The Role of Informal Collaboration and Technology Transfer between Higher Education Institutions and the Local SMEs an International Case

This qualitative-exploratory study aims to discover and understand the degree of propensity, characteristics, academic expectations, and type of collaboration in the area of information technologies that have been informally transferred from the faculty in local public universities to Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in Nuevo Laredo, Tamaulipas, México and Laredo, Texas, USA. The purpose of this research is to describe the characteristics and understand the reasons of faculty members who engage in this kind of informal collaboration in information technology transfer at the regional SMEs.