Abstract
It is important for government policy in Japan to promote partnerships between SMEs and universities, and the number of such partnerships has been increasing recently. However the number of SMEs having partnerships with universities has not been estimated, and the proportions of such SMEs to the total SMEs estimated in previous research are various. This research conducted statistical analysis and a survey by questionnaire focusing on joint research, and estimated the number of SMEs which conduct joint research with universities was 2.4 thousand, which was about 25% of the total number of SMEs conducting R&D. Such collaborative SMEs has been increasing by about 190 per year on average recently, including firms initiating R&D activities for the first time when participating in joint research with universities. Moreover, we examined future measures to promote joint research between SMEs and universities.
