Customers´ profile of a ready-to-commercialize-technologies identification model

Abstract

Results of R&D activities derived from technology push approaches are challenging universities and research organizations of the kind to develop commercialization models in order to find the proper customer for those innovative products and or services. Selection criteria and commercialization rules supports an operational platform working under the frame of a Ready-to- commercialize-technology Model which involves researchers, managers, institutional officers and agents, as well as regulatory frameworks such as copyright ownership, taxes and ownership contraction. Matching the innovation supply with its correspondent demand is a key commercialization issue (Economic Theory), being the customer´s profile identification a relevant input from the marketing perspective. Barriers emerge when commercialization of innovation activities are new functions for the R&D organization due to the lack of hard data of innovation customers profile. Working in the Technology Transfer field (Management of Technology Theory), marketing concepts such as customer and market segment are integrated as a means to gain efficiency for innovations commercialization efforts (Market Theory). In this paper Technology Transfer operations with 40 innovation customers are described from the commercialization process to the type of interaction realized with the R&D institution to gain understanding in the customer profile as a key component of the innovation management process, assuming that from the buyer perspective, acquiring technology solutions resulted from research and development activities becomes of key importance to add to the collection of resources inside an administrative framework, that enables a firm to gain competitive advantage (Resource View Theory). Under this premises, simple questions regarding the customer of R&D results such as Who are they? What do they buy? What type of linkage do they create with the technology developer? What is the impact of the purchase on their businesses? are explored here in an attempt to identify some R&D customer’s profile