The influence of human capital and perceived university support on patent applications of biomedical investigators

The Bayh–Doyle Act of 1980 accelerated academic entrepreneurship in universities. However, not all qualified researchers sought to be involved in patenting. We compared researchers’ human capital and their perceptions of resource availability on patent applications. We collected primary data from biomedical principal investigators from 15 universities using a validated questionnaire. Our results from logistic regression strongly suggest that human capital had a stronger influence than perceptions of resource availability for commercialization activities on patent applications. The policy implications are that universities should seek to enhance the stock of human capital most associated with patenting behaviors to improve academic entrepreneurial outcomes.