Recent debates in mass media related to education and research seem to reflect a sense of unsuccessful application of the huge accumulation of knowledge to society. Universities do not necessary provide answers to actual problems encountered in business or industry, but should indicate how to solve them. In other words, universities offer knowledge along with method to convert knowledge to wisdom. Lack of information exchange between academic and business circles prevents the conversion of knowledge to wisdom and vice versa : they are inseparable from each other. The task of the conversion, by no means an easy one, should be addressed by all involved in research.

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The mechanisms and implications of two phenomena concerning the university and the professionals are discussed : (i) emergence of a new kind of professionals responsible for collaboration with the industry beyond the capacity of traditional teaching and office staff, and (ii) creation of new graduate schools for legal and business professionals. Review of their present circumstances and analysis of their growth processes show that both the phenomena are necessity in strengthening social linkage of the modern universities. These trends are significant in that they prepare a road to formation of organizations of the professionals as a social basis for knowledge production, whose absence has been an important weakness of the traditional Japanese society dominated by individual-corporation relationship based on lifelong employment.

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In this paper I surveyed career paths and academic backgrounds of licensing specialists in Technology Licensing Offices (TLOs) of US universities and institutes. Many of them were the "Multi-major talents" who has both degrees in science-related and business-related fields. Next I analyzed the recruitment strategies of the universities and institutes surveyed. It was shown that the three types, 1) focusing on legal experience as NIH's OTT, 2) Focusing on young Ph.D. as UCSF and 3) Not referring to degrees as Stanford, was seen in TLOs of US universities and institutes yielding large licensing income. The interview of administrators of those offices was consistent with the data accumulated in this study. According to these results, I examined how to train the specialists for university-industry collaboration and technology transfer in Japan.

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The formation of local scientific and technological platforms are expected to promote local area activities through technological innovation, to improve the quality of life of residents, and to lead to higher science and technology levels throughout Japan via diverse science and technology developments. For this regional specific formation of scientific and technological platforms to be successful, local research cooperation needs to be promoted beyond boundaries between disciplines and organizations. As well, a new system of research coordination based on the needs of the local community is needed. Against this background, plans such as determining research and local needs, assigning priorities to core research and developments, combining local needs with research seeds, and cooperative research projects need to be implemented to promote local governments coordination of research programs. Simultaneously, industry-academia-government collaboration should be strengthened to promote the development of science and technology, and the creation of new industries and technologies by utilizing programs instituted by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT, former by the Science and Technology Agency) and the Japan Science and Technology Corporation. In Okayama prefecture, the Okayama Industrial Promotion Foundation that I have been involved in, which has been selected by the Japan Science and Technology Corporation as a designated agency in Okayama, has implemented the "Regional Science Promotion Program with network construction (RSP program)" . For 4 years from 1997 to 2000, the RSP program cultivated the interests of industry, connected the needs to the seeds in academic areas, and coordinated research project teams through feasibility studies (FS), with the intention to construct a network of researchers involved in these activities. This report is summarized based on the approaches adopted during those 7-8 years and outlines the outcomes.

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Public research institutes (PRIs) are increasingly creating mechanisms for collaboration with academia and industry, potentially stimulating debates on the linkage between and responsibilities of PRIs and universities in the industry-academia-government collaboration scheme. Iwate Prefecture, with the wellknown Iwate Network System serving as a platform for industry-academia-government collaboration centered on the university, provides a case in point. This paper describes the present situation of the collaboration as well as the activities of Iwate Industrial Research Institute, and discusses its role in the collaboration and human resources needed, with the author himself as an example. The following propositions are made : (i) PRIs need liaisons, as those in universities, for optimizing exploitation of its resources. (ii) With its focus on commercialization of research results, PRIs can utilize university research outcomes to support a whole project ranging from the research to production phases through their liaisons for the collaboration. (iii) These activities enable PRIs to train people for the collaboration. (iv) The ever-increasing importance of industry-academia-government collaboration requires, however, education and training in more systematic programs involving the national government, prefectural authorities and industry supporting organizations.

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National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) was started 3 years ago. It established the technology transfer policy in which technology transfer was decided as duty of researchers. Collaboration department was set with over 100 staffs. Collaboration scheme was improved drastically, for example, incentive to researchers is 25% of license fee rewarded with no upper limit and entrusted research is acceptable flexibly and promptly. These improvements resulted in extreme increase of entrusted research and license fee. Collaboration coordinators at AIST mainly work for matching of needs from outside and research seeds of AIST using their humannetwork. The coordinator is required the sense of speed and sincerity. The maintenance of the number of talented coordinator will be the problem at AIST in future.

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The characteristics, working environment and role of coordinators in middle-scale local universities, responsible for industry-academia-government collaboration, are described, along with tasks for the universities in such collaboration as well as their present activities. The circumstances of Gifu University were reviewed to identify the role expected and specific tasks to play it. Willingness of the university staff and proactive information disclosure are prerequisites for the collaboration. Actions taken for publicity included brochures about the university staff and industry-academia-government collaboration, newsletters, lectures at public agencies, and visits to local industrial sites. Efforts were made to exploit given situation and human resources as efficiently as possible. Specifically for site visits, a new platform was created for cooperation with local financing bodies. This series of campaign contributed to increase in collaborative research contracts from 84 in 2001 to 160 in 2002 to 177 in 2003. The key to the success was willingness and cooperation of people involved, showing the importance of human connection.

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Although a variety of cases for coordinators in the industry-academia-government collaboration scheme are presented in this issue, their activities are restricted, as a matter of course, by specific policies that led to their appointments. This paper describes coordinators in the industry as a complementary party in the scene, exemplified by four firms : Sangaku Kyodo System, Venturelabo, IBLC and Knowledge Management, and explores features of their business model. Since the university reform, including the status change of national universities to "independent administrative corporations", will enhance industry-academia-government collaboration scheme, success of the coordinator businesses depends on the consistency of the evolution of their business model with that trend, as well as competence of personnel involved. Coordinators in the private sector will hopefully play an important role in the progress of the collaboration by filling the gap between the public and private sectors.

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Cases of successful product development processes in Japanese electronics firms were analyzed and the R&D Flow & Stock Diagram describing the development processes was derived. The analysis revealed the followings : 1. The sense of crisis is one of the major motivations to initiate a development project, 2. A concrete decision action is needed to actually ignite the project, 3. Another concrete decision action is needed to commercialize the developed result, 4. The product-specific technology is vital for eventual success of the project, 5. A person possessing strong will plays key roles in the project execution.

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