In the 90’s Swiss universities developed a professional framework to support both cooperation with the private sector and the commercialization of research results. Since then, these institutions have made significant advances, showing very good performance within international competitions.

Notably, the Global Competitiveness Report 2006-2007 of the World Economic Forum (resp. IMD competitiveness yearbook 2007) ranks Switzerland FIRST worldwide with regard to collaborations between academic institutions and industry (resp. Knowledge Transfer)