A study of economic utility resulting from CERN contracts

This study attempts to quantify the technical and economic benefits to the manufacturing industries involved in CERN contracts in relation to the expenditures on CERN by its member states. Interviews were carried out in some 130 European firms, which supplied data on estimates of increased sales and decreased costs due to CERN contracts. This economic utility totals 1665 million Swiss francs (MSF) (up to the year 1978) compared with a sales value to CERN of 394 MSF. Utility/sales ratios range from 0.9 to 7.3 for application fields of cables, magnets, cooling systems, vacuum equipment, electronics, and steel; they are as high as 17.3 for computers and 31.6 for precision mechanics. Some 80 percent of the total reported utility results from sales to markets outside high-energy and nuclear physics, for example, railways, shipbuilding, refrigeration, power generation, and power distribution. For the 877 MSF spent by CERN in European industry from its overall budget of 3500 MSF during 1955 to 1973, the total utility is estimated to be nearly 5000 MSF. The method and procedure of analysis and quantification are discussed in detail and some specific cases are presented as examples.