What does the Laffitte Bill have in store ?

• Pierre LAFFITTE
  Senator and reporter of government
  
• Pascal IRIS
  Director, the association 'Armines'
  

Summary

The relationships between public research and private companies are acknowledged to be at the heart of the present economic growth and innovative development. However, the French institutional system has been curbing interactions between research and industry. State-employed researchers were not legally entitled to benefit from the results of their research or to be involved in the creation of private companies which would develop this research. Joint research efforts could only be carried out thanks to ingenious but unstable partnerships with associations. The bill proposed by Senator Pierre Laffitte, which came into being in July 1999, aims to put an end definitively to this situation. Will it manage to do this ? Whether it does or not, this bill raises many questions about the nature of the interaction between public research and the market, as well as the legal context which exists and which may stimulate interaction.

Summary translated from French by Rachel MARLIN.

• The entire article was written by Blanche SEGRESTIN.

To obtain this article, you can :

• download it for free in French (PDF help) or contact ecopar@paris.ensmp.fr (Reference RT241199).

The entire article appears in French in the Journal de l'École de Paris du management N° 23.