Navigating the path to market

In this Working Paper, the aim is to examine in depth the commercialization processes of university-generated inventions. The explorative analysis draws on primary and secondary data obtained from the internal invention disclosure database of the Technical University of Denmark (DTU) for the period 2000-2015. This dataset is both exceptional and highly exclusive, as most universities do not make comparable information publicly available, often compelling technology transfer researchers to rely on proxies and indirect measures. Access to this privileged dataset enables the use of original, unprocessed information and thereby offers a direct, real-time view of how university inventions progress toward market application. Given the confidential nature of this data, the data analysis remains at an aggregated level, deliberately omitting specific firm names or exact years of invention or patent licensing (that is the precondition under which DTU shared this exclusive data).