös Loránd University 10.0 8.3
Szent István University 8.7 2.6
University of Szeged 7.3 13.5
University of Miskolc 6.8 3.6
University of West Hungary 6.3 4.0
University of Pannonia 4.1 2.0
Széchenyi István University 3.4 5.2
Semmelweis University 3.2 14.3
Corvinus University of Budapest 2.7 2.8
Zrı́nyi National Defence University 1.9 2.4
University of Kaposvár 1.3 0.8

(Table 1). Scientists from Semmelweis University are considerably underrepre-

sented in the sample.
The positive skew of the dependent variables (Table 2) shows that even
academics relatively less active in RC responded to the survey. Since only about
half of the respondents indicated some RC experience, it seems that even

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The Heterogeneity of the Academic Profession

Table 2 The distribution of university scientists by the frequency of their participation in RC (N=1562)
1 = Never 2 = Rarely 3 = Sometimes 4 = Often 5 = Continuously Mean

In the previous 5 years…

(1) …did you provide R&D for firms financed by government/EU grants?
55% 10.9% 17.5% 9.9% 6.7% 2.02
(2) …did you provide R&D for corporate clients (contract research)?
50.3% 13.2% 18.9% 10.4% 7.2% 2.11
(3) …did you provide consulting for private businesses?
46.3% 18.9% 19.8% 10.2% 4.7% 2.08
(4) …did you apply for patents?
87.8% 5.6% 4.7% 1.5% 0.4% 1.21
(5) …did you approach firms with your R&D ideas?
64.9% 13.1% 12.9% 4% 0.8% 1.57
(6) …did firms ask you for R&D?
53.3% 16.4% 16.4% 7.5% 2.2% 1.84
(7) Are you an owner or employee of a for-profit venture that is for commercializing research findings, or
providing R&D or consulting services for clients?
‘no’: 78.6% ‘yes’: 21.4%

nonparticipants found the questionnaire thought-provoking and relevant in the

current higher education setting. Concerning other common method biases, ‘social
desirability’ and self-report bias (Donaldson and Grant-Vallone 2002) may
influence the results. Although the questionnaire was anonymous, respondents
might have been influenced by their preconceptions about the social and
organizational acceptability/desirability of RC and the ideal professional character
in their field of study.
The independent variables are discipline (Table 5), university (Table 1), location
(regional GDP per capita in 2009)5, the number of publications (sum of articles,
book chapters, and books in the five years prior to the survey), academic rank
(Table 1, plus professor emeriti and technical assistant), and industry experience (no
experience/less than a year/1–5 years/6–10 years/more than 10 years). For the easier
interpretation of regression estimations, categorical variables (university, location,
rank, and industry experience) were dummy coded. As academics could select more
than one field to specify their research activity, disciplines were coded into
(independent) binary variables.
To outline the major behavioral patterns of the academic community regarding
RC, I segmented faculty members based on the activities presented in Table 2. To
test the hypotheses, i.e. the effect of occupational variables on segment membership,
I applied logistic regression analysis.

5
In Hungary, there are seven NUTS 2 regions, used as the bases for statistical analysis and economic
planning in the EU.

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 A. Novotny

Findings

The typical respondent is a middle-aged man with a PhD in engineering who works
as an associate professor. He has no or only less than a year’s work experience in the
corporate sector. In the five-year span prior to the survey, he had more than a dozen
publications. By their own admission, 53.7% of the respondents took part in
consulting, 49.7% in industry funded R&D, 45% in government funded commer-
cialization programs, and 12.2% in patenting. As indicated by the scale means, there
are no significant differences in the frequency of involvement in contract research,
government funded RC, and consulting. Patenting is significantly less typical than
other forms of RC (p \ .001). The majority (73%) of academics participates in
commercialization at least ‘rarely,’ while one-third takes part in some form of it
‘often’ or ‘continuously.’ One in five respondents (21.4%) works in a spin-off firm,
but the university is a joint owner only in 7.5% of these enterprises. Slightly more
than one-third of the respondents approached firms themselves, while almost half of
them were approached by private businesses interested in research collaboration.
I performed a two-step cluster analysis on the sample to categorize faculty into
sufficiently different groups based on their involvement in RC. The two-step
clustering method offered by SPSS allows for analysis of variables measured on
different levels (categorical and continuous) and is especially effective for large
data sets and when the optimal number of clusters is unknown (SPSS 2001; Mooi
and Sarstedt 2011). All the seven forms of commercialization as presented in
Table 2 were included in the analysis; engagement in RC was sufficiently reliable
(a = 0.79). On the basis of BIC, BIC change, ratio of BIC changes and ratio of
distant measures, the procedure divided respondents into three meaningful segments
(Fig. 1) with the following distribution: 53.6% (838 academics), 21.2% (331), and
20.9% (326). The remaining respondents (4.3% or 67 academics) were considered
outliers and have been excluded from the analysis.
The largest segment includes the least market-oriented faculty, whose partici-
pation is lukewarm in every form of RC: they do not, or only rarely involve
themselves in commercialization and do not work for a spin-off venture (Table 3). I
will refer to them as ‘traditional faculty.’ The second group engages in RC relatively
frequently, but has not started a (spin-off) firm to do so. I label them ‘market-

Fig. 1 The segments of

academics by their engagement
in RC (dependent variable; N= Academic
1495) entrepreneur:
21.8%
Traditional:
Market- 56.1%
oriented:
22.1%

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The Heterogeneity of the Academic Profession

Table 3 Segments of academic faculty based on their participation in RC

Faculty Was engaged in … in the previous 5 years. Approached Approached
segments firms by firms
Government Industry Consulting Patenting Spin-off
financed R&D financed firms
for firms R&D

Traditional (N= 838)

Mean 1.55*** 1.44*** 1.44*** 1.02*** 0.0% 1.15*** 1.21***
Mode Never Never Never Never No Never Never
Market-oriented (N= 331)
Mean 2.80** 3.26*** 2.86 1.51 0.0% 2.16 2.85***
Mode Never Sometimes Sometimes Never No Never Sometimes
Academic entrepreneurs (N= 326)
Mean 2.45** 2.59*** 2.92 1.40 100.0% 2.03 2.43***
Mode Never Never Sometimes Never Yes Never Never
All segments 2.02 2.09 2.08 1.21 21.4% 1.57 1.84

Mean of frequency scales. 1 = ‘never,’ 2 = ‘rarely,’ 3 = ‘sometimes,’ 4 = ‘often,’ 5 = ‘continuously.’

Segment characteristics that are significantly different from the other two segments are marked with an
asterisk. Significance is reported in comparison with the other two segments, hence only the weaker
significance level is stated. (* p \ .05, ** p \ .01, *** p \ .001)

Spinning out 1.00

Approached by firms 0.59

Consulting 0.45

Industry funded R&D 0.44

Approached firms 0.31

Government funded R&D 0.20

Patenting 0.13

Fig. 2 The predictor importance value of the RC variables in the formation of the cluster solution

oriented faculty.’ The third segment includes ‘academic entrepreneurs’ who,

alongside their academic positions, have their own venture or are employed by a
firm that commercializes research results. Traditional faculty can be regarded as RC
nonparticipants, while market-oriented faculty and academic entrepreneurs are RC
participants. According to the predictor importance values, working in a spin-off

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firm is the most important, while patenting is the least important variable in the
formation of the three clusters (Fig. 2).6
I tested the effects of occupational characteristics on segment membership by
multinomial logistic regression. The multinomial logit model is used to predict the
probability of category membership on an outcome variable that has more than two
categories based on discrete or continuous independent variables (Rodrı́guez 2007;
Gujarati 2014). It estimates J–1 models, where J is the number of levels of the
response variable, aj is a constant and bj is a vector of regression coefficients (j = 1,
2, …J-1), there are k explanatory variables, and we have data for n sets of
observations (i = 1, 2, …n). The logits (logs of the odds ratio) are supposed to be
linear functions of the independent variable(s):
pij
gij ¼ log ¼ a j þ b1j x1i þ . . . þ bkj xki ð1Þ
piJ
Hence, the log odds to be categorized as market-oriented (MO) rather than
traditional (TR) are as follows:
piMO
log ¼ aMO þ bMO MO
1 x1i þ . . . þ bk xki ð2Þ
piTR
The log odds to be classified as an academic entrepreneur (AE) rather than a
traditional scientist (TR) can be written as:
piAE
log ¼ aAE þ bAE AE
1 x1i þ . . . þ bk xki ð3Þ
piTR
There are three groups of faculty members, thus the procedure predicts two models.
I treat nonparticipant (traditional) faculty as the reference or base category and
estimate a model for the market-oriented segment relative to traditional faculty
(Equation 2), and another model for academic entrepreneurs relative to traditional
faculty (Equation 3). I evaluate the models by their fit, pseudo R-square statistics, and
the ratio of academics classified correctly. To compare the effect-size of the models I
apply McFadden’s (1973) likelihood-ratio test, which, as stated by Menard (2000), is
the best measure for logistic regression. The test compares the intercept-only model to
the model with predictors: it equals zero if the likelihoods of the null-model and the
model with explanatory variables are the same, and equals one if the likelihood of the
model is 1, which actually can never be achieved. I also report Nagelkerke’s (1991)
test, which corrects the R-square developed by Cox and Snell (1989) to make it behave
like the R-square in linear modeling. I estimate the predictive power of the explanatory
variables separately and then in a multiple regression model. The summary of the
tested logit models are presented in Table 4. Considering the proportional by-chance
accuracy rate (0.5612 ? 0.2212 ? 0.2182 = 0.411), all models improve on chance by
more than 25% (their accuracy rates are greater than 51.4%), which is regarded as
adequate (Petrucci 2009). The traditional segment has a much higher accuracy of
predictions in each model compared to the other two groups. To evaluate the effect of a

6
The standardized predictor importance value, ranging between 0.0 and 1.0, is obtained from the
t-statistic distribution: it shows the relative contribution of each variable to the cluster formation (SPSS
2011). The greater the predictor importance value, the more critical the variable is in the formation of the
clusters.

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The Heterogeneity of the Academic Profession

Table 4 The summary of the multinomial logit models (outcome variable: segment membership)
Predictors Model fit Pseudo R-squares Frequencies predicted correctly
(%)

McFadden’s Nagelkerke’s TR MO AE Overall

Discipline (H1) v2 (54) = 231.656 0.078 0.167 92.6 16.3 6.4 56.9
p \ .001
University (H1) v2 (26) = 106.684 0.036 0.080 97.1 9.1 0.0 56.5
p \ .001
Location (H2) v2 (12) = 63.226 0.021 0.048 97.1 9.1 0.0 56.5
p \ .001
Publications (H3) v2 (2) = 42.555 0.014 0.033 98.3 5.1 0.0 56.3
p \ .001
Academic rank (H4) v2 (24) = 75.660 0.026 0.057 100.0 0.0 0.0 56.1
p \ .001
Experience (H5) v2 (8) = 206.414 0.070 0.150 93.2 0.0 27.3 58.2
p \ .001
Full model v2 (124) = 559.481 0.189 0.362 84.8 32.6 40.4 63.6
p \ .001

single variable in a model I report Exp(B) values or odds ratios (OR), i.e. the odds of
categorization in one of the participant segments relative to the odds of classification
in the traditional segment. 7
Research fields predict cluster membership better than the intercept-only model
and are a relatively good fit (Table 4). The ORs presented in Table 5 indicate that
larger disciplinary areas are not homogeneous regarding their RC potential.
Pursuing research in some engineering (applied–non-life) sciences and in a few
applied–life sciences (agricultural science and forestry, pharmaceutics, biotechnol-
ogy and biomedical engineering) increases the relative odds of classification in the
market-oriented and entrepreneurial segments by about a factor of 2–5 and 1.5–3,
respectively; while mathematics and geography significantly decrease ORs. Table 5
also presents the share of traditional and non-traditional faculty in each discipline.
The top 10 fields, which have the highest proportion of non-traditional scientists, are
all in engineering as well as in the aforementioned fields of applied–life sciences.
Traditional scientists dominate (50%\) pure sciences, and surprisingly some
applied fields as well, such as earth science, informatics and computer science,
medicine, medical sciences, and health science. If we combine the 27 narrow fields
into four dummy variables, each representing a major disciplinary area (applied–
life, applied–non-life, pure–life, and pure–non-life), we find that classification in the
market-oriented and entrepreneurial segments is more likely in the fields of applied–

7
One way to calculate odds ratios is by raising the mathematical constant e to the power of the logistic
coefficient.

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 A. Novotny

Table 5 The RC potential of disciplines; descending order of the proportion of faculty participating in
RC
Research fields N Estimated multinomial logistics Share of … scientists (%)
regression coefficients
(Reference group: Traditional faculty)

Market-oriented Academic
segment entrepreneurs

Exp(B) SE Exp(B) SE Traditional Market- Entrepreneurial

oriented

1 Chemical 61 4.979*** 0.334 2.997** 0.395 28.3 50.0 21.7

technology
2 Biotechnology 66 2.350* 0.333 2.815** 0.333 34.8 33.3 31.8
&
biomedical
engineering
3 Transportation 43 1.661 0.455 3.300** 0.37 38.1 19.0 42.9
and vehicle
engineering
4 Mechanical 175 2.708*** 0.231 2.333*** 0.237 39.0 33.3 27.7
engineering
5 Electrical 112 2.915*** 0.263 2.234** 0.274 39.8 33.3 26.9
engineering
6 Food 39 1.16 0.466 3.061** 0.384 41.0 20.5 38.5
engineering
7 Materials 113 2.155** 0.259 0.935 0.317 42.6 40.4 17.0
science
8 Pharmaceutics 86 2.455** 0.285 1.967* 0.322 44.2 34.9 20.9
9 Agricultural 206 2.400*** 0.206 1.568* 0.22 46.1 31.6 22.3
science &
forestry
10 Architecture 110 1.02 0.318 2.442*** 0.252 49.5 14.7 35.8
and civil
engineering
11 Environmental 25 1.244 0.597 2.049 0.482 50.0 16.7 33.3
science
12 Biophysics 27 1.038 0.512 1.026 0.526 51.9 25.9 22.2
13 Biochemistry 50 1.45 0.368 0.863 0.447 52.0 32.0 16.0
14 Earth science 106 0.971 0.321 1.594 0.259 54.2 15.6 30.2
15 Informatics & 240 1.225 0.213 1.459 0.199 54.5 19.9 25.5
computer
science
16 Physics 68 0.774 0.353 1.074 0.328 58.2 19.4 22.4
17 Immunology 22 0.942 0.608 1.278 0.563 59.1 18.2 22.7
18 Physiology 71 1.455 0.353 0.78 0.382 59.2 26.8 14.1
19 Chemistry 160 0.936 0.24 0.598 0.282 61.5 25.6 12.8
20 Geography 63 0.211* 0.741 1.817 0.313 62.7 3.4 33.9
21 Biology 177 0.676 0.248 0.794 0.241 64.4 17.5 18.1
22 Neuroscience 11 0.625 0.522 1.05 0.467 70.7 12.2 17.1

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The Heterogeneity of the Academic Profession

Table 5 continued

Research fields N Estimated multinomial logistics Share of … scientists (%)

regression coefficients
(Reference group: Traditional faculty)

Market-oriented Academic
segment entrepreneurs

Exp(B) SE Exp(B) SE Traditional Market- Entrepreneurial

oriented

23 Mathematics 118 0.483* 0.334 0.547* 0.317 74.8 10.8 14.4

24 Medicine (incl. 45 0.816 0.445 0.488 0.549 75.6 15.6 8.9
veterinary)
25 Military 14 0.909 0.686 n/a n/a 78.6 21.4 0.0
science
26 Anatomy 41 0.405 1.137 0.467 1.122 81.8 9.1 9.1
27 Health science 20 n/a n/a 0.233 1.038 95.0 0.0 5.0

Significance levels are marked with asterisks: * p \ .05, ** p \ .01, *** p \ .001. Multiple responses
were allowed (N = 1562; number of responses: 2269)

non-life (OR = 2.986 and 2.883, resp.; p \ .001) and applied–life sciences
(OR = 2.132 and 1.604, resp.; p \ .01). Pure–life sciences, combined, do not
influence ORs; while pure–non-life fields halve the relative odds of an academic to
become market-oriented (OR = 0.577; p \ .05).
Institutional affiliation also predicts cluster membership significantly better than
the null-model. Compared to Budapest University of Technology and Economics
(reference category), which is represented in the sample by its engineering faculties,
academics at all institutions, except for Corvinus University of Budapest, are less
likely to start a spin-off firm (ORs are significantly smaller for six universities). It
seems that engineering faculties at universities located in/near the capital city of
Budapest offer the most fertile ground for academic entrepreneurship. Regarding
market-orientation, the picture is less clear: affiliation to some institutions lowers,
while affiliation to others increases the relative odds of categorization as market-
oriented compared to the reference university. For example, University of Pannonia
more than doubles the relative odds (OR = 2.5; p \ 0.01) of classification in the
market-oriented segment, in comparison with the reference university. Working for
large multi-faculty universities, such as University of Pécs (OR = 0.262; p\0.001),
Eötvös Loránd University (OR = 0.458; p\0.01), or University of Debrecen (OR =
0.467; p \ 0.01), in contrast, significantly decreases the chance of occurring in the
market-oriented group compared with Budapest University of Technology and
Economics. Since both some disciplines and universities influence segment
membership, regression models that test their effects separately are not sufficient
to draw a conclusion regarding H1 with certainty.
The most developed region in the country is Central Hungary, with Budapest
providing more than one third of the national GDP (HCSO 2013). This imparity
suggests that location or economic geography influences participation in RC. The

123
 A. Novotny

capital city is followed by the regions west of Budapest, while southern, eastern and
especially northern parts of the country considerably lag behind the most developed
regions. According to the logit model, location, measured by the GDP per capita of
NUTS 2 regions, significantly predicts segment membership. Relative chances to
become an academic entrepreneur are smaller in all regions compared to Central
Hungary, but only two of them are significantly (p \ 0.05) lower, including
Northern Hungary (OR = 0.094), which has the smallest per capita income in the
country. Two of the less developed regions significantly reduce the relative odds to
become a market-oriented researcher (OR = 0.456 and 0.525, resp.; p \ .01), while
one of the more developed ones increases them (OR = 2.81; p \ .001) compared to
Central Hungary. Although regional disparities seem to influence participation in
RC in line with the hypothesis, other occupational factors probably attenuate this
effect to a degree that it becomes observable (significant) only in a few regions, so
results weakly support H2.
The regression model containing publication count as a covariate indicates that
higher publication output raises the odds of placement in the participant segments
versus the traditional one. One additional publication increases the relative odds to
be placed in the market-oriented and entrepreneurial segments by 2.4 and 1.9%
respectively (OR = 1.024 and 1.019; p \ .001), therefore we can accept H3. The
number of publications correlates (p \ .001) with every examined dimension of RC
and primarily with interactions with firms (sb for approaching firms: 0.22; sb for
getting requests by firms: 0.18) and patenting (sb = 0.15).
Academic ranks predict segment membership significantly better than the
intercept model. Compared to PhD students (reference group), academics in all
teaching and research positions, and especially college and university professors
(OR = 4.697, p\0.01 and 4.349, p\0.001; resp.), have greater odds to occur in the
market-oriented segment rather than in the traditional one. Furthermore, there
seems to be a positive relationship between odds to engage in RC and academic
ranks: OR is 1.36 for assistant lecturers, 2.23 for senior lecturers, 2.87 for associate
professors, and over 3 for professors including professor emeriti. Apart from
technical assistants, scholars in both teaching and research positions have higher
relative odds to work for a spin-off firm as opposed to be a traditional scientist. On
the other hand, there appears to be no (linear) relationship between ranks and the
relative odds to start a firm: ORs are about the same for both less and more senior
ranks. For example, senior lecturers and university professors both have high
relative odds to start firms compared to PhD students: 3.167, p \ 0.001 and 2.818,
p \ 0.01, resp. Thus H4, which assumes lukewarm RC activity for academics of
higher ranks, is rejected in the case of spin-offs, but supported regarding other ways
of RC.
The literature suggests that work experience gained in the private sector increases
academics’ likelihood of engaging in RC, and spin-offs in particular. The model
containing industry experience is a significant improvement to the null-model and is
the second best fit after disciplines. Previous corporate experience increases the
relative odds of classification in both the market-oriented and entrepreneurial
segments (p \ .001). Compared with the lack of experience, an academic has 2.22
(less than a year experience) to 3.76 (more than 10 years of experience) times

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The Heterogeneity of the Academic Profession

Table 6 The significant predictors of becoming a market-oriented researcher (full model)

B SE Sig. Exp(B)

Intercept -2.322 0.399 0.000***

Chemical technology 1.527 0.409 0.000*** 4.605
Biotechnology, biomedical engineering 1.033 0.369 0.005** 2.810
Pharmaceutics 0.983 0.341 0.004** 2.672
Materials science 0.681 0.295 0.021* 1.976
Agricultural science, forestry 0.635 0.271 0.019* 1.887
Electrical engineering 0.616 0.310 0.047* 1.852
Mechanical engineering 0.557 0.268 0.038* 1.745
Mathematics -0.723 0.356 0.042* 0.485
University of Pannonia 0.949 0.376 0.012* 2.582
University of Pecs -0.892 0.364 0.014* 0.410
Budapest University of Technology and Economics (reference 0
category)
Publications 0.016 0.005 0.001** 1.016
Professor 1.388 0.461 0.003** 4.008
College professor 2.083 0.631 0.001** 8.026
Associate professor 1.100 0.359 0.002** 3.004
Senior lecturer 1.007 0.321 0.002** 2.738
Assistant research fellow 1.215 0.412 0.003** 3.371
PhD student (reference category) 0
Industry experience (10 years\) 0.915 0.347 0.008** 2.496
Industry experience (1–5 years) 1.120 0.196 0.000*** 3.066
Industry experience (\1 year) 0.726 0.247 0.003** 2.067
No industry experience (reference category) 0
Women -0.565 0.193 0.003** 0.569
Men (reference category) 0

DV: membership in the market-oriented segment versus the traditional one. Due to the large number of
dummy variables in the full model, the table contains the significant predictors only

greater odds to become market-oriented (versus traditional) if he/she has industry

experience. Similarly, it is 2.31–10.88 times more likely for a scholar with industry
experience to be associated with a spin-off firm that commercializes research
findings than being a traditional scientist. With regard to academic entrepreneurs,
ORs to work in a spin-off and the duration of industry experience are positively
linked. These results clearly support H5.
Finally, I tested the hypotheses by running a multiple regression including all
predictors plus age and gender as control variables. The largest improvement of the
multiple analysis compared to the simple regressions appears in categorizing
participant faculty, both market-oriented (33%) and entrepreneurial (40%)
(Table 4). The significant explanatories of the model predicting membership in
the market-oriented versus the traditional segment are shown in Table 6.

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 A. Novotny

Table 7 The significant predictors of becoming an academic entrepreneur (full model)

B S.E. Sig. Exp(B)

Intercept -2.267 0.406 0.000***

Chemical technology 1.303 0.473 0.006** 3.679
Biotechnology, biomedical engineering 1.232 0.381 0.001** 3.430
Transportation and vehicle engineering 0.896 0.447 0.045* 2.449
Pharmaceutics 0.894 0.373 0.016* 2.445
Geography 0.760 0.362 0.036* 2.138
Eotvos Lorand University -0.884 0.356 0.013* 0.413
Szechenyi Istvan University -1.170 0.489 0.017* 0.310
Miskolc University -2.423 1.054 0.022* 0.089
Budapest University of Technology and 0
Economics (reference category)
Publications 0.013 0.005 0.008** 1.013
College professor 1.663 0.674 0.014* 5.275
Associate professor 0.921 0.365 0.012* 2.511
Senior lecturer 1.069 0.322 0.001** 2.912
Assistant lecturer 1.126 0.312 0.000*** 3.084
Research fellow 0.960 0.459 0.036* 2.612
PhD student (reference category) 0
Industry experience (10 years \) 2.117 0.308 0.000*** 8.309
Industry experience (6–10 years) 1.598 0.326 0.000*** 4.945
Industry experience (1–5 years) 1.470 0.202 0.000*** 4.348
Industry experience (\1 year) 0.734 0.262 0.005** 2.083
No industry experience (reference category) 0
Women -0.868 0.202 0.000** 0.420
Men (reference category) 0

DV: occurring in the segment of academic entrepreneurs versus that of traditional scientists. Due to the
large number of dummy variables in the full model, the table contains the significant predictors only

Accordingly, actively publishing male professors8 of engineering, biotechnology, or

pharmaceutics with some industry experience are the most likely members of the
market-oriented segment. University affiliation becomes marginal in the presence of
other occupational variables, and all regions lost their significance.
The significant explanatory variables of the model predicting membership in the
entrepreneurial segment as opposed to the traditional one are presented in Table 7.
Typical academic entrepreneurs have slightly different characteristics from their
colleagues in the market-oriented segment. Industry experience, for instance, has a
strong influence on capabilities to start a firm. Engineering and research in chemical
and biological technologies in particular, have the highest RC potential concerning
disciplines.

8
According to the law on higher education (Act CCIV of 2011), ‘university professors’ have higher
(international) academic experience/reputation and receive higher salaries than ‘college professors.’

123
The Heterogeneity of the Academic Profession

The multiple regression models support the predictive significance of research

field (H1), industrial work experience (H5), publication count (H3), and even
academic rank (H4); however, more senior ranks do not necessarily couple with a
higher capability of academic entrepreneurship, as suggested by H4. The university
(H1) and its geographical location (H2) seem to lose importance when other
occupational variables are added to the model. In summary, results support H1, H3,
and H5, they partly support H4, but reject H2.

Conclusion

Despite the German and socialist traditions of higher education institutions,

Hungarian academics seem to take part in RC with an intensity similar to that of
their colleagues in more developed market economies with more market-oriented
higher education systems. However, the relatively extensive involvement in RC
should not be attributed to the inherently entrepreneurial spirit of universities like
those in the US. Instead, it is due to factors such as the increasing focus of European
and national research policy on innovation and networking between academia and
industry, the scattered division of funds among several areas of interest and interest
groups, and faculty’s relatively low remuneration, especially compared to their
human capital and social status.9 Besides, the quality of university-industry
collaborations is more important for economic development than the number of
academic faculty occasionally participating in it, so further studies may examine the
socio-economic impact of RC activities including that of spin-off firms in Eastern
Europe.
Based on their engagement in the commercialization of technologies, this paper
differentiated three groups of university scientists: traditional, market-oriented, and
entrepreneurial. Traditional faculty comprises about half of the academics in the
fields under examination, while the other two segments (participants in RC) make
up the other half. Along with industry experience and some academic ranks,
research field is an influential predictor of segment membership. While applied–
non-life fields such as engineering have the biggest RC potential, disciplines in life-
sciences and even within applied–life-sciences are not homogeneous: agricultural
science and pharmaceutics, for example, are more application-oriented than
medicine. Fields dealing with technological advances concerning living organisms
such as biotechnology and bio-engineering have more capacity for market
applications than other related fields (e.g. biology, biochemistry, anatomy). The
field of study seems to limit (or facilitate) academics’ capacity for applied research
and collaboration with firms and outweighs the effect of other occupational
characteristics such as the university and its location. Occupation-related variables,
on the other hand, are more sensitive in predicting membership in the traditional
segment than in the participant ones, i.e. they are more accurate in telling which
academics are not likely to engage in commercialization than showing who will

9
Their salaries are regulated by law, so academics can only increase the return on their human capital
from external (non-university) sources, i.e. industry funds and government grants.

123
 A. Novotny

participate in it. It is plausible that RC behavior, and especially academic

entrepreneurship, is influenced by a more complex set of factors than occupational
characteristics per se, possibly including motivations, opportunities, department
culture, family background, etc.
The results show that academic entrepreneurs on average engage in RC activities
less intensively than other participants referred to as market-oriented faculty in this
paper. So the launch of a firm must be motivated at least in part by other reasons
apart from the desire occasionally to commercialize research findings. Motivations
for founding spin-offs may be rooted in entrepreneurial faculty’s special resources
such as private sector work experience. Many of these faculty-run businesses may
be necessity-driven consulting firms, established to augment university remuner-
ation, provide employment for family members, or to make it easier to accept
payments from industry clients. While market-oriented faculty is probably engaged
in RC mainly through university-coordinated projects, the majority of (part-time)
academic entrepreneurs are likely to be solitary inventors or necessity driven sole
proprietors. Since spin-off founders rely more on their own efforts and resources in
RC, they probably try to distance themselves from the university to avoid the
internal (transaction) costs of academic entrepreneurship associated with bureau-
cracy, slow decision-making practices, and various IP regulations.
In line with other recent studies (e.g. Perkmann et al. 2013; Teichler and Höhle
2013; Bienkowska et al. 2016) this paper contributes to the literature that draws
attention to the heterogeneity of the university sector and the challenges associated
with it. There is diversity within institutions and, as shown in this paper, even within
disciplinary areas regarding the capabilities and willingness of academics to engage
in RC. The main implication of this paper for policymaking is that emulating
selected measures of complex innovation systems in more developed countries and
implementing them throughout the whole spectrum of higher education institutions
and disciplines is not the most effective way of facilitating the contribution of
universities to economic development. Instead, government and university level
decision-makers should consider the variety of universities, sciences, academics,
and the socio-economic environments in which they operate. A holistic approach
should be adopted to develop the three major university missions (teaching,
research, and RC) in such a way that minimizes conflicts/trade-offs, and maximizes
synergies among them. For example, instituting a multi-dimensional university
reward system would allow for more specialization among faculty members and
departments, leading to higher job satisfaction overall and more success regarding
each university mission.

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