Capacity Building for University-Industry Linkages in Developing Countries: The Case of the Thai Higher Education Development Project

摘要

The aim of this article is to analyse the impact of academic capacity building on university-industry-linkages (UILs) and to identify a set of critical success factors to guide improvements of university-industry knowledge transfers in developing countries. Extensive empirical evidence from a unique case of academic institution building and efforts to improve UILs in the context of a developing country-the Thai Higher Education Development Project (HEDP)-is used. Since the Thai HEDP combines the enhancement of both core academic missions and UIL activities within newly founded centres, it provides an interesting case study to support the cross-fertilization of ideas and academic entrepreneurship.rnThe article is organised as follows: (ⅰ) A generic overview of UILs in Thailand is presented to place the establishment and evolution of the centres into perspective; (ⅱ) The quantitative relevance of UILs at the centres is measured and considered by looking at their sources of income generation; (ⅲ) Approaches and best practices of the centres towards UILs are discussed with the help of qualitative analysis; (ⅳ) The empirical results are used to identify critical success factors for UILs, and their potential for cross-fertilisation of academic tasks in developing countries.