The Leiden-Delft-Erasmus alliance is showing good signs of success among the top 100 most innovative European universities. The three universities are the highest-scoring Dutch universities in the ranking produced by Thomson Reuters.
The ranking of Europe’s most innovative universities has been compiled by Clarivate Analytics (formerly the Intellectual Property & Science business of Thomson Reuters) and it has been published this year for the second time. The position in the ranking is determined at least in part by the number of scientific articles published and the number of patents that a university has applied for over the past year (the minimum number is 50).
TU Delft is in eighth place in the list, Leiden University in 17th place and Erasmus University in 32nd place, making the LDE partner universities the highest-ranking Dutch universities in the innovative top 100. KU Leuven, which has one of the largest research and development institutions in the world, heads the list for the second year in succession. The KU currently has 586 active patents, each of which is valid in several different countries.
Leiden University was one of the biggest climbers since last year’s list was published, rising from 38th position to 17th. One surprising result is that the TU Eindhoven has fallen from the list this year: the university applied for fewer than fifty patents in 2016. In general the list is not very different from last year, which the compilers regard as logical. It is unlikely that output such as publications and patents will fluctuate year on year.
The full ranking and how it was compiled van be viewed at Reuters.