wary! Rewards for the transformation of scientific and technological achievements are now "comparing the wind"

Reporter Tian Ruiying

Not less than 50%, is the lower limit of the reward ratio for the transformation of scientific and technological achievements stipulated after the revision of the Law of the People's Republic of China on Promoting the Transformation of Scientific and Technological Achievements (hereinafter referred to as the Law on Promoting the Transformation of Scientific and Technological Achievements). In the case of "no capping", some universities and research institutes have the phenomenon of "comparison" of the proportion of awards. To a certain extent, this atmosphere of "labor competition" has affected the normal transformation work of other units, so that scientific researchers have a mentality of "not suffering from widowhood but suffering from inequality".

Why is there a trend of "comparison" in the proportion of rewards for the transformation of scientific and technological achievements? Should there be a harmonization of specific reward criteria? What other outstanding problems are faced in the process of reward landing? To this end, China Science News interviewed a number of professionals who have long been engaged in the transformation of scientific and technological achievements.

The transformation of scientific and technological achievements should not change the original intention

"Why is the reward ratio of our unit not as high as that of other units?" At present, most universities and scientific research institutes give scientific and technological research personnel a reward ratio of 70% to 80%, but some units will increase the proportion to more than 90%. This makes many researchers start to mutter: their achievements transformation benefits are "lost" due to different unit policies.

Chen Baiqiang, director of the Technology Transfer Center of Beijing Institute of Technology, said in an interview with China Science News that the original intention of implementing the reward for the transformation of scientific and technological achievements is to mobilize the enthusiasm of scientific researchers and promote scientific and technological innovation and achievement transformation. In the actual implementation process, some units overemphasize personal economic interests, coupled with the rendering of some media, the transformation of scientific and technological achievements has become a simple problem of scientists getting rich to a certain extent.

He believes that we should create a good public opinion, encourage the majority of scientific researchers to carry forward the spirit of scientists, and take the realization of scientific research value as the core and primary pursuit of the transformation of scientific and technological achievements.

"Looking at a number of typical cases in the field of achievement transformation in recent years, an important common point is to serve the urgent needs of the country and the industry through transformation, rather than putting personal interests first." Chen Baiqiang believes that "getting rich" is a natural product of the successful transformation of scientific and technological achievements, rather than the starting point for the implementation of the transformation of achievements.

Qiu Fan (pseudonym), who has long been engaged in the transformation of scientific and technological achievements in scientific research institutes, told China Science News that the way to only stipulate the lower limit of the reward ratio is both principled and flexible, but the reward ratio is arbitrarily increased, even close to 100%, at the same time, some units will simply increase the proportion of rewards as a policy breakthrough point to publicize, behind which reflects a phenomenon of comparison.

"Practice has proved that the revised Law on Promoting the Transformation of Scientific and Technological Achievements has indeed increased the proportion of rewards to a certain extent, and compared with before 2015, whether it is the transfer, licensing or the amount and amount of investment in scientific and technological achievements from 2016 to 2018, there has been a relatively large increase nationwide." Liu Qunyan, director of the Technology Transfer Office of Shanghai Jiao Tong University, told China Science News.

However, he also pointed out that without considering the premise of the actual situation in the region and the unit, arbitrarily raising the reward standard, ignoring the subjective initiative of management, service agencies and other entities, without distinguishing between the transformation attributes and incentive characteristics of cash income and share income, it also led to the phenomenon of "comparison bubble" of conversion income.

Song Qi, general manager of the Technology Transfer Center of Peking University Science and Technology Park, believes that in the short term, the extremely high proportion of rewards can stimulate and encourage the transfer and transformation to a certain extent; but in the long run, it will hurt the interests of other relevant parties and lead to an imbalance between rights and responsibilities.

Is harmonization of standards feasible?

In view of the current trend of proportional rewards for the transformation of scientific and technological achievements, some people in the industry have explored whether they can be solved by formulating unified and specific reward standards.

Gao Wen, director of the Achievement Transformation Department of the Industrial Operation and Management Center of Capital Medical University, told China Science News that the Beijing Municipal Regulations on Promoting the Transformation of Scientific and Technological Achievements allows colleges and universities to increase the proportion of income distribution of scientific and technological achievements transformation to no less than 70%. At present, most universities in Beijing have formulated a 70% reward standard, "if the standard is unified within the region, it will help alleviate the phenomenon of comparison to a certain extent."

Song Qi said that the distribution of benefits is an economic issue, which should be based on the division of labor contributions, appropriately oriented, and the current standard of not less than 50% is intended to mobilize the initiative of the team of scientists.

"Due to the large differences in the level of economic development throughout the country, the development concept and policy implementation of scientific and technological innovation are different, the degree of attention paid by various types of innovative entities to basic research and applied research is different, and the maturity of scientific and technological achievements is also very different, therefore, the Law on Promoting the Transformation of Scientific and Technological Achievements stipulates that standards are set by themselves, which is conducive to stimulating the innovation initiative of different innovative entities and setting different reward and incentive standards according to the actual situation." Liu Qunyan said.

In his view, although setting standards on his own will cause problems such as comparison, setting a unified reward standard may also lead to a situation of "unification is dead". For example, the focus of scientific research in different universities is quite different, and for economically underdeveloped areas or universities that focus on basic research, a higher proportion of reward standards are conducive to encouraging researchers to increase the intensity of applied research and realize the transfer of science and technology to market applications. In addition, the realization cycle of the economic value of different types of scientific and technological achievements is different, and the unified reward and incentive standards may not fully adapt to the characteristics of the transformation of achievements.

In this regard, Liu Qunyan suggested that the relevant state departments can adopt the method of issuing guidance opinions to carry out the guidance of rewards and incentives in different categories. For example, for the cash income of the transfer and licensing of science and engineering universities, under the premise of completely completing the project by the scientific researchers, the scientific researchers can be rewarded and incentivized with 70% of the guiding standards, and at the same time, with reference to the management measures for technology research and development, technical consulting, and technical service funds, under the premise that the indirect funds of the unit are not reduced, part of the pre-research funds are reserved to support the continuous research and development of scientific researchers; if the technology transfer institutions contribute, they can pay the fees according to the service agreement before the allocation according to the transformation cost (in 10-30%) according to the allocation of the cost. The scale interval is more reasonable).

Qiu Fan believes that the transformation of scientific and technological achievements is a complex system engineering, scientific research units and their related scientific and technological achievements transfer and transformation departments have played a key role, only the balance of interests, is a reasonable reward, in order to make the transformation of scientific and technological achievements "cake".

He suggested that on the basis of the current practice of setting reward standards on its own, systematic research and evaluation of the effectiveness of the transformation of scientific and technological achievements should be carried out, and more reasonable and conducive to the transformation of Scientific and technological achievements in China should be formulated through actual data.

"Setting a lower limit for rewards and leaving room for adjustment is conducive to each unit to formulate personalized plans based on their own conditions, combine other initiatives to play a 'combination fist', and realize the innovation of models and mechanisms." Chen Baiqiang said, "At present, the transformation service system and ecological system construction of China's scientific and technological achievements are still in the development stage, and the understanding of the policies by managers and researchers in many universities is not deep. With the gradual deepening of the understanding of the law of the transformation of scientific and technological achievements, it is believed that there will be more incentive policies in line with China's actual situation, and a virtuous circle of win-win results and unified responsibilities and rights will be built. ”

Explore new asset management approaches

After the policy is formulated, it is more necessary to implement, and according to the reporter's understanding, there are still many blockages and pain points in the current distribution of rewards for the transformation of scientific and technological achievements in the process of landing.

Gao Wen told reporters that at present, many colleges and universities have encountered the embarrassing phenomenon of conflicting with the policies of other departments of the school when carrying out the work of awarding and distributing the transformation of scientific and technological achievements. On the one hand, it is difficult for the transformation policy of scientific and technological achievements to be "thoroughly" eaten by all departments; on the other hand, in the specific implementation process, the policy methods referred to by different departments are not the same.

He believes that the process of awarding the transformation of scientific and technological achievements should be determined by the department or institution specifically responsible for the transformation of scientific and technological achievements according to the unit system, without the need for multiple different departments to participate in decision-making.

"The scientific and technological achievements of universities and scientific research institutes are different from the management of other state-owned assets, and more have the characteristics of 'phased achievements' of scientific research; and the requirements of the financial management system at this stage such as bookkeeping and write-off of accounts do not conform to the law of the transformation of scientific and technological achievements." Liu Qunyan told reporters.

Chen Baiqiang believes that scientific and technological achievements belong to state-owned assets, which are different from other traditional state-owned assets such as tables, chairs, benches, etc., and need to be managed by classification. To this end, he suggested that, in view of the whole process of the transformation of scientific and technological achievements, a set of technical state-owned asset management methods should be specially formulated, from the form of intellectual property rights to the form of equity formed by investment at a price, from the disposal of state-owned assets to the assessment of value preservation and appreciation, and a set of special management methods that conform to the law of the transformation of scientific and technological achievements should be formed. Correspondingly, the transformation of scientific and technological achievements should be a professional institution's whole process through management, rather than multiple departments to manage a section, so as to effectively improve the efficiency of transformation and implementation, and ensure the implementation of reform policies.

In Qiu Fan's view, there is a cross-agency and cross-departmental formulation and management of the reward policy for the transformation of scientific and technological achievements, and it is not uncommon for policies to conflict. The "Notice on Issues Related to the Inclusion of Cash Rewards for the Transformation of Scientific and Technological Achievements in Scientific and Technological Achievements of Public Institutions into performance pay management" issued not long ago has solved some problems in the conflict between policy and actual operation, and it is hoped that more similar multi-departmental jointly issued incentive operation rules will be issued in the future.

In addition to the asset management of scientific and technological achievements transformation awards, Song Qi also pointed out the difficulties in other practical processes, such as whether the incentive is "first award and then investment" or "first investment and then award", how technology transfer institutions can establish three major work systems of "management, service and business" in colleges and universities. "On the whole, in recent years, the 'loosening' of laws and policies has been very strong and thorough, and the orientation is very obvious, but there are still many ways to go in the actual implementation process."

Source: China Science Daily