University–Industry Linkages in Promoting

Technology Transfer: A Study of Vietnamese

Technical and Engineering Universities

LE HIEU HOC and NGUYEN DUC TRONG

Both university and industry are key actors of the national innovation system (NIS) of any country
(OECD (1997) National Innovation Systems, OECD Publishing, Paris). Not only does the university
or industry contribute to the knowledge production and transformation in the NIS as an individual
actor but also the collaboration between these two institutions is increasingly a critical component
of the NIS. This is truly illustrated either in developed countries or in developing ones. This article
first reviews the current status of NIS in Vietnam to see the contribution of Vietnamese universities in
knowledge transfer. Second, it describes the collaboration between university and industry in Vietnam
by presenting the findings of a survey of 570 respondents, who are teaching at five Vietnamese technical
and engineering universities to better understand the different types of university-industry (U–I)
collaboration and motivations of and barriers to the university and industry linkage in Vietnam. Based
on such findings, some recommendations to promote the university and industry linkage in research
and technology transfer are proposed for the university, the industry and the government so that the
Vietnam’s NIS will have more impact on economic development.

Keywords: National innovation system, U–I linkage, technological research and transfer, university,
Vietnam

Introduction

In recent years, as the knowledge economy is rising at global level, the essential
role of technological innovation in the economic development of countries is highly
recognised. Strategies underlying the framework of national innovation systems

Le Hieu Hoc (corresponding author), Associate Professor, Hanoi University of Science and
Technology, No. 1, Dai Co Viet Road, Hanoi, Vietnam. E-mail: hoc.lehieu@hust.edu.vn
Nguyen Duc Trong, PhD Scholar, Hanoi University of Science and Technology, Hanoi, Vietnam.

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SAGE Publications Los Angeles/London/New Delhi/Singapore/Washington DC/Melbourne
DOI: 10.1177/0971721818821796
 74    Le Hieu Hoc and Nguyen Duc Trong

(NISs) play a crucial role in the countries’ efforts to catch up with technological
advances, which are critical for the long-term sustainable economic growth and
development of countries. Within the NIS framework, universities have long been
considered as an important player in NIS (Lundvall, 1992; Nelson, 1993). In addition
to the traditional roles, which were mainly teaching and basic research activities,
universities around the world have been taking on additional roles such as know-
ledge and technology transfer to industry and commercialisation of knowledge.
The collaboration between academia and industry is understood as the transac-
tions between universities and business for mutual benefit. Promoting university–
industry (U–I) linkage and employing its value not only can help higher educational
institutions (HEIs) face the problem of decreasing public funds (Carayol, 2003) and
help businesses gain and maintain their competitive advantage in today’s dynamic
global world (Tucker, 2002), but also contribute to the economic development on
a regional and national level (OECD, 2002) as well as meet the demands of the
labour market to provide more relevant knowledge and skills (Gibb & Hannon,
2006). In this circumstance, the U–I linkage creates mutual benefits for all involved
stakeholders and to society as a whole.
Nguyen, Nguyen, Doan, and Dao (2017) found that, in Vietnam, the NIS is
still in the making. The government and various institutions have put into place
the fundamentals of a comprehensive NIS. Vietnam’s NIS is still very much at the
early stage of development and faces many challenges and weaknesses. Among
others, the most significant are (a) isolation of research institutions including
universities from the productive sectors of the economy and (b) that the higher
education sector is not yet operating to its full potential as the source of knowledge
creation and transfer.
Therefore, studying the current status of U–I linkage in Vietnam to identify the
modes of the collaboration, the motivations as well as the inhibitors of the linkage
is truly necessary to provide the scientific basis for developing relevant policies
to foster this driver of economic development. The article also contributes to the
literature of U–I linkage by adding the experience of Vietnam—an emerging
economy in the ASEAN.

Literature Review

The linkage between university and industry is being researched since the
1970s. The topic has attracted tremendous attention from academics, the govern-
ment and policymakers from developed countries as well as developing coun-
tries. In the latter, U–I linkages are still considered as an unutilised source of
science and technology innovation (Etzkowitz & Leydesdorff, 2000; Schiller
& Brimble, 2009). In recent decades, many scholars have studied the col-
laboration between the university and industry. The researches on this topic
have included the typology of U–I linkage and the drivers for and the barriers
to promoting the linkage (Guimón, 2013; Howells, Nedeva & Georghiou, 1998;
Krishna, 2017; OECD, 2012; Polt, Rammer, Gassler, Schibany, & Schartinger,

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 University–Industry Linkages in Promoting Technology Transfer    75

2001; Vedovello, 1998). According to these scholars, the U–I linkage can
be seen in all types of direct and indirect, personal and non-personal inter-
actions between HEIs and businesses for reciprocal and mutual benefit. This may
include collaboration in R&D, personnel mobility (academics, students and busi-
ness professionals), commercialisation of R&D results, curriculum development
and delivery, entrepreneurship and governance (Davey et al., 2011).
In addition, there are many reasons that Polt et al. (2001) considered as the drivers
for the firms to promote U–I linkage, including the access to the human resources,
research outcomes that can be used for the development of new products and pro-
duction processes, solutions for specific problems and the facilities and research
equipment of the university. On the other hand, the motivation for the university to
develop U–I linkage is rather simple. Polt et al. (2002) and Guimón (2013) identi-
fied some main reasons: the improvement of teaching, access to funding, reputa-
tion enhancement and access to empirical data from industry. Despite the growing
strength of these motivations, many barriers to U–I collaboration persist, including
the following (Howells, J., Nedeva, M. and Georghiou, L. (1998); OECD, 2012).

• There is an inherent mismatch between the research orientations of firms

and universities, with an excessive focus on fast commercial results in firms
and on basic research in universities. Collaboration is costly, and the returns
only accrue in the medium to long run, but firms seek short-term results and
clear contributions to current business lines.
• In terms of outputs, firms are usually interested in how quickly new patents
or new products can be obtained and want to delay publications to avoid
disclosing information. University researchers, in contrast, are typically
motivated to publish research results as fast as possible.
• Industry is concerned about secrecy and misalignment of expectations with
regard to intellectual property (IP) rights and making a profit from them.
Thus, agreements need to be established in a commercially timely manner
that ensures the ability to commercialise with appropriate returns.
• Difficulties in negotiating collaboration include lack of information, difficul-
ties finding contact persons and transaction costs of finding the right partner,
among others.

The above issues were also found in the literature of U–I linkages in Asian coun-
tries. While Krishna (2012) emphasised the roles of universities in its NIS, Aslan
(2006), Esham (2008), Intarakumnerd and Schiller (2009), Kim and Ko (2014) and
Rupika and Vivek (2016) identified the types, the success and failure factors of
U–I linkages in Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Thailand, South Korea and India, respectively.
This is an evidence of the popularity of U–I linkage and its contribution to the
economic progress of these countries. The literature review, however, has not found
much studies on U–I linkages in Vietnam, except some papers giving an overview
of Vietnam’s NIS (Nguyen, Doan, & Nguyen, 2013) and the role of universities
in Vietnam’s NIS (Nguyen et al., 2017). Thus, the research gaps on U–I linkages in
Vietnam exist.

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 76    Le Hieu Hoc and Nguyen Duc Trong

Research Model and Methodology

In order to measure the current situation of U–I linkage in Vietnam, this article
poses two research questions. The first question seeks to explore what the types
of U–I linkage in Vietnam are and second, what the motivations of and barriers
to the promotion of U–I linkage in the country are. The research model shown
in Appendix 1 was expected to yield answers to these above research questions.
Based on the literature review, the article summarises and suggests the main vari-
ables on the types of U–I linkages (from the university point of view), its drivers
and barriers. These variables are broken down in the questionnaires for the survey.
An empirical study was undertaken to understand the orientations of the academic
community towards U-I linkages and their views on innovation. There were totally
570 lecturers, researchers and managers who responded to the questionnaires. The
majority of the respondents were from Hanoi University of Science and Technology
(HUST) (30%) and Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology (BKU) (27%).
More than half (52%) of the respondents were deans/vice-deans of the schools and
heads of departments.
As the statistical data are very weak in Vietnam, it is difficult to measure the
U–I linkage quantitatively by the frequency and the value of each type of linkage.
Thus, this article used the qualitative approach found by Esham (2008), Davey
et al. (2011). Thus, each type of U–I linkage and the degree of collaboration were
measured based on the Likert scale (1 = doesn’t exist or very limited and 5 = sig-
nificant exists in terms of frequency and scope). The motivations and inhibitors of
U–I linkages were described and measured based on the respondent’s degree of
agreement on the Likert scale (1 = strongly disagree; 5 = strongly agree). In this
article, we focus on the assessment of U–I linkages from the perspective of staff,
faculty and managers who are working at five universities: HUST, Thai Nguyen
University of Technology (TNUT), Da Nang University of Technology (DUT),
BKU and Vietnam National University—Hanoi (VNU). These are the leading
universities in Vietnam in the field of engineering and technology with the number
of students ranging from 10,000 to 25,000. At each university, the research team
used convenient and snowball sampling approach. The types of U–I linkages were
assessed in two phases: from 2005 to 2009 and from 2010 to 2015. The question-
naire was distributed to the lecturers/researchers by email, links or hardcopy. The
number of distributed, responded and valid questionnaires of each university is
shown in Table 1.
In the questionnaire, the variables on working division, position and academic
title of the respondents were also used to test the difference in the perspectives of
each group. After being revised several times by trial interviews and analysis, the
reliability of the questionnaire was checked with Cronbach’s alpha test, and all
main variables received tested value at 80 per cent as the lowest.

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 University–Industry Linkages in Promoting Technology Transfer    77

Table 1
The Distribution of the Questionnaire

No. University Distributed Responded Valid

1 HUST 300 187 173
2 TNUT  75  63  50
3 DUT 120  98  86
4 BKU 150 107 107
5 VNU 150 154 154
Total 570
Source: Authors’ survey

Vietnam’s National Innovation System

Figure 1 describes the NIS of Vietnam including the political and legal system,
the administrative bodies, the funding agencies and the research execution.

Political and Legal System

After almost 30 years of economic reform, changing from a centrally planned

economy towards the market economy, Vietnam has undergone significant economic
growth and became a lower ‘middle-income’ country in 2010. Vietnam realised
that it needed to restructure the economy and become an industrialised country. For
industrialisation to be realised, the education policy and Science and Technology
(S&T) policies have to play important roles. For this purpose, the National Assembly
and the Government of Vietnam had put into place a comprehensive legal frame-
work for the development of S&T activities. The Law on Science and Technology
promulgated in 2000 served as the backbone for innovation in the country. In addi-
tion, a range of many other regulations are in place, including Law on Intellectual
Properties (2005) and Amendments of and Additions to some articles of Law on
Intellectual Properties (2009); Law on Standardization and Technical Regulations
(2006); Law on Technology Transfer (2006); Law on Good and Product Quality
(2007); Law on High Technology (2008); and Law on Nuclear Energy (2008).
These laws and regulations have laid the essential foundation for the NIS. More
recently, the Science and Technology Strategy 2011–2020 was approved in 2010
which sets out specific targets for the future development of Vietnam NIS for the
next 10 years.

Administrative Bodies, Funding Agencies and Financial Incentives

At the administrative level, the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) is

supposed to be the key actor which is mandated to oversee S&T activities and
related regulatory regimes. Other line ministries in education, industry, trade, natural
resources and finance, among others, are actors in the NIS. The National Council
for Science and Technology Policy plays an advisory role. At the sub-national level,
there are provincial departments for science and technologies (DOST) overseeing

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 78    Le Hieu Hoc and Nguyen Duc Trong

Figure 1
Vietnam’s NIS

Source: Adopted from OECD (2017)

their respective regional and local S&T and innovation activities. However, with
many line ministries, the funds for research are distributed widely, but not effec-
tively, in developing core research capabilities. In addition to these administrative
agencies, there are a number of funding agencies that support innovation and R&D
activities such as the National Fund for S&T Development, the National Programs
for S&T development, the State Agency for Technology Innovation, the National
Foundation for Science and Technology Development (NAFOSTED) (provides
funding for basic research) and the National Agency for Science and Technology
Information. However, the investment by the country into R&D, innovation and
higher education does not seem to complement other interventionist industrial
policies and support the development of the industrial base. However, Vietnam
has spent 2 per cent of its state spending on science and technology equivalent to 0.5
per cent of GDP since 2001. This is rather modest as compared to other countries
(Nguyen et al., 2013). In recent years, Vietnam has attempted to increase financial
incentives for investment in S&T and innovation. The government extends tax
incentives to enterprises engaged in R&D and for investment in technologically

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 University–Industry Linkages in Promoting Technology Transfer    79

advanced machinery and equipment. A state fund has been approved to allow firms
investing in technology to have easier access to credit. Unfortunately, there have
been no tax incentives for the collaboration with universities as well as research
institutions, who are the key factors in R&D activities, in addition to the industry.

Higher Education System

There are about 230 universities, of which nearly three-fourths are public universi-
ties, the remaining being either semi-public or private ones (GSO, 2017). Table 2
shows the development of HEIs in terms of number of the universities, the quali-
fication of faculty, the number of students and especially the number of produced
postgraduates in the period 2011–2016.
The number of lecturers in the higher education sector (only the universities)
increased by 1.43 times between 2010 and 2016. The proportion of faculty having
a doctoral degree increased over the last decade with a large number of students
for each faculty member. Besides, the number of postgraduates gradually increased
from 2010, doubling in 2014 and kept rising in the years after. However, master
graduates account for the majority, which implies a lower research capability of
Vietnamese HEIs.

Table 2
Basic Information of Vietnam’s Higher Education System

2010 2013 2014 2015 2016

Number of universities
Total 188 214 219 223 229
- Public 138 156 159 163 169
- Non-public 58 58 60 60 60
Number of Faculty
Total 50,591 65,206 65,664 69,591 72,346
- Public 43,396 52,500 52,689 55,401 57,198
- Non-public 7,555 12,706 12,975 14,190 15,148
Qualifications
Total 50,591 65,206 65,664 69,591 72,346
- Master and Doctoral 30,637 44,124 48,077 54,644 59,736
degrees
- Bachelor degree 20,059 21,006 17,251 14,897 12,461
- Others 255 76 336 50 149
Number of students (thousand persons)
Total 1,435.9 1,670.0 1,824.3 1,753.2 1,759.5
- Public 1,246.4 1,493.3 1,596.7 1,520.8 1,515.5
- Non-public 189.5 176.7 227.6 232.4 244.0
Number of postgraduates (person)
Total 15,630 27,920 32,496 33,072 35,121
- Doctoral degree 504 790 965 866 2,100
- Master degree 15,126 27,130 31,531 32,260 33,021
Source: GSO (2017).

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 80    Le Hieu Hoc and Nguyen Duc Trong

Public Research Institutions

Until now, the public sector has been playing a major role in the innovation system
in Vietnam. These organisations were under the administration of line ministries
and specialised in areas such as natural sciences, social and cultural research,
agriculture and engineering. Table 3 statistically summarises the number of research
institutions in Vietnam, distributed by the research fields. More than one-third of
the research institutions are engaged in S&T research areas.
An unfortunate feature is that these research institutions have no or limited
connection with the polytechnic universities and are isolated from other innovation
actors, including the private sector.

Business Sector

The emergence of the private enterprise sector (mostly consisting of small and
medium enterprises—SMEs) since the reform is an important development
within the framework of the Vietnam’s NIS. Table 4 shows that SMEs account for
98 per cent of the total number of enterprises in 2015, increasing from 92 per cent
in 2000 (VCCI, 2017). Interestingly, the SMEs seem to not invest in new products.
Instead, they are investing in new processes with improved technologies and product
modifications. At the current stage of development, this may prove the right strategy.
However, in order for future development, investment in new product innovation
will prove essential. Thanks to the progressively liberalised regulations towards
FDI, the FDI sector has also become an important part of the national economy.
Previous studies have found little evidence of technical spillover from FDI-related
enterprises to local counterparts (Nguyen et al., 2008).
In addition, the statistical data show that the majority of enterprises are wholesale
and retail trade, manufacturing and construction ones. In particular, manufacturing
accounts for 15 per cent of the total enterprise population but mostly concentrates
on food and beverage productions, textile and apparel manufacturing, wood product
making and metal product fabricating (GSO, 2017). These sectors do not demand
intensive innovation in technology.

Table 3
The Distribution of R&D Organisations by Research Fields

Fields Number Percentage

1. Natural Science 60 11.9
2. Technology and Engineering Science 178 35.2
3. Pharmaceutical and Healthcare Science 27 5.4
4. Agricultural Science 104 20.6
5. Social Science 105 20.8
6. Humanity Science 31 6.1
Total 505 100
Source: Ministry of Science and Technology (2016)

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 University–Industry Linkages in Promoting Technology Transfer    81

Table 4
Classification of Business Enterprises Based on the Size and Ownership

Ownership
State- Non-state-
owned owned FDI Total
Micro No. of enterprises 90 319,097 3,049 322,236
Classification of enterprises based

small % in row 0.03 99.03 0.95 72.82

on the number of employees

% in column 3.17 74.61 25.53

Small No. of enterprises 1,139 97,105 5,509 103,753
% in row 1.1 93.59 5.31 23.45
% in column 40.18 22.70 46.13
Medium No. of enterprises 407 6,304 934 7,685
% in row 5.30 82.03 12.67 1.74
% in column 14.36 1.47 8.16
Large No. of enterprises 1.199 5,203 2,410 8,812
% in row 13.61 59.04 27.35 1.99
% in column 42.29 1.22 20.18
Total No. of enterprises 2,835 427,709 11,942 442,486
% 0.65 96.66 2.70 100.0
Source: VCCI (2017).

Financial Investment for Science and Technology Activities

Vietnam has been spending 1.4–1.85 per cent of its state spending on S&T, equiva-
lent to 0.5 per cent of GDP, since 2001 (Table 5). The S&T investment in 2015
was about US$790.5 million, which was a significant increase from previous years.
However, this absolute amount is still modest as compared to other countries.
Regarding the country’s investment in R&D, Vietnam, unfortunately, does not
publish reliable, internationally comparable statistics on gross expenditure for

Table 5
State Spending on S&T

State Spending Proportion of S&T Percentage of

on S&T 
 Investment on State Growth S&T Investment
Year (million USD) Spending (%) Rate (%) on GDP (%)
2006 246.8 1.85 0.51
2007 286.8 1.81 16.22 0.51
2008 299.3 1.69 4.36 0.41
2009 357.6 1.62 19.46 0.43
2010 417.2 1.60 16.66 0.43
2011 522.7 1.58 25.28 0.41
2012 598.6 1.46 14.51 0.41
2013 630.4 1.44 7.41 0.39
2014 621.2 1.36 –1.46 0.35
2015 790.5 1.52 27.25 0.41
Source: Ministry of Science and Technology (2016).

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 82    Le Hieu Hoc and Nguyen Duc Trong

research and development (GERD) or subcomponents—itself a policy gap to be

closed. The best estimates of comparable GERD figures put spending at about
0.3 per cent of GDP (The World Bank & Ministry of Investment and Planning of
Vietnam, 2016).

Science and Technology Performance

According to MOST (2016), Vietnam has achieved some significant outcomes in

the implementation of the S&T Strategy 2011–2020:

• The contribution of technology intensity in GDP has increased in 2011–2013

with a corresponding ratio of 11.7 per cent, 19.1 per cent and 28.1 per cent.
• From 2011 to 2014, the technology upgrading speed is 10.68 per cent, espe-
cially in ICT, telecommunication, petroleum, aviation, finance and banking
industries.
• The number of international publications also doubled in 2011–2015 in
comparison to 2006–2010, which took Vietnam to the 59th in world ranking,
below Singapore (32nd), Malaysia (38th) and Thailand (43rd).

From 2011 to 2017, there were 2,860 patents registered, which is 62 per cent
higher than in 2006–2010. The number of certified patents from 2011 to 2017 is
428 (Table 6).
In brief, Vietnam’s NIS is in the making. With long-term commitment towards
S&T activities, the government of Vietnam seems to have put into place the fun-
damentals of a comprehensive NIS. However, the Vietnam NIS is still very much
at the early stage of development and faces many weaknesses. Among others, the
most significant are the following:

• there is isolation of research institutions including universities from the

productive sectors of the economy; 


Table 6
Number of International Publications of Vietnamese Authors in 2011–2017

Papers on ISI/Scopus Journals Number of Patents

Year Numbers Growth rate (%) Registered Granted
2011  1,584 300 40
2012  1,964 23.99 382 45
2013  2,509 27.75 443 59
2014  2,759 9.96 487 36
2015  4,288 13.70 583 63
2016  3,828 −11% 556 76
2017  4,546 18.76 109 109
Total 21,478 2,860 428
Source: Web of Science, https://clarivate.com/products/web-of-science/ retrieved on 8 July 2018;
National Office of Intellectual Property of Vietnam, http://www.noip.gov.vn/web/noip/home/
en/ retrieved on 24 June 2018.

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 University–Industry Linkages in Promoting Technology Transfer    83

• within the productive sectors of the economy, the linkages between the more
advanced (FDI) sectors with the laggard (domestic SMEs) are weak; 

• there is a still favourable bias towards the state sectors; 

• the higher education sector does not operate properly as the source of know-
ledge creation and transfer; 

• inadequate level of coordination between the policies, especially incentives
for R&D for the business community; and 

• insufficient coordination between S&T policies at the national, regional and
community levels.

In order to find solutions for enhancing Vietnam’s NIS, this article explores the
importance of U–I linkages with reference to five major universities.

Research Findings

Overview of the Five Participant Universities

Table 7 presents the general information of the five universities, including the
year of establishment, the number of faculty members and the researchers and the
number of schools/faculties and research centres.
These five institutions are multidiscipline universities. While HUST, TNUT,
DUT and BKU are mainly specialised in technology and engineering areas, VNU
is the national university (under the direct authority of the prime minister) and
has seven-member universities in natural science, technology, social science and
humanity, business, economics, education and linguistic fields of study. But this
article studies only the R&D activities of VNU’s University of Natural Science and
University of Technology. In these universities, there are schools and/or faculties,
which tend to concentrate on both undergraduate and graduate levels, even though
they also conduct research works. Besides, there are research centres and institutes
aiming mainly at research activities, and some of them provide graduate training
at only graduate levels. With 13 research centres and institutes, HUST seems to
be a research-oriented university as opposed to the others.

Table 7 
Human Resources, Schools and Students

HUST VNU TNUT DUT BKU

Year of establishment 1956 1993 1965 1975 1976
Number of faculty members 1.296 1.434 583 700 930
No. of schools/faculties 17 12 10 14 11
No. of research centres/institutes 13 7 1 7 5
Number of undergraduate students 25.000 26.000 8.000 16.000 20.000
No. of master students 5.000 6.800 120 770 3.000
No. of doctoral students 500 1.200 29 70 300
Source: Website of HUST (hust.edu.vn), VNU (vnu.edu.vn), TNUT (tnut.edu.vn), DUT (dut.edu.vn),
and BKU (hcmut.edu.vn)

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 84    Le Hieu Hoc and Nguyen Duc Trong

Figure 2
The Sources of Research Funds at the Vietnamese Universities

Source: Data From the Respondent’s Survey.

The data show that these five universities have a high ratio of students over
lecturers (ranging from 1:14 (TNTU) to 1:24 (BKU)). Thus, the teaching workload
of the faculty members must be heavy, which certainly result in their limited time
for doing research. In Vietnam, the funds for research activities of the university
come from the government, the international organisations/programmes, NGOs
and businesses. The respondents also recognised these as the main sources of the
research fund at their university. In fact, most of the respondents chose govern-
ment (both at national and regional levels) as the major source of research funds.
A considerable number of respondents also indicated that they received financial
support from private enterprises (Figure 2). However, due to poor statistical records,
not all universities can identify the contribution of individual sources.
Table 8 shows the research outputs of the five universities in terms of
the publications. VNU is the institution that has the best performance for
publications in Institute for Scientific Information(ISI)/Scopus, international
journals and local journals/proceedings. Nevertheless, the majority of the
publications is in natural and basic sciences rather than in engineering fields.
In contrast, HUST also has a high number of publications, but most of their
publications are in engineering fields, especially in material sciences, physical
engineering, electronics engineering, environmental and chemical engineering,
mechanical engineering and power engineering. BKU’s scientists have also
published a significant number of articles, especially in the recent years.

Types of U–I Linkages

Figure 3 shows that in both periods (2005–2009 and 2010–2015), the five univer-
sities conducted all types of U–I linkages, but the significance and the frequency of

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 University–Industry Linkages in Promoting Technology Transfer    85

Table 8
The Number of Publications of the Five Universities

University Types of publications 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016

HUST ISI/Scopus indexed journals 84 130 137 160 210
International journals/ 174 187 230 240 310
proceedings
Local journals/proceedings 855 1040 970 930 1128
VNU ISI/Scopus indexed journals 190 217 246 248 308
International journals 196 243 342 367 384
Local journals/proceedings 1503 1629 1629 1745 1759
TNTU ISI/Scopus indexed journals 0 0 0 0 5
International journals/ 39 28 37 55 53
proceedings
Local journals/proceedings 52 75 307 274 68
DUT ISI/Scopus indexed journals 9 20 35 52 48
International journals/ 57 88 109 95 153
proceedings
Local journals/proceedings 149 152 194 208 236
BKU ISI/Scopus indexed journals 139
International journals/ 99 116 145 256 318
proceedings
Local journals/proceedings 137 252 302 547 568
Source: Summarised from the statistical data of the five universities.

individual collaboration mechanisms were different. It seems that in the 2010–2015

period, the collaboration between these universities and industry occurred more
frequently with higher commitment from both parties (in terms of time, costs and
contents). However, the linkage for training activities, such as providing internship
to students, donating scholarships, recruiting graduates and contributing practical
experiences in curriculum development, was recognised more frequently. The
collaborations in research and technology transfer occurred with a lower level
of commitment and emphasised on organising workshops on new technologies
(mean 2005–2009 = 3,05; mean2010–2015 = 3,49), participating in joint research projects
(mean2005–2009 = 3,01; mean2010–2015 = 3,34) and in contract research programmes
(mean2005–2009 = 2,98; mean2010–2015 = 3,30).
One-way ANOVA analysis was used to test the hypothesis that different univer-
sities have different levels of commitment in collaborating with the industry. The
statistical test shows that there was a considerable difference in the collaboration
with firms among universities. During both periods, respondents from DUT and
TNUT rated the regularity of some U–I linkage types higher than those from other
institutions. BKU’s respondents gave most of their U–I collaboration types with
the lowest mean value (Tables 9 and 10).

Drivers for U–I Linkage

Most of the respondents had full awareness and highly recognised the benefits of
U–I linkages. They considered that these motivations are highly significant to

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 Figure 3
Respondent’s Assessment on U–I Linkage Typology

Source: Data From the Respondent’s Survey.

 University–Industry Linkages in Promoting Technology Transfer    87

Table 9
ANOVA Analysis on the Type of U–I linkage by University, Period 2005–2009

Types of U–I linkage (only

significant types are listed) Total HUST VNU TNUT DUT BKU
Firm provides internship to 3.62 3.28 3.75 4.47 4.38 3.23
students
Firm and university collaborate 3.05 2.80 3.12 3.57 3.62 2.80
to organise the workshops on
new technology
Firm provides scholarships for 3.57 3.37 3.64 3.90 4.09 3.36
students and academic staff
Firm’s staff and experts 3.01 2.96 3.17 2.92 3.22 2.86
deliver lectures and speeches
about new technology in the
university
Firm’s executives participate 2.58 2.36 2.84 2.90 3.00 2.29
in teaching, doing research
and supervising students of the
university
Firm recruits graduates from 3.48 3.28 3.50 4.14 3.86 3.28
the university
Firm contributes to the 3.09 3.14 3.09 3.18 2.85 3.14
curriculum development of the
university
University and firm jointly 1.51 1.15 1.67 2.29 2.19 1.16
publish scientific publications
University participates in 3.01 3.14 2.93 3.16 2.73 3.01
contract research with industry
University cooperates with 1.44 1.12 1.70 1.92 2.08 1.13
industry to participate in
science parks and incubators
Source: Data From the Respondent’s Survey.
Note: ANOVA compare mean analysis with 95% confidence interval.

promote U–I linkages (Figure 4). Nevertheless, the highest drivers for U–I link-
ages include:

• providing students with the opportunity to approach the career practices

through internship and conducting research at firms (mean = 4.3);
• providing the opportunity for the lecturers to accumulate practical experi-
ences (4.26);
• improving the reputation and images of the university to the government and
community (4.22);
• providing the university with appropriate information to develop the
curriculum that satisfy the practical needs of firms (4.16); and
• improving the facilities and equipment for the university’s research from the
donation of industry (4.15).

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 88    Le Hieu Hoc and Nguyen Duc Trong

Table 10
ANOVA Analysis on the Type of U–I Linkage by University, Period 2010–2015

Types of U–I linkage (only

significant types are listed) Total HUST VNU TNUT DUT BKU
Firm provides internship to 4.05 3.76 4.19 4.66 4.72 3.72
students
Firm and university collaborate 3.49 3.24 3.58 3.85 4.13 3.25
to organise the workshops on
new technology
Firm provides scholarships for 3.94 3.67 4.03 4.31 4.66 3.67
students and academic staff
Firm’s staff and experts 3.39 3.31 3.61 3.16 3.83 3.16
deliver lectures and speeches
about new technology in the
university
Firm’s executives participate 2.94 2.62 3.14 3.41 3.59 2.65
in teaching, doing research
and supervising students of the
university
Firm recruits graduates from 3.99 3.72 4.12 4.43 4.65 3.69
the university
Firm contributes to the 3.75 3.69 3.80 3.38 4.08 3.71
curriculum development of the
university
University and firm jointly 1.70 1.20 1.92 2.54 2.74 1.25
publish scientific publications
University cooperates with 1.68 1.14 2.09 1.96 3.03 1.15
industry to participate in
science parks and incubators
Source: Data From the Respondent’s Survey.
Note: ANOVA compare mean analysis with 95% confidence interval.

Besides, there are some drivers to U–I linkages in research, innovation and
technology transfer that were highly rated by the respondents:

• Provide the university with more information on market needs that help
shorten the time gap between basic and applied research (4.06);
• Increase income for the university’s staff and lecturers from the research
contracts, consultancy services, copyright royalties and patents (3.99);
• Research and teaching contracts with the firms are attractive to the university’s
lecturers due to worthy compensation and easy payment (3.89);
• Supplement research funds with the financial support from industry (3.88)
• Support firms to conducting technological innovation for building up the
competitive advantages during international integration (3.8).

However, promoting U–I linkages to get the best incentives from the government’s
support programmes received the lowest mean value (3.09) from the respondents.

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 University–Industry Linkages in Promoting Technology Transfer    89

Figure 4
Respondent’s Viewpoint on the Drivers of U–I Linkage

Source: Data From the Respondent’s Survey.

It implies that, on the one hand, either the university or industry (or even both)
do not notice the existence of such policies. On the other hand, the incentives are
not appropriate to motivate the two players and/or the procedures for receiving
the incentives are complicated. These were also realised by the firm’s managers in
another survey conducted by Hoc and Trong (2017).
The ANOVA analysis accepted the hypothesis that respondents from different
universities differ in the viewpoint of U–I linkage drivers but in only eleven
factors (Table 11).

• Respondents from HUST considered that the drivers for promoting U–I
linkages were the high compensation policy, easy payment procedures when
having research and teaching contracts with the firms and the improvement
in the facilities and equipment for the university’s research from the dona-
tion of industry. They rated these drivers higher weight (mean = 4.1 and 4.3,
respectively) than the respondents from other universities.
• Respondents from TNUT paid higher attention on several reasons: ‘Provide
the opportunity for the lecturers to acquire practical experiences’ (4.46);
‘Provide more opportunity for commercializing the research outcomes’ (4.37);
‘Increase income for the faculty from the research contracts, consultancy
services, copyright royalties, and patents’ (4.14); and ‘Collaborate with the
industry to get benefits from the government support programmes’ (3.86).

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 90    Le Hieu Hoc and Nguyen Duc Trong

Table 11
Motivation for U–I Linkage by Institutions

Drivers for U–I linkage

(Only significant drivers are listed) Total HUST VNU TNUT DUT BKU
Increase income for the 3.99 4.10 3.86 4.14 3.70 4.07
university’s staff and lecturers from
the research contracts, consultancy
services, copyright royalties and
patents
Research and teaching contracts 3.89 4.10 3.69 3.92 3.45 4.04
with the firms are attractive to the
university’s lecturers due to worthy
compensation and easy payment
Provide more opportunities for 3.62 3.33 3.75 4.37 4.12 3.32
commercialising the research
outcomes
Motivate the university to apply 3.96 3.68 4.10 4.36 4.64 3.66
the theories to practices and to
improve the faculty’s knowledge
Provide the university with more 4.06 3.88 4.15 4.24 4.58 3.84
information on market needs that
help shorten the time gap between
basic and applied research
Provide students with the 4.30 4.20 4.43 4.58 4.65 4.05
opportunity to approach job
practices through internship and
doing research at firms
Expand the resources to support 4.05 3.84 4.16 4.40 4.50 3.84
the teaching, doing research and
students through donations and
scholarships from firms
Improve the facilities and 4.15 4.30 4.04 4.26 3.99 4.13
equipment for the university’s
research from the donation of
industry
Provide the university with 4.16 4.10 4.23 4.14 4.56 3.95
appropriate information to develop
the curriculum that satisfies the
practical needs of firm
Provide the opportunity for the 4.26 4.24 4.28 4.46 4.45 4.12
lecturers to acquire practical
experiences
Source: Data From the Respondent’s Survey
Note: ANOVA compare mean analysis with 95% confidence interval.

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 University–Industry Linkages in Promoting Technology Transfer    91

• Meanwhile, respondents from DUT tended to focus on other motivations

for U–I linkages: ‘Provide students with the opportunity to approach the job
practices through internship and doing research at firms’ (4.65); ‘Motivate
the university to apply the theories to practices and to improve the faculty’s
knowledge’ (4.64); ‘Provide the university with more information on market
needs that help shorten the time gap between basic and applied research’
(4.58) and ‘Expand the resources to support the teaching, doing research
and students through the donations and scholarships from firms’ (4.5).
• In contrast, BKU’s respondents provided the lowest rate to most of the reasons
for U–I linkages, even though they were still aware of its importance (the
mean ranged from 3.32 to 4.13).
• In turn, VNU’s respondents rated the motivation of ‘getting benefits from
government support programmes’ (2.88), regardless of the fact that VNU
has been receiving a huge research fund directly from the central govern-
ment with a unique mechanism as the research areas focus more on solving
economical–cultural issues of the regions rather than engaging with firms.

Barriers to U–I Linkage

The above findings confirmed that in Vietnam, the U–I linkage is necessary and
considered as a crucial driver for improving training and research quality of the
HEIs and supporting firms to solve and innovate product and production quality.
Both HEIs and industry are willing to collaborate with each other. However, the
survey also indicated that U–I linkage is rather weak due to some barriers (Figure 5).
The respondents assessed the impacts of the barriers on U–I linkages at relatively
average levels and lower than those of lecturers in Malaysia and Sri Lanka (Esham,
2008).
The biggest barriers to U–I linkage is the difference in the research objectives
of the university and industry (3.49), the limitation in practical experience as the
university usually emphasises on basic research (3.24) and the time for doing
research being insufficient because the faculty has heavy teaching workload (3.21).
While the first two barriers imply the difference in basic research conducted by the
university and the applied research expected by the firms and skill inappropriateness
of the lecturers, the latter can be explained by the reason that most of the HEIs in
Vietnam are teaching universities with high student–lecturer ratios. Table 4 also
confirmed this characteristic of the five universities. The ANOVA comparing mean
test showed that the respondents from different universities have different points
of view on the U–I linkage barriers (Table 12).
While HUST’s respondents considered the difference in research objectives
of the university and industry (3.62), the faculty’s research capability (3.62)
and their confidence in doing research upon the request of industry (3.36) as the
biggest constraints for promoting U–I linkage, TNUT’s respondents emphasised
the university’s rules and regulations (4.28) and organisational structure (4.08),
the faculty’s teaching and administrative workloads (3.98), the firm’s interests in

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 92    Le Hieu Hoc and Nguyen Duc Trong

Table 12
Barriers to U–I Linkage by Institutions

Barriers to U–I Linkage

(Only significant barriers are listed) Total HUST VNU TNUT DUT BKU
The university has limited practical 3.49 3.62 3.46 3.00 3.34 3.59
experience because its goals focus on
training and basic research
Faculty’s research capability does not 3.03 3.28 2.85 2.69 2.52 3.26
meet the practical needs of the firms
The university’s infrastructure and 3.19 3.25 2.94 2.96 3.40 3.27
research equipment do not meet the
research requirement of firms
The faculty’s culture and attitude 2.99 3.17 2.77 2.12 3.08 3.19
towards collaboration with industry is
inappropriate.
The faculty does not feel confident 3.06 3.36 2.64 2.30 2.92 3.34
enough to conduct research to satisfy
by firm’s requirement
Collaborating with the firm is not a 2.95 3.19 2.66 2.04 2.86 3.21
mission of the faculty
The faculty does not have sufficient 3.21 3.24 2.84 3.98 3.02 3.29
time for collaborating with industry
because of heavy teaching and
administrative workload
The faculty does not have appropriate 3.13 3.17 2.79 3.82 2.99 3.18
awareness of the benefits of U–I
linkage
Collaboration with industry has 3.05 3.44 2.24 3.74 2.30 3.37
negative impacts on the teaching
professionals of the faculty
Collaboration with industry limits the 2.79 3.17 2.26 1.86 2.26 3.32
freedom in the selection of research
topics
Firms are not interested in 3.01 2.83 2.81 3.88 3.21 2.94
collaborating with the university
The university’s rules and regulations 3.02 3.30 2.27 4.28 2.10 3.32
inhibit the collaboration with industry
The university’s organisational 3.00 3.18 2.33 4.08 2.44 3.23
structure is inappropriate to support the
promotion of U–I linkages
The university doesn’t have incentive 2.84 3.16 2.31 3.18 1.91 3.25
policies for collaborating with industry
The geographical location of the 3.11 3.58 2.39 3.60 2.22 3.42
university is too far for the industry to
approach
Source: Data From the Respondent’s Survey
Note: ANOVA compare mean analysis at 95% confidence interval.

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 University–Industry Linkages in Promoting Technology Transfer    93

Figure 5
Inhibitors of the U–I Linkage

Source: Data From the Respondent’s Survey

collaboration with university (3.88), the faculty’s awareness of the faculty about
the benefits of U–I linkage (3.84), the negative impacts of firm collaboration on
teaching profession of the faculty (3.82) and the geographical location between
university and industry (3.6). These mean values are higher than those rated by
the respondents of the other four universities.
In addition, the barriers like the culture and attitude of the faculty on U–I
linkages, the freedom in selecting research topics and the university’s incentive
policy in setting up collaboration with the industry were viewed more important
by BKU’s respondents.

Solutions for Promoting U–I Linkage

Respondents figured out many tasks that universities and firms should do to promote
the U–I linkages in which the following activities have higher priorities (Figure 6).

• Offer visits to firms for students (4.33);

• PR widely the firm-related activities of the university (4.28);
• Establish a separate unit responsible for collaborating with industry (4.28);
• Organise workshops and seminars for executives and experts from the industry
(4.24); and
• Empower more the faculty and schools for collaboration with firms. (4.19)

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 94    Le Hieu Hoc and Nguyen Duc Trong

Figure 6
Tasks for Promoting U–I Linkage

Source: Data From the Respondent’s Survey

In addition, the idea of ‘propose to the government tax incentive policy to the
firms who have U–I linkage activities’ received a relatively high significance (mean
= 3.98). Nevertheless, most of the high-ranking recommendations focused more
on U–I collaboration in training and recruitment rather than the activities related
to research and development.

Conclusions and Recommendations

Conclusions

The above findings described the U–I linkage, especially from the perspective of
the faculty staff as the following:
In terms of U–I linkage typology, the respondents from five universities con-
firmed that most of the mechanisms suggested by Esham (2008), Etzkowitz (2012)
and Wang (2012) coexisted. During 2010–2015, the collaborations between HEIs
and firms occurred more frequently and significantly than in 2005–2009. These can
be explained by the impacts of the issuance and/or adjustment of legal documents
as mentioned in Section 5.1. However, in both periods, the collaboration between
universities and firms concentrated on the support for students in internships and
scholarships. The collaborative activities on research and technology transfer were
limited.
In addition, there were some differences in the assessment of the respondents
from different universities on the frequency and the signification of individual type
of U–I linkages. The U–I collaborations in research and technology transfer were
observed more frequently and with higher sense in technology and engineering
multidiscipline universities such as HUST, DUT and BKU.
Regarding the drivers for U–I linkages, the data analysis also showed that the
respondents realised all factors that Aslan (2006), Esham (2008) and Guimon
(2013) proposed for developing countries. But it seemed that the respondents

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 University–Industry Linkages in Promoting Technology Transfer    95

emphasised more on the collaboration in supporting the training activities of the

university. The higher-weighted drivers for U–I linkages include the enhancement
of facilities and equipment of the university, improving the reputation and images
of the university to the government and community, the provision of opportunity
for acquiring practical experiences and opportunities for students to approach the
practical jobs through internships and conducting research in firms.
The statistical test also indicated that the respondents from HUST, DUT and
TNUT assessed the importance of U–I linkage drivers significantly higher than
those from the VNU and BKU.
In addition, the respondents have different viewpoints on the inhibitors of
U–I linkages, which is proposed by Esham (2008) and adjusted by Trong and
Hoc (2014). The higher-impact inhibitors include the differences in research objec-
tives, geographical location, the confidence of faculty, the respondent’s freedom in
selecting research topics and the rules and regulations of the university.
Recommendations

For Promoting U–I Linkage in Vietnam

Based on the current status of U–I linkages in Vietnam described above (the type
of U–I linkages, the motivation factors and barriers) and the tasks that respondents
suggested, the article also provides some recommendations for promoting the
linkages:
For Universities

• The university’s top management, deans and lecturers should have an appro-
priate awareness of the necessity and benefits of U–I linkages. With the right
awareness, top management can develop the right direction and strategy as
well as commit to allocate the right resources for developing the collabora-
tions with industry, and the faculty will define the right tasks to do.
• The university should consider U–I collaboration as a strategic priority and
communicate the message throughout the organisation. Based on that, all
managerial levels should develop a strategy for promoting U–I linkages with
clear implementing mechanisms.
• The university should develop an ecosystem in the whole university, in
addition to a responsible unit (with clear terms in references, appropriate
personnel and necessary resources); the university should not limit the
collaboration within this unit or in engineering or business schools, but they
should develop an environment in which the U–I linkage can be developed
by individual faculty, division and department and encourage the collabora-
tion with the participation of cross-department members.
• The university should encourage the real involvement of industry’s repre-
sentatives in the university’s committees, from the governance (Board of
Trustees, Board of Science and Education) to joint research, deliver lectures,
supervise student’s thesis with practical research topics, organise workshops

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 96    Le Hieu Hoc and Nguyen Duc Trong

and seminars to exchange knowledge and experience and contribute to

curriculum development.
• The university should develop mechanisms that encourage the faculty to
participate in the firm’s operations: internship, visits, short-course training and
applied research. The university should empower the faculty in collaboration
with industry.
• The university should develop performance evaluation, compensation,
reward and promotion policies based on the extent to which the lecturers can
participate in U–I linkages. Teaching experience and publications should be
taken into account in the compensation system and other rewards in addition
to the awarding of professorships.
• The university should add internship into the curriculum in order to provide
students with practical knowledge, so that they can access the firm’s opera-
tions in advance and consider adding practical experience into the academic
records of students.
• The university should regularly exchange information with the industry
to reduce the lack of understanding about the objectives, experiences and
capabilities of universities and firms through the PR programmes or locate
the university’s research centres near the firms as well as set up the firm’s
laboratory in the university campus.
• The university should design the sabbatical leaves in the firms so that the
faculty can conduct research and/or manage the spin-offs based on their
research outcomes.
For Industry

The top management of firms also has to be aware clearly about the roles of U–I
linkages. The university is not only the source for recruitment of high-quality
human resources but also a source of new technological knowledge, solutions for
technological changes and quality improvement as well as the management system.
Investing in basic research requires a great commitment, which is very difficult
for firms, especially most Vietnamese enterprises are small and medium size with
limited financial resources. Hence, ‘open the door’ will help receive the research
excellences and experts from the university to identify the kaizen opportunities in
the firm’s operations. In addition, one of the CSR trends is to participate in training
programmes from the early stage in order to provide the qualified human resources
to the society. These are the reasons why university–business collaborations should
be considered as a strategic priority of the firms.
In general, the firms should develop long-term strategic partnerships with
universities, focusing on their creative and talented human resources, who can assure
the innovation of firms in the future, even though such benefits can be achieved
only after 5–10 years.
Firms should be constantly ready for exchanging and sharing their own research
capabilities and the core competences of universities to define the prospectus

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 University–Industry Linkages in Promoting Technology Transfer    97

collaboration. The firm’s managers and the university’s academicians should discuss
thoroughly to define the mutual research interests.
The followings are solutions that firms should do:

• Open for the visits of the university’s faculty and students in the firm’s facili-
ties in order to supplement practical knowledge for training and identify the
firm’s issues for research.
• Develop a mechanism to encourage the firm’s personnel to deliver lectures/
courses and conduct research in the universities.
• Organise workshops and seminars for exchanging and updating new know-
ledge and state-of-the-art technology.
• Send the firm’s representative to participate in the university’s boards.
• Sponsor for the research projects of the university’s faculty and students.
• Propose the research interests so that the university’s faculty can apply through
joint and/or contract research.
• Effectively and efficiently use the research and innovation funds aiming at
research collaboration with universities.
• Depending on the scale, requirements and resource availability, firms should
establish the laboratories and experimental job shops in the university.
For Government

Although the roles of the government had not been studied in this research, the
literature review and the primary data of this research also indicated that the govern-
ment is very important in promoting U–I linkages so that the triple helix can be a
component of the NIS (Etzkowitz, 2012). Hence, there are some recommendations
for the government and its institutions.
First and the most important thing is that the decision-makers should redefine
and emphasise the roles of HEIs, especially the research universities, as the cradle
of expertise and potential for solving societal issues. The responsibility of the
government is creating an environment fostering the U–I linkage and encourag-
ing the universities to collaborate with industry in a larger scope of training and
research. Even teaching universities can develop the curriculum with entrepreneur-
ship orientation. The training programmes with practical experimentation will
help students achieve higher studying outcomes, be engaged in learning and have
better recruitment opportunities. When formulating education, S&T innovation
and development policies, the government should take into account the involve-
ment of the universities and the collaboration between the university and industry.
The detailed recommendations consist of:

• developing the policies that encourage and recognise the mobility of staff
between university and firm;
• renovating and simplifying the administrative procedures so that universities
and firms easily access the government supporting funds for research and
innovation;

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 98    Le Hieu Hoc and Nguyen Duc Trong

• establishing the national and regional funds for firm’s R&D activities as well
as the university’s research projects and subsidising the firm’s innovation
programmes via financial loans using the university’s and research centre’s
facilities and services, especially for SMEs;
• developing the tax incentive policies for firms who undertake collabora-
tions with universities in research and technology transfer projects and/or
programmes, instead of supporting for those investing in R&D themselves;
• renewing the criteria for assessing the university’s performance and allocating
the research budget for the universities. Such criteria can be: the number of
students, especially the doctoral students, number of publications, patents,
number of consultancy projects, number of joint and/or contract researches,
revenues from licensing and then the number of spin-offs by the faculty of
graduated students; and
• fostering the establishment of science parks, start-ups and entrepreneur-
ship incubators. The science parks should be built nearby the universities
and provide supports for the university’s research teams to start up on their
research results, using connections with public venture capital institutions
and the subsidies for entrepreneurs.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship and/
or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received financial support from Vietnam’s Ministry of Education and Training to conduct
a research project on University and Industry Linkage in Technology Transfer in the period 2014–2016.
A part of this project’s was used to publish this article.

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