A new study shows a growing contribution of universities to the continent's innovation ecosystem but laments the bloc's fragmentation is crippling the ability to turn high-level scientific research into economic competitiveness.
A new report by the European Patent Observatory (EPO) shows that patent submissions across the continent are concentrated in just a few places.
Half of all direct and indirect patent applications submitted with the European Patent Office between 2000 and 2020 - on a total of over 100,000 - came from only 5% of all European universities.
France's University of Grenoble was the most active, with 3,348 submissions, followed by Zurich's ETH (2,219) and Munich's Technical University (2,183).
Overall, submissions were the highest in Europe's most industrialised regions, says the report, "where opportunities for collaboration and technology transfers with industry are greatest."
