The ethics of industry collaboration in transformational entrepreneurship: the case of an industry-funded student team at TU/e

Student teams work on technical or societal problems, supported by both their university and industry partners. Ideally, such teams allow students to work independently on challenges they are passionate about, apply their newly acquired technical and scientific knowledge and build a professional network. However, ethical questions exist about the nature of the collaborations these teams enter and develop. Some may depend entirely on one major company for funding, giving it significant leverage in determining the set-up and goals of the student team. Financial and non-financial incentives may induce student teams to act as subsidiary organisations of the funding company. Since student teams are also associated with the university, there are dangers that the terms of collaboration are not in the university’s favour, the project is affected by irresponsible activities of the student team, or external interests undermine the university’s autonomy. We discuss the case of a student team at Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e). This student team was solely funded by one international company, which determined the set-up of the student team, its activities and goals, as well as its leadership. The company is a powerful international corporation, and serious concerns exist about its activities’ legitimacy. In the paper, we describe this case and aim to analyse the ethical considerations underlying the advice of a university committee not to recognise it as an official student team.