Fuentek will be in New Orleans for AUTM 2015. You can find us at Booth #202 and in two sessions: Best Practices to Maximize Potential on a Small Campus – Monday at 10:30am (Track A) and All Aboard! Getting Faculty on the SRA Train – Monday at 3:30pm (Track C).

Since last summer, I’ve had the privilege to serve on North Carolina Governor Pat McCrory’s Innovation-to-Jobs (I2J) Working Group, whose recommendations were released by the governor 2 weeks ago. I share this with you today because (a) I’m proud of the hard work the group did and (b) our process and approach to developing an implementation plan might serve as a model for others seeking to extract more value from their state’s university R&D. The goal of the Innovation-to-Jobs Working Group was:…

In her Wall Street Journal article “Universities Push Harder Into Realm of Startups,” reporter Ruth Simon observed that “universities are stepping up efforts to create ‘spinouts,’ or business startups born from some of the cutting-edge research of their students or faculty. Some schools are creating funds that help cover startup costs.” She mentions several schools’ efforts to support their spinout/startup companies, …

Universities and government labs — especially in the United States — are keen to transfer technologies into commercial ventures. It can be tough, but not impossible, for corporates to engage with those organizations and find those innovations. I wrote an article for Intellectual Asset Management (IAM) magazine, entitled “Cutting-Edge Tech: A How-To Guide for Corporate Licensing Officers.”…

I wish to offer an answer to the RFI’s third Overarching Question: What specific actions can the Federal Government take to build and sustain U.S. strengths including its entrepreneurial culture, flexible labor markets, world-class research universities, strong regional innovation ecosystems, and large share of global venture capital investment? My answer: …

Recently I had the pleasure of being interviewed by JJ DiGeronimo of the organization Advancing Women in STEM about my career trajectory, my leap into technology transfer, and what motivated me to start Fuentek in 2001. I was also asked for my advice for women who are newly hired for — or trying to get — a job in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM). I was able to share a few ideas during the interview, but today I’d like to elaborate on that list. Actually, this advice applies to women going into non-STEM professions too.

Although we tend to focus on technology transfer here on the Fuentek blog, our industry is broader than that. One aspect I was asked about recently is knowledge transfer. Specifically, I was asked: Can you suggest a tool to measure/assess quantity and quality of knowledge transfer? This is a complex question since knowledge transfer is more qualitative than quantitative, but metrics gathering is an inherently quantitative exercise. However, there are some quantitative measures that provide a sense of knowledge transfer.

Welcome to the latest post in our “Metrics Monday” series. Today, I’m going to talk about some important metrics that most TTOs don’t track… but should. Why these metrics? Because these three metrics indicate whether your TTO is on the right path to achieving higher targets for your university’s government funding and industry sponsored research agreements (SRAs). And these targets will have a much bigger impact on the local economy than most startups will because they lead to hiring more staff that are high-salary jobs.

Several months ago, a read an article called “Are Universities Creating Too Many Biotech Startups?” At the time I thought: The question is not how many startups should a university do, but why are they doing them? Since then, I’ve seen more and more stories in the industry news about universities focusing heavily on startups, particularly within the context of job creation and helping the local economy. …

What’s a reasonable royalty rate when licensing a technology? Good question! Those of you with years of experience negotiating licensing or other technology transfer agreements know that there are many approaches for determining the value of a potential deal and therefore what the royalty rate should be. Which method is best? When we provide deal-making support to our clients, Fuentek uses a combination of three deal valuation techniques: market assessments, cost assessments, and income evaluations. Let’s consider each element.