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The aim of this article is to shed light on the decision-making process at university technology transfer offices and show that the last steps in the process of international patent extension, when costs step up, tend to be only taken conditional on the existence of a licensing agreement. This information has so far been underexploited by policymakers and innovation scholars in search of innovation indicators. We argue that the number of international patent families filed by a university can be used as a rough indicator of technology transfer activity mediated through patents, especially in the context of tight public university budgets and national patent systems with fee reductions for universities. To support our argument, we review qualitative information from interviews at technology transfer offices, regulations, and internal statutes from a selection of Spanish universities and present a statistical analysis of the relation between patent internationalisation and licensing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]