Industry-university interactions in a peripheral European region: an empirical study of Valencian firms, Regional Studies. In this paper the interactions among industry and academic staff in the Mediterranean Spanish Region of Valencia are analysed. The information comes from the manufacturing firm survey about industry-university (I-U) collaboration carried out in 2001 by the Valencian administration. The findings show that the factors that had the most influence on I-U interaction are those related to firms§ structural characteristics, in particular managers§ qualifications and the sector of activity. Firm size was less of an influence. Firms prefer interactions related to the training of students and education of personnel rather than performance of contract research and development (R&D) and joint R&D projects.