Industry Collaboration Index · Edition 1 · 2026
On 15 October, Global Research Partnerships publishes the Industry Collaboration Index: how much, how durably, how widely and how broadly 1,192 research universities work with industry, from the open scholarly record. Every one of 1,966,368 candidate university and company links has been checked against the affiliation its authors actually wrote; the 937,119 that could not be confirmed were set aside before a single score was calculated.
What it measures
The Research Collaboration Index shows who universities work with across the research world. The Industry Collaboration Index asks the next question: which universities actually co-author research with industry, with whom, in which sectors, and for how long.
How much of the university's research is written with a verified company, compared with what its own mix of fields would predict. Size does not matter here.
How much of its industry work sits in sustained partnerships: company groups with five or more joint works, active in at least three of the five years.
The size of its industry network: how many company groups it works with, how many sustained partnerships it holds, and its position in the worldwide university and company network.
How varied its industry partners are, measured across the companies' own main fields of research.
Sealed until launch
Every ranked university's position, rank range and four pillars; every sector index; and up to ten finalist partnerships in each of 22 award categories. Published at 09:00 BST, Thursday 15 October 2026.
The Sector Awards 2026
The Global Industry Partnership of the Year and one award for each of 21 sectors, each with up to ten finalist partnerships represented by an academic and an industry researcher who wrote a cited paper together. The finalists and the winner in each category are announced with the index at 09:00 BST, Thursday 15 October 2026; winners are decided by the data alone.
The categories and the rules →21 sectors
The Research Collaboration Index is live now. Every university profile will link to both.
Independence. The index is free, public and independent. No commercial relationship with any university or company changes any position, and no one can pay to be included, excluded or moved.