BioWorld International Correspondent

LONDON - A study of the quality of biotech research, and the success of efforts to commercialize it in universities worldwide, has found European institutions lagging far behind their U.S. peers.

Harvard in Boston was ranked first for research as measured by volume of papers and citations, and U.S. universities held 33 of the top 50 positions. Similarly, nine of the top 10 patents holders are in the U.S., while European universities do not feature at all in the technology transfer and commercialization index compiled by the economics think tank the Milken Institute in its report, "Mind to Market: a global analysis of University Biotechnology Transfer and Commercialization," published last week.

The report said research and innovation in biotechnology is shifting away from corporate laboratories and back to academia, with universities seen increasingly as commercial partners for business and government.

As a result the relationship between universities and the biotech industry is becoming more complex and intertwined. That makes it crucial to "examine the process of university technology transfer for its strengths and vulnerabilities in order to facilitate the commercialization process and ensure the greatest possible returns on public investment," the report said.

Jim Greenwood, President and CEO of the U.S. Biotechnology Industry Organization, said the study reaffirms the critical role of technology transfer in the development of the industry worldwide. "[It] also underscores the significant role of university research in product development," he said.

The study analyzed university biotech innovation pipelines on the basis of three measures - publication rankings, patenting activity and technology transfer outcome measures - developing indexes that allow a systematic comparison of each university's international standing.

The publication ranking covers 492 universities, including 222 in Europe (45 percent), 161 in the U.S. (33 percent), 44 in Japan, 23 in Canada, nine in Australia, five in China and 17 in the rest of Asia.

The strongest European showing was the University of London (representing a loose federation of 20 institutes including Imperial College, King's College and University College) in third place. It was accompanied by the universities of Cambridge at 15th; Oxford 17th; Paris 23rd; Karolinska Institute, Stockholm 35th; Geneva 39th; University of Wales 40th; Basel at 43rd; Dundee 46th; Edinburgh 48th; Strasbourg 49th and Zurich 50th.

Other non-U.S. universities in the top 50 are Tokyo at second, and Osaka and Kyoto at 19th and 20th, respectively, and Toronto and McGill University, Montreal at 30th and 31st.

Similarly, Europe is classed as an also-ran in biotech patenting, a table that is headed by the University of Texas. The researchers used four indicators to create the patenting index. Here, only the University of London at 10th, the University of Oxford at 24th, Queen's University Belfast at 31st and University Louis Pasteur at 47th make the top 50.

Worse still, there are no European universities in the ranking of overall commercialization performance, where the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has the pole position.

However, that is partly explained by a shortage of data. As the researchers noted, "We tried to include the maximum number of universities. However, we were limited by the paucity of comparable global data. Additional transparency should be a top priority, especially since much research funding comes from public sources."

European universities surpass their U.S. and Canadian peers in just one category: the number of start-ups, with European universities providing the base for three times as many companies relative to research expenditure.

However, the researchers noted, "This reflects an emphasis on start-up activity as a public policy priority. [It] says nothing about survival rates and whether start ups become publicly traded firms with high levels of employment."