Article by Dr. Lorenz Granrath (April 1, 2024)

TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER INGERMANYGermany is the biggest economy in the European Union and competes with Japan
about place three in the ranking of the largest industries worldwide. Germany’s
success is built on Science and Technology.
The first German university was founded 1386 in Heidelberg and started the long
tradition of scientific curiosity. In 1825 the first Technical University was founded inKarlsruhe, now KIT Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, starting to emphasize applied
technology research. In the 20th century, non-university research institutes wereestablished.

R&D - Differences between Germany and Japan
Germany spends more than 3% of GDP on R&D, but less than Japan.
In Japan, almost 80% of R&D is done in industrial laboratories versus 60-70% in
Germany. The reason is, that on the one hand Japan is characterized by big
industrial groups, the Keiretsu, that do considerable own research. Hitachi forexample, started its Central Research Lab CRL already in the year 1943.
Germany however does not have comparably large industrial groups. It has a strong
Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (SME) sector with many unique companies,that produce their own products in a niche market and sell them worldwide. Theyoften cannot afford own research laboratories and therefore depend on strong
external research capabilities that exist in Germany.
Here, the Technology Transfer (TT) from science to industry becomes crucial andGermany therefore has an elaborated TT landscape. Especially the 70 Fraunhofer
Institutes are dedicated to providing competence up to product or production level.
Many universities are doing R&D and have technology transfer offices. Germany hasa larger public R&D sector than Japan with around 1.000 public research institutes.

1Article by Dr. Lorenz Granrath (April 1, 2024)
In Japan however, due to the industrial structure of big groups, transfer from public
R&D in universities and public labs to the industry was less needed for a long time.
The big industrial groups were capable of doing their research by themselves andonly complemented this research by external sources, also from foreign countries.
Likewise, public research in Japan did not have incentives to transfer theirknowledge. This is now gradually changing.

Research at Universities
Germany has around 400 Universities that are building on a long tradition. They areinfluenced by the ideas of Wilhelm von Humboldt (1767–1835), the founder of theBerlin University, to have a unity of learning, teaching, and research. This implies thata professor not only teaches, but also does research and the students not only learn,
but also participate in research as part of their education. This laid the foundation forresearch being conducted in all universities and constitutes the long tradition ofscientific curiosity.
Today there are 110 Universities, including 20 Technical Universities. They canaward degrees up to the doctorate (PhD). Some university labs also conduct
research for industry and have big laboratories.
The second category are 210 Universities of Applied Science, including 40 TechnicalUniversities of Applied Science. The Universities of Applied Sciences usually only
award degrees up to a Master’s degree, though some can award doctorate (PhD)
degrees as well.
The third category are 50 Art and Music Colleges and 30 Universities of Applied
Administrative Science in Germany.
The higher education intuitions spend around 20 billion Euro per year for research,almost half of that (9 billion Euro) is through third party funding. A big part of thatcomes from German funding agencies like DFG and the selection process iscompetitive. Third party funding also includes funding directly from industry for very
applied research for industrial applications.
→ Universities in Germany
2Article by Dr. Lorenz Granrath (April 1, 2024)

Research Institutes
Germany also has around 1.000 public research institutes. They can be distinguishedby their focus from basic research to applied research and their funding from publicfunding to private funding. There are for example the Max-Planck Institutes for basic
research producing Nobel Prize Winners and on the other side of the spectrum theFraunhofer Institutes offering applied research of help for industry. In between are
more organizations as shown below.

Souce: https://www.research-in-germany.org/en/research-landscape/researchinstitutions.html→ Research Institutions in Germany
There are the following groups of research institutions:
1. Fraunhofer Gesellschaft
76 institutes and 30.000 staff, focus on applied research for industry, 20%
basic funding, 80% contract research from industry and public projects.
2. Max-Planck Gesellschaft
86 institutes and 24.000 staff, focus is basic research, 88% basic funding fromgovernment, 12% third party funding, 31 Nobel Prize Winners.
3. Helmholtz Association
18 centers and 44.000 staff, focus on future applications like space, health,energy, environment, 70% basic funding, 30% third party funding3

Article by Dr. Lorenz Granrath (April 1, 2024)
4. Leibniz Association
97 institutes, 21.000 staff, covers on all academic areas, 62% basic funding,
28% third party funding, 10% others
5. Academies of Science and Humanities
Leopoldina: 1652 founded, 1.600 staff from 30 countries. Independent sciencebased advise for politics, 90% basic funding
acatech – National Academy for Science and Engineering: founded 2002, 600
staff, focus is forward-looking recommendations and knowledge transfer
between science and industry, 95% basic funding
Federal Institutes
44 institutes belonging to the federal government and reporting to ministries,
20.000 staff, focus is supporting ministeries, 95% basic funding
6. Federal State Research Institutes
143 belonging to the federal states, 6.000 staff, 92% basic funding

Private Research Institutes
German Industry is also conducting research with Volkswagen leading the spending.
There are however also special institutes serving well the SMEs. The Federation ofIndustrial Research Institutes (AIF) is a network of 84 Industrial ResearchAssociations that each run partly several laboratories with very specialized topics,
like brewery, leather, iron, etc. and they serve approximately 130.000 SMEs.

Further Information:
Overview of Keyplayers of the German-Japanese Technology Transfer Landscape:https://www.dwih-tokyo.org/transfer/
Information on the Japanese Research Landscape and Cooperation with Japan:
https://www.dwih-tokyo.org/en/the-japanese-research-landscape/4