Fifth, the role of intellectual property was contentious in our interviews, as has been previously noted (Ferguson, 2014). Recent decades have seen a decided policy focus in North America and beyond on encouraging academics to patent with the goal of augmenting translation and university funding (Nicol, 2008). However, there is little consistent evidence to support this model’s effectiveness (Kenney and Patton, 2009; Williams, 2017). Open science at the institutional level offers the potential for faster dissemination of academic outputs, greater leverage of research investments, and an emphasis on universities as hubs for knowledge generation and dissemination (Nicol, 2008). At the same time, open science is expected to promote the local innovation ecosystem by spreading socio-economic impact (Gold, 2016). Thus, the seeming conflict between commercialization and open science agendas may be more apparent than real. Exploration at the interface of these two streams is needed to clarify how they may cross-pollinate to maximize equity, justice and efficiency in exacting research benefits.