Basic research — Who pays it?

Very often people and in particular politicians and leaders in industry blame universities to disregard innovation processes and entrepreneurship. Mostly these critics are based on the (historic) “linear model” of innovation which starts with an idea and, finally, leading directly to an (industrial) product on the market which will be a guaranty for jobs and competitiveness. In this presentation the importance of so called “unapplied” research or in other words basic research at universities is discussed. However, even everybody recognises the importance of basic research when it comes to funding one tries to shift the responsibility to another entity. The role of the universities in the in innovation processes in particular the contribution to the transformation from information to knowledge as well as the education of critical thinking graduates are emphasized. Furthermore suggestions of ideas to improve the relation between industry and university will be presented. Finally, politics is challenged to improve the understanding for universities which should be considered just as a production line for graduates, PhDs and scientific papers. Universities can and do more than that for our society and industry.