Public Funding of Collaborative Research and the Access to Research Results

Does public funding of collaborative research between academia and industry associate with the access to project outcomes and research results? To answer this question, we investigate the contractual terms of 312 publicly funded research projects in Norway. We provide an in-depth analysis of the terms on which the partners involved in a project agree to, concerning the ownership of research results, the distribution of rights to all commercial use of intellectual property, the provisions regarding the dissemination and publication of project results, and the degree of confidentiality. Overall, our results indicate a positive, even though weak, relationship between public funding and the various dimensions of access and openness, with the association being strongest with the ownership of research results. Moreover, we show that the institutional composition of the project determines the project’s openness and the access to the project’s research. Our study has implications for public funding bodies as well as science, technology and innovation policy.