Abstract
The chapter explores the current idea of building development strategies for EU regions around smart specialisation, assigning universities a significant role. The purpose is to improve the hitherto limited effects of EU funding of R&D on the competitiveness of European industry through specialisation in research, science–industrial relations and conversion processes. We ask whether part of the problem lies not in the lack of specialisation but rather in the way universities and their knowledge interact (or not) with industry. Furthermore, would this improve (or worsen) with a greater division of science between regions? A case study of one university considered to be successful in respect of the science–industry nexus indicates that professors, researchers and brokers cooperating in entrepreneurial manners with the industry all combined an intimate knowledge of subject matter and context of use on both sides of the bonds and bridges they went into. Structural explanations are posited of this knowledge transfer as the handling of an object against a deeper understanding of the essential role of knowledge conversion as a socio-cognitive process. Suggestions are made for what universities in other settings might learn from this exercise about developing their role in smart specialisation.