Infographic: The Road to Technology Transfer

Laura Schoppe is the founder and president of Fuentek, LLC. She is currently chair of the AUTM Foundation. For AUTM, she formerly served as vice president of strategic alliances and chair of the Global Technology Portal Committee.

At one time or another, most technology transfer offices (TTOs) — particularly at universities, government labs, and other non-corporate entities — are asked why discoveries aren’t getting into the marketplace faster. Or more frequently. Or both.

Whether this question comes from innovators, administrators, or legislators, TTOs say they struggle to answer it clearly and succinctly. Explaining the complexities of technology transfer is not easy, yet it is easy to sound defensive.

Over time, we at Fuentek heard from so many tech transfer professionals about this being a challenge that we decided to do something to help them with this explanation.

Since a picture is worth a thousand words, we developed an infographic that lays out a representative path from innovation to product launch. Entitled “The Road to Technology Transfer,” the infographic moves from invention disclosure down the winding road through prioritization/triage, market-based assessment, and the development of strategies that occur before active marketing to targeted prospects. A tech transfer prospect might “exit” the main road to sign a collaborative agreement for further R&D and/or prototyping or head directly onto the licensing “expressway” into negotiations and eventual product development.

We developed this infographic as a service to technology transfer professionals, and we are making it freely available for the community’s use. The URL is https://www.fuentek.com/techtransfer-process-infographic.php, and included at the bottom of the infographic page is the HTML code to embed the image on your Web site or into a presentation. (For the latter, you’ll probably need to download an add-in tool for inserting Web pages onto slides.) All we ask is that the infographic not be modified, particularly our copyright notice.

Our intention in providing this infographic is to help you convey to your stakeholders that the destination — that is, technology transfer success — is not right around the corner or even a direct route. No matter how fast a car drives, a 500-mile journey takes time, and there are points along the way where things can come to a stop. Helping stakeholders understand that helps set reasonable, fair expectations.

Of course, the trick is to make your TTO a car that is reliable, safe, gets great gas mileage, and has low emissions. That’s where Fuentek can help — it’s what we do. We offer a variety of services that can be uniquely combined to help with:

Establishing/Building TTOs
Managing innovation/IP portfolios
Establishing agreements for technology licenses, collaborative R&D, and other partnerships
Implementing open innovation and technology sourcing
Strategic planning for innovation-based organizations
Fostering entrepreneurship and startups

Contact us to discuss how Fuentek can help transform your TTO into a high-performance, fuel-efficient roadster. Vrooooom!

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