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Industry Collaboration Index

Industry Collaboration Index 2026 · University profile

Seoul National University

South Korea · Asia-Pacific · Platinum

★ Sector Awards 2026. Winner: the Batteries and Energy Storage Award (with Samsung; Kisuk Kang and Dongmin Im). Finalist: the Semiconductors and Microelectronics Award (with Samsung; Youn Sang Kim and Hyun‐Jae Na); the Next-Generation Communications Award (with Samsung; Jungsuek Oh and Sang‐Hyuk Wi); the Advanced Materials and Nanotechnology Award (with Samsung; Min Hyuk Park and Duk‐Hyun Choe).

#18World rank of 1,038
84.6ICI scoreout of 100
#1National rank, of 28 in South Korea
#5Regional rank, of 343 in Asia-Pacific
3,999Verified industry works, 2021 to 2025
839Company groups worked with (317 on two or more works)

Seoul National University is ranked #18 of 1,038, with Platinum standing. Its strongest pillar is durability (99): 109 of its company groups are sustained partners (five or more joint works in three or more of the five years). It is held back most by breadth (44): partners concentrated in a few research fields.

Research Collaboration Index 2026: #223 of 1,195, Gold standing · View the RCI profile →

Why this position

Four pillars, as percentiles

Co-creation30% of the score
91

How often it co-authors with companies, compared with what its own mix of research fields would predict; size makes no difference. 3,999 verified works against about 2,491 expected for its fields (1.61 times the expected rate).

Durability20% of the score
99

How much of its industry work sits in sustained partnerships with the same company group. 109 sustained partnerships: five or more joint works in three or more of the five years.

Scale30% of the score
96

The size of its industry network: company groups on two or more works, sustained partnerships, and its place in the worldwide network of universities and companies. 317 company groups on two or more joint works; 109 sustained partnerships.

Breadth20% of the score
44

How varied its partners are, judged by each company's main research field. Measured across the main research fields of all the company groups it worked with.

Each pillar is a percentile among the 1,038 ranked universities: a value of 80 means a higher value than about 80 in every 100 of them. The ICI score (84.6) is the weighted average of the four percentiles. Rank 18 of 1,038 overall; 1 of 28 in South Korea; 5 of 343 in Asia-Pacific. Standing bands: Platinum for ranks 1 to 100, Gold 101 to 300, Silver 301 to 600. How the index is built →

In numbers

The evidence behind the position

6.9%of its 58,308 research works in 2021 to 2025 were co-authored with a verified company
1.61Industry co-authorship rate: 1.61 times what its mix of research fields would predict (3,999 verified works; about 2,491 expected)
109sustained partnerships: the same company group on five or more joint works in three or more of the five years

In South Korea

1 of 28 ranked universities in South Korea

  1. #1 Seoul National University world #18, score 84.6
  2. #2 Sungkyunkwan University world #35, score 80.9
  3. #3 Yonsei University world #47, score 79.5
  4. #4 Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology world #201, score 69.0
  5. #5 University of Ulsan world #209, score 68.3

All ranked universities →   Asia-Pacific: 5 of 343 →

Where it works with industry

Sector strengths

Verified industry works by sector, with its position in each sector ranking. A university is ranked in a sector once it has at least 20 verified works there; sectors with fewer than 50 eligible universities are provisional.

Strongest sector positions

#4 of 220Biotechnology and Advanced Therapies154 verified works in the sector
#17 of 638Pharmaceuticals and Therapeutics1,034 verified works in the sector
#35 of 481Advanced Materials and Nanotechnology244.5 verified works in the sector
Pharmaceuticals and Therapeutics
1,034#17 of 638
Advanced Materials and Nanotechnology
244.5#35 of 481
Biotechnology and Advanced Therapies
154#4 of 220
Artificial Intelligence
119.5#38 of 292
Medical Technology and Digital Health
111#47 of 323
Semiconductors and Microelectronics
84.5#17 of 109
Clean Energy Transition
81.5#49 of 295
Batteries and Energy Storage
81#30 of 126
Advanced Manufacturing and Industry 4.0
75.5#34 of 201
Software, Cloud and Data
73#38 of 167
Next-Generation Communications
59.5#66 of 188
Chemicals, Process and Resources
51#93 of 237
Climate, Environment and Sustainability
46.5#171 of 373
Automotive and Mobility
34#38 of 72
Agriculture and Food Technology
31#109 of 194
Built Environment and Infrastructure
31#127 of 215
Robotics and Autonomous Systems
18ranking withheld (under 10 eligible)
Aerospace and Aviation
11.5under 20 works
Cybersecurity and Digital Trust
9under 20 works
Quantum Technologies
5under 20 works
Space and Satellite Technology
2under 20 works
Not in any of the 21 sectors
1,630counted in the overall index

2,369 of its 3,999 verified industry works fall within the 21 sectors. The rest have research topics that belong to no industry sector (basic science, for example) or are consortium papers with 100 or more authors, which the sector indices leave out; all of them count fully in the overall index.

Who it works with

Company partners, 2021 to 2025

Seoul National University co-authored verified work with 839 company groups, consortium papers aside: 317 of them on two or more works, and 109 as sustained partners.

The largest 12 of its 839 company groups, by joint works

Company groupBased inCompany's main research fieldJoint worksYears with a joint work
SamsungSouth KoreaEngineering8855 of 5
Hyundai MotorsSouth KoreaEngineering181.55 of 5
AstraZenecaUnited KingdomMedicine175.55 of 5
Merck & Co. (MSD)United StatesMedicine1275 of 5
SK GroupSouth KoreaEngineering100.55 of 5
NovartisSwitzerlandMedicine88.55 of 5
Johnson & JohnsonUnited StatesMedicine885 of 5
RocheSwitzerlandMedicine80.55 of 5
SK HynixSouth KoreaEngineering77.55 of 5
PfizerUnited StatesMedicine695 of 5
Pohang Iron and SteelSouth KoreaEngineering61.55 of 5
LGSouth KoreaEngineering615 of 5

A company group brings together a company's subsidiaries and research labs under one name. A work counts half when its only company author also holds a post at this university. Consortium papers with 100 or more authors are left out of this table.

Examples of its work with industry

Most-cited verified joint works

Its most-cited verified works with 30 or fewer authors, leaving out guidelines and consensus statements. Citation counts are those of the open scholarly record at harvest. Each title links to the work.

Over time

Verified industry works by year

726.52021
757.52022
798.52023
834.52024
8822025

2025 is not yet complete: papers published late in the year are still being added to the open record, and coverage may not be equally complete for every university, so compare years with care. A work counts half when its only company author also holds a post at the university, so some totals end in .5.

Clinical trials (reported, not scored)

57 industry-partnered clinical trials

Trials starting 2021 to 2025 in ClinicalTrials.gov in which a company and this university are the sponsor and a collaborator. Names are matched exactly, so a trial registered only under an affiliated hospital's own name is not counted here, and the count can be well below the university's real trial activity. Trials do not enter the score.

Examples:

  • NCT07363278 A Prospective Observational Study Evaluating the Incidence of Silent Cerebral Lesions and Procedural Safety Following Atrial Fibrillation Ablation Using the VARIPULSE™ Pulsed Field Ablation System with Biosense Webster, Inc., 2025
  • NCT07297524 CRESCENDO: ChildREn's muSiC ENhancement in Cochlear Implant Users with BELL Therapeutics Inc., 2025
  • NCT06845553 A Study to Assess the Efficacy and Safety of Vutiglabridin in Knee Osteoarthritis Patients with Glaceum, 2025
  • NCT07266415 Study for Pregnant Women With Insomnia Using Sleep Inducing Digital Sound Application with BELL Therapeutics Inc., 2025
  • NCT07828080 Clinical Outcomes of Primary Cementless Total Hip Arthroplasty Using the Collarless Actis Stem with Johnson & Johnson Medical Korea Ltd, 2025
  • NCT06868186 A Multicenter Study of RUS NE with Hutom Corp, 2025

Funded partnerships (reported, not scored)

Publicly funded research projects with companies

European Union: 7 Horizon projects with company partners

Horizon 2020 and Horizon Europe projects starting 2021-2025 in which this university and at least one company take part (35 distinct companies). Company partners include: Arcelormittal Maizieres Research, Aim Future, Inc, Almatis GmbH, Calderys Deutschland GmbH, CS Group - Romania Srl, Elkem Silicon Product Development AS.

  • INTEND Intent-based data operation in the computing continuum 2024, 11 companies
  • Swarmchestrate Application-level Swarm-based Orchestration Across the Cloud-to-Edge Continuum 2024, 4 companies
  • PREPARED Pro-active Pandemic Crisis Ethics and Integrity Framework 2022, 1 company

Shown for context from the public grant registries; they do not enter the score in Edition 1. Comparable open registries of company partners exist for the European Union and the United Kingdom but not yet for most other research systems, and in some countries national research organisations take part on behalf of university laboratories, so these counts are not comparable between countries.

Funded and co-publishing. Of the funded company partners that match an ICI company group, 4 also appear in this university's verified co-authorship record (Intel [group I1343180700], Tata Steel, Ericsson, Fluxim) and 9 are funded partners not yet visible in it. About 37% of funded company names could be matched to a company group; the rest are counted, not guessed. Sources: UKRI Gateway to Research harvested 4 Oct 2026; CORDIS bulk files of 2026-10-12 (latest record update 2026-06-10). Funded partnerships cover UK (UKRI Gateway to Research) and EU (Horizon 2020 and Horizon Europe, CORDIS) projects starting 2021 to 2025 only. They are reported, never scored, and a funder record outside these two sources is not visible here.

Evidence checked

5,860 verified company links

Each counted link (one work, this university and one company) was confirmed against the affiliation text its author wrote; 2,127 of 7,987 candidate links were set aside.

Why links were set aside
  • 1,147 company name not written in the author's affiliation
  • 360 part of a university or public institute's own unit
  • 328 ordinary-word name without a company suffix
  • 77 a place or common word that failed its stricter rule
  • 25 a funding or conflict-of-interest statement
  • 24 excluded after hand audit: General Atomics' evidence here is almost entirely from DIII-D and inertial-fusion work it performs as operator of US government facilities; treated as a contractor-operated government laboratory, like Leidos Biomedical Research
  • 166 for other reasons: smaller hand-audit findings, and links the current open record no longer supports

If a partner is missing or should not be here, send the evidence; corrections are free and reviewed against the public record.

For your communications

Badges you can use

Platinum standing badgeSector Awards finalist badgeSector Awards winner badge (Batteries and Energy Storage)

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GRP Partnership Intelligence Platform

Where Seoul National University's collaboration could go next

This profile is free and public, and it stays that way. Beyond it, the GRP Partnership Intelligence Platform, a partner service arranged with each university, sets your record in both GRP indices beside the peers you choose: the universities and companies your peers work with that you do not, live funding calls matched to your strengths, the EU projects your peers have won, and a brief ready for your executive. It opens to partner universities on Monday 19 October 2026: enquire, and the GRP team will confirm availability and pricing for your university.

Request first access →  See what is inside →

The platform cannot move any university's position, band or score.

The other GRP index

Research Collaboration Index

In the Research Collaboration Index 2026, Seoul National University ranks #223 of 1,195, with Gold standing. It measures the whole research network, not only industry.

View the RCI profile →

Something wrong? Every figure comes from the public record and can be checked. If a partner is missing or should not be there, tell us and we will review it with the evidence. The 2027 edition will be calculated with the same published methodology. The window for universities to submit data for it is open now: submit data for the 2027 edition. 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.