Spin-out companies created from university research tend to attract more external investment if their founders come from a Russell Group institution, results from the latest Knowledge Exchange Framework (KEF) suggest.

New data??show institutions within the 24-strong group of research-intensive universities performed most strongly on intellectual property (IP) and commercialisation when institutions were measured on average external investment per spin-out surviving at least three years.

On this metric, only 12 universities finished in the top 20 per cent of institutions for ¡°engagement¡± in all categories used by the KEF.

These institutions were: Imperial College London, King¡¯s College London, Newcastle University, Queen Mary University of London, UCL and the universities of Bristol, Cambridge, Leeds, Manchester, Oxford, Sheffield and Southampton.

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On graduate start-ups, however, modern universities outperformed older more research-intensive universities. Only one Russell Group university (the London School of Economics) was ranked in the top quintile for graduate start-ups as a proportion of the total full-time student cohort, whereas 17 post-1992 universities finished in the top 20 per cent of all institutions on this metric.

These institutions include Birmingham City University, De Montfort University,? Falmouth University, Kingston University, London Metropolitan University, and the universities of Chichester, East London, Huddersfield, Lincoln, Plymouth and Westminster.

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Several specialist institutions also feature in the top quintile for graduate start-ups including the? Royal Central School of Speech and Drama. Royal College of Art, Royal College of Music and Royal Northern College of Music, as well as Arts University Bournemouth and Arts University Plymouth.

Unlike the Research Excellence Framework, the KEF does not allow for an overall ranking of institutions based on its judging criteria. These are: research partnerships, working with business, working with the public and third sector, continuing professional development (CPD) and graduate start-ups, local growth and regeneration, IP and commercialisation and public and community engagement.

Institutions are instead placed into quintiles based on their performance against certain metrics. Now in its fifth year, the KEF has been billed by Research England as shining a light on how different universities collaborate with businesses, communities and public services.

Neither does the KEF inform funding decisions although discussions on whether this should happen are ongoing.

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Since KEF2 in 2022, the framework has used a stable methodology, now enabling universities to compare four years of results, said Research England.

The body highlighted how the Royal Northern College of Music has managed to move up from the lowest score of 1 to the highest of 5 on the CPD and graduate start-ups criterion, while Queen Mary University of London has improved from a score of 1 to 3.

In IP and commercialisation, the University of Portsmouth has improved from a score of 3 to the highest of 5.

jack.grove@timeshighereducation.com