Tieteen rinnalla tekniikkaa. Suomalaiset korkeakoulututkijat kaupallisten sovellusten kehittäjinä 1900-luvulla

Abstract

Korkeakouluopetus ja -tutkimus eivät enää riitä. 2000-luvun alussa akateemiselta maailmalta odotetaan entistä suurempaa panosta yhteiskunnan hyväksi. Esimerkiksi tutkimustulokset, joita voidaan hyödyntää teknologian tuotannossa, halutaan saattaa aikaisempaa tehokkaammin teollisuuden ja yritysten käyttöön. Ollaanko puhtaan tieteen näyttämöä siis alistamassa markkinavoimille? Vai onko kyse siitä, että korkeakoulut muuttuvat etäisistä norsunluutorneista organisaatioiksi, jotka palvelevat ympäröivää yhteiskuntaa entistä paremmin?

Sampsa Kaatajan väitöskirjatutkimus Tieteen rinnalla tekniikkaa kyseenalaistaa molemmat vaihtoehdot ja tarjoaa tietoa kolmannen näkökulman pohjaksi. Tutkimus paneutuu suomalaisten korkeakoulututkijoiden rooliin kaupallisille markkinoille suunnatun teknologian kehityksessä 1900-luvulla. Siinä kysytään, kuinka yleisesti tieteenharjoittajat ovat osallistuneet kaupallisen teknologian kehittämiseen, mille tekniikanaloille heiltä on syntynyt sovelluksia ja missä määrin korkeakoululähtöinen teknologia on päätynyt markkinoiden käyttöön.

Kaataja osoittaa, että korkeakouluissa on työskennelty kaupallisen teknologian parissa koko 1900-luvun ajan, ja tietyillä tekniikan sektoreilla tutkijoiden teknologinen panos on ollut merkittävä. Pitkän aikavälin tarkastelussa huomataan myös se, että suomalaisissa korkeakouluissa ollaan oltu yhtä aktiivisia teknologian kehittäjiä kuin ulkomaisissa huippuyliopistoissa.

At the beginning of a new millennium universities globally face new demands and challenges. A different kind of activity is now required besides the traditional academic work of teaching and research. In several countries an explicit intention of science policy is to change the academic world from a passive bystander to an actor participating actively in societal issues.

In Europe this new interest in universities is noticeable both at the national level and at the European Union. In the case of the multinational community it becomes apparent in the discussions, publications and concrete actions of science policy. In the Lisbon declaration of 2007 the EU committed to the better use and commercialisation of university research. The EU has commissioned studies where the universities´ commercial activities are mapped for example, links between universities, technology and commercial activities have been studied. New scientific institutions with a clear commercial orientation in mind have been founded: in October 2006 the European Commission proposed establishing the European Institute of Technology (EIT), the commercial basis of which is clear.

Universities are also facing these new expectations and challenges in Finland. The government has worked actively in order to promote the commercial activities of the academic world. In the 2004 amendment to the Universities Act a third task was included in the agenda of the academic world besides teaching and research. Now universities are expected to be in more direct contact with the rest of society and they must promote the use of research results for the benefit of society. One important part of this direct contact is the commercialisation of university-based technology. Another law came into force in 2007, which strengthened the position of universities in their performance of the third task. Some of the immaterial property rights previously belonging to individual scientists were shifted to their academic institutions. This was considered to promote the commercialisation of technology developed in universities.

Besides increased discussion and legislative changes relating to the commercial activities of universities, a growing body of research has also been published in Finland and elsewhere concerning the connections between universities, research, technology, innovations and commercialisation. Studies have examined e.g. the possibilities of universities to engage in commercial activities, attitudes towards the commercialisation of science inside the academic world and the innovation processes of individual inventions of academic origin. The actual technology developed in universities has remained as less-known topic, which is exactly the focus of this dissertation.

The purpose of the study at hand is to analyse academic scientists as developers of technology aimed at commercial markets and the use of different industries in Finland during the 20th century. How much commercial technology has been developed inside the academic world during the last century and how common has it been that scientists develop new applications? Which scientific fields and which groups of scientists have been active as developers of technology? Another question is the technical quality of inventions and innovations what kind of technology has been invented by scientists in academia? A closer look at the technical quality of inventions of university origin enable also the analysis how important scientists have been as developers of new technology at national level.

In addition, two viewpoints are taken into account which illustrate the participation of academic scientists in the development of new technology: firstly, the relationship between individuals´ scientific work and technological output and secondly, the commercialisation of the technology developed. The former reveals if the technology was based on the scientific work carried out in the academic world or not. At the same time it is also possible to see if scientists have a particular technological profile differentiating them from the numerous actors in technological innovation. Finally, the focus is turned to the technology transfer of university-based technology and the commercialisation of inventions to what extent is this technology of academic origin diffused outside universities and what kind of commercial success stories were there in the Finnish universities during the 20th century?

Answers to these questions are sought at the level of two Finnish universities. Both the University of Helsinki (UH) and Helsinki University of Technology (HUT) were leading institutions of teaching and research in 20th century Finland. When concentrating to UH and HUT it is possible to analyse differences in the technological output of two different types of academic institutions: a traditional science university and a technical university (technische Hochschule). These academic institutions are typically perceived to be different in working culture and basis of research. The technological profiles of UH and HUT will reveal to what extent the difference is reality in the case of technology developed by individual scientists.

The study concentrates on scientists working at the University of Helsinki and Helsinki University of Technology during the period 1900 1975. The group consists of 2150 individuals, of whom 1247 worked in UH and 1020 in HUT. They obtained 1021 Finnish patents in the period 1891 and 2004. These inventions form the main source material of the work and the basis for statistical analysis. In addition to this, a detailed examination of seven individual UH and HUT scientists is included in the study. These cases offer more detailed information about the everyday experiences that cannot be traced from patent statistics: the opportunities, difficulties, demands, successes and failures faced by university scientists while developing commercial technology.

The purpose of the study is twofold: the work of the UH and HUT scientists in commercial technology will enhance our understanding of the activities of the academic world in the 20th century. Hopefully, the analysis can also offer insight into the ongoing debate about the role of universities in a knowledge society and knowledge-based economy, and even give a perspective on contemporary science policy, where the universities´ technological contribution is being promoted more than ever before.

Summary of the results

The patenting activity would suggest that the development of commercial technology has been quite rare among the scientists: 10.5 % of UH and HUT personnel were academic patentees, individuals who participated in patenting during their university careers. This shows clearly how teaching and research have been the most important forms of activity in the academic community while the development of commercial technology has concerned only a minority of scientists. The number of patented inventions has also been modest in proportion to the overall number of scientists studied. Both in UH and HUT less than 0.1 patents were granted per scientist during the period 1900 1985. Nor were there any significant changes in patenting activity throughout the nine decades studied the number of academic patentees and quantity of patents remained modest in all periods.

Even though university scientists´ patenting activity initially seems to be modest, in some particular fields of technology their inventive contribution was substantial and also significant at national level. In four patent classes UH and HUT scientists were responsible for more than 20 % of the inventions patented by a Finnish patentee in Finland during the period 1900 1985. Their contribution was exceptionally great in technology relating to food and foodstuffs and separation of solid materials. In those two fields the share of academic patents was almost 27 % every fourth invention, patented in Finland by a domestic patentee was technology of UH or HUT origin. Thus, in some specialised fields university scientists have acted as significant developers of new technology, also in quantitative terms.

The interconnectedness of scientific work and commercial technology becomes evident in the examination of the nature of the technology scientists patented. The great majority of patents belonged to science-based fields of technology, where inventive activity would have not been possible without a scientific background. On closer examination of a random sample of 58 academic patentees a clear pattern was found when their scientific careers and technology developed were compared: the great majority of patented inventions related directly to individuals´ scientific expertise and to the themes they were working on when the patents were applied for.

Consequently, academic scientists have had a clear technological profile, which distinguished them from Finnish patentees in general. This profile is characterised by scientific expertise and a close connection between technology and current scientific research. According to the study at hand it has not been a problem to combine a university career and the development of commercial technology. For the academic patentees of UH and HUT these two spheres of life were not separate activities, but were carried out in parallel and usually inside the academic world. The individuals studied often had a true compound career where teaching, research and technological innovation activities were closely connected.

Scientific and technological fields of university-based technology

Activity in developing technological applications has varied significantly between different parts of the academic world. In some departments it was common practice while in others practically non-existent. For example, in the HUT departments of wood processing, mining and chemistry the share of patents per working scientists was approximately 1.0 but in architecture only 0.11. In the first three of the four departments research has materialised most as commercial applications. Mining, wood processing and chemical industries developed greatly in Finland during the 20th century, and in each of them university scientists were also part of the modernisation process as developers of new technology.

Scientists with a background in chemistry were the most active developers of technology. In HUT the share of chemists was 33 % of all academic patents. In UH they were responsible for 40 % of patented inventions. Another group of scientists active in developing commercial technology was physicists. They concentrated especially on devices and methods of measurement, analysis and control.

Besides scientific fields there was also notable variation in academic patenting according to the individuals´ academic status. At least in light of patent statistics the development of commercial technology was more typical among experienced scientists than their junior colleagues. Of all academic groups professors clearly dominated patenting. Second big group was adjunct professors (docents), who in many cases had their primary careers outside the academic world.

One of the key questions of current work is the technological quality of inventions developed by university scientists. As already noted, there is an obvious profile in the technological output of the scientists, and it becomes evident in the distribution of patents over different sectors of technology. Even though patents can be found in all patent groups, inventions relating to chemistry and metallurgy, human necessities and physics dominated academic patenting. At the other end of the spectrum are fixed constructions: scientists´ contribution was minimal in technology relating, for example, to the construction of roads, railways, bridges and structural elements of buildings.

Some notable changes also occurred in the orientation of academic patenting during the 20th century. The proportion of the two biggest groups of academic patents chemistry and metallurgy and human necessities were stable for most of the period studied. Changes occurred in groups for electricity and physics: in both fields the number of patented inventions started to grow at the end of the century. The increase was especially notable in physics: in the 1970´s and 1980´s UH and HUT scientists became active as developers of new measuring equipment and physics became the most active field in academic patenting. At the level of individual patent classes another clear change occurred in biotechnology; there are clear signs that during the 1990´s it became one of the most important fields of university-based technology.

An important detail is that in patent group of physics it was not instruments of science that were patented, but applications for industrial or commercial purposes, which were often based on devices and methods with a scientific function. Thus, patenting of scientific measuring equipment was not considered necessary; patenting of commercial applications based on them was. Another typical feature relating to this technology for measurement, analysis and control is that it was developed across scientific boundaries. Scientists in several fields of natural sciences created different devices and methods. This explains why technology relating to measuring and testing was the biggest single patent class among university scientists during the 20th century.

Technology transfer and commercialisation of academic inventions

A granted patent tells nothing about the importance of the technology developed. Only if inventions are transferred to markets and successfully commercialised can they become innovations of commercial and societal significance. In the case of academic patents it was possible to examine the level of technology transfer with the help of inventions, which patent rights ended up to company possession. It turned out that 57 % of the patents developed inside universities became company property. Even though this is only an indicative figure it suggests that the technological contribution of university scientists has not remained inside the ivory tower, but diffused for the use of society.

It is more difficult to estimate what kind of financial value technology of university origin has had to the scientists themselves, to universities and to companies that put these inventions to use. It is impossible to examine the commercialisation of each academic patent and give an estimate about the financial profit they generated. However, the existing information about the monetary significance of the university-based technology is consistent: only a small share of North-American universities who have commercialised inventions developed in their sphere have benefited financially. This also applies to individual scientists in Europe: only a few have been able to gain substantially from their technological efforts. Nothing implies that the situation was any different in two Finnish universities during the 20th century.

Regardless of a few commercial success stories to be found among UH and HUT scientists´ academic patents, for the most participation in the development of commercial technology has not been profitable. Why? The fact is that only a small share of all new inventions become commercial successes; the majority disappear without leaving a trace in society. In the case of academic scientists three additional aspects can be found leading to a negative outcome: inexperience of academic scientists in the commercialisation of technology, absence of support mechanisms in that process and reluctance of scientists to participate actively in the further development and commercialisation of patented technology.