Regimes of ordering: the commercialization of intellectual property in industrial-academic collaborations

Abstract

This paper examines a diversity of regulatory mechanisms and negotiation processes involved in attmpts to commercialize university research which provide direct and indirect means of linking the activities o f individuals and organizations in the acquisition and exchange of commodified goods. The key,question addressed is how is an activity that is always uncertain —the production of knowledge —is ‘packaged’ by intellectual property management and intellectual property rights so that it is controllable, commod$able and enhs into exchange reidiomhips. This paper addresses the acquisition and stabilization of proprietaly claim to knowledge between public and priuate organizations by considering a detailed case o f a unwersip spin-off and in doing so raises a number of more general issues about the translation of knowledge.