The Contrasting Perceptions and the Cause Regarding Patenting Technologies Between Academic Medical Researchers and Pharmaceutical Companies Based in Japan

BACKGROUND: The recent trend of pharmaceutical companies commercializing new objects as new drugs based on the findings of academic medical researchers, commonly categorizing them as “academic drug discovery” is increasingly gaining popularity in the pharmaceutical industry. Studies state that academic researchers based in universities have lower motivation to apply for patents. However, none of the studies evaluated the existence and extent of the “motivation for patent” in academic researchers, being lower than that of pharmaceutical companies. This study assesses two hypotheses; H1: academic medical researchers are less likely to believe that the patent system is necessary for pharmaceuticals, and thus have diminished interest in the commercialization of their research findings when compared to those in the pharmaceutical industry, H2: apprehension of the raison d’être of the patent system affects positive impressions on patents among academic medical researchers. METHODS: From February to March 2020, an anonymous survey was conducted among academic medical researchers, pharmaceutical industry professionals, and IP researchers based in Japan. Overall response rate was 27.4% (192/700). We conducted an analysis of variance for H1 and used the PLS-SEM model for H2 in order to verify the hypotheses. RESULTS: The results confirmed that the mean calculated from the responses of the academic medical researchers was significantly lower than the mean of pharmaceutical company personnel when responses to patenting an emerging technology or drug for the advancement of medicine were analyzed. In addition, we found that a causal relationship between academic medical researchers’ understanding of patents and their positive impressions on patents, depending on the degree to which they consider that the patent system is to encourage and promote new inventions. CONCLUSION: We conclude that a contrasting perception of patents not only exists between academic medical researchers and pharmaceutical company personnel but also it is caused by their apprehension of patents. More efforts to promote the raison d’être of the patent system among academic medical researchers will enable them to view pharmaceutical patents in a more positive light. Through this study, the pertinence to promote academic drug discoveries has been uncovered.