Examining university-industry collaboration as a source of innovation in the emerging economy of Turkey

Companies in developed countries have clearly benefited from university-industry collaborations but emerging nations around the world have a different series of challenges and barriers to overcome in establishing strong university-industry collaborations. The following article discusses the barrier that 202 Turkish companies experienced while collaborating with local universities. Establishing trust and awareness were found to be major barriers preventing deep research collaborations. Interestingly, Turkish companies did take great advantage of universities' technical infrastructures being their equipment and laboratory facilities to test products, conduct research, and run experiments without formally collaborating, the authors term this "light collaboration." To accelerate university-industry collaborations in Turkey and other emerging nations a simple three tiered model is presented herein and is composed of: building awareness, building trust and exposure, and transitioning companies to full research projects. It is hoped that the ideas proposed herein will positively generate new concepts for grants and programs for emerging countries to support their university-industry innovation collaborations efforts