KU Leuven Research & Development — Europe's Longest-Running University Tech-Transfer Office

KU Leuven Research & Development (LRD) was established in 1972, making it one of the first university technology-transfer offices in Europe, responsible for patenting, licensing and spinning out companies from KU Leuven research.

In 2025 alone, LRD generated 3,142 new industry collaboration agreements, 102 new patents and €152.6 million in licence income; 10 new spin-off companies were launched that year, bringing the cumulative total to 199 since the early 1980s. During 2002–2023, KU Leuven spin-offs collectively attracted more than €2.1 billion in external investment, with a reported 78% five-year survival rate.

Independent validation: Reuters (via Clarivate Analytics) ranked KU Leuven first on its 'Europe's Most Innovative Universities' list for four consecutive years starting in 2016. Per the World Economic Forum's coverage of the methodology, Clarivate screened over 600 institutions down to those filing at least 50 WIPO patents between 2012–2017, then scored the finalists on 10 metrics, with patent-citation impact — how often KU Leuven's patents are cited in other institutions' filings — cited as a key differentiator.

Caution: an external ranking built on patent volume and citation counts rewards institutions with large, well-resourced tech-transfer bureaucracies and does not itself measure the societal impact, research quality or commercial success of individual spin-offs; no equity or inclusion data on founders was found in either source.

Read the full analysis: https://research.kuleuven.be/en/policy-figures/facts-figures/research-figures