Author: Marie Powers

Students at South Dakota State University (SDSU) who think they have a profitable idea now have an opportunity to make their entrepreneurial vision a reality. The South Dakota Student Ventures Competition, sponsored by South Dakota Innovation Partners in collaboration with SDSU’s College of Engineering Entrepreneurial Studies Program and the university’s TTO, will give students a chance to collect up to $25,000 of investment capital to start a science and technology-based company. Organizers hope the competition will develop student entrepreneurial talent and boost technology-based economic development in the state. Another key objective is to provide a healthy return for investors. Prior to his arrival at the university in 2007, SDSU President David Chicoine launched the model for the Student Ventures competition at the University of Illinois, successfully developing Illinois Ventures as an early-stage capital and business development services company to support start-ups.

Individuals or teams interested in the South Dakota competition must find a concept that addresses a market issue and leads to the creation of a science or technology start-up. The top proposal, as judged by a panel of seasoned investors, will qualify for funding to launch the business, up to a maximum of $25,000. Besides the student entrepreneur, teams may include faculty members, industry professionals, graduate and undergraduate students, and others. “We believe that one of the best opportunities to develop a knowledge-based economy is through the concepts developed by our students,” says Mark Luecke, managing director and CEO of Innovation Partners. The review of student applications will follow the same rigorous process that any top VC firm would employ, he explains. In fact, it’s possible that no applications will be selected for an investment offer, but any start-ups that result from the competition will be formed and capitalized, with work beginning by mid-May of next year. The program “casts a wide net to capture inventions with high commercial value,” says Denichiro Otsuga, SDSU’s director of technology transfer.

Source: The Brookings Register

Patent holders — including technology transfer offices — don’t have to make the difficult judgment call about whether to spend often-scarce resources on defending their assets in infringement cases. A new option has emerged in which a third-party essentially foots the bill for that litigation, in exchange for a cut of the proceeds. In a still-struggling economy, pressing ahead with an expensive court fight may be even harder to justify, particularly for public universities that must answer to taxpayers and legislators. Michael J. Cannata wants those TTOs to know he’s here to help. The Toronto-based firm he’s managing director of, BOCA Advisory Services Inc., specializes in monetizing patent assets through licensing, sale or, importantly, litigation. BOCA is one of a growing number of firms that will now fund infringement cases with no cost or risk to the client, who only pays out of the proceeds if the firm wins an award. Of course, these firms choose their clients carefully, but if you’ve got a strong case and a weak stomach for the risk, the third-party funding option may be a perfect fit. A detailed article on the use of third-party litigation funding appears in the November issue of Technology Transfer Tactics. For subscription information, CLICK HERE.

Immersed in research about using ice plants to forestall soil damage caused by salt, Akihiro Nose, a professor in the agriculture department at Saga University in Honjo, Japan, was surprised when a student suggested the plant might be edible. While continuing his research, Nose put the plant on the market in 2006, calling it “barafu.” A venture firm named Nokendo, run by Nose and former students, is working to find a sales channel. Nose describes barafu as “salty, crispy, and refreshing,” and Nokendo sales director Takahiro Ogawa says the plant “has a pretty appearance” that appeals to consumers. Sales contracts with local farmers and the development of processed foods containing ice plant — including ice cream — are underway.

Saga is among a growing number of Japanese research institutions that have developed food products as an offshoot to their research projects. Foodstuffs developed by universities face a rough road to commercialization, since the institutions lack sales outlets and business know-how. However, last summer 28 Japanese institutions marketed their products at a special sale in a department store. Hokkaido University brought kelp, Shinshu University exhibited what it called “ruby honey,” and Yamagata University displayed bread made from rice powder. Commercialization of university-brand foods can help publicize research results in a way that people can understand and could also help universities attract students, according to the institutions.

Source: The Japan Times

Our Distance Learning Division has four outstanding events on the schedule in the coming weeks, each one filled with usable, how-to strategies and practical take-aways for tech transfer professionals. For complete information or to register, click on any of the titles below, and for information on reduced registration rates for multiple events using our Distance Learning Subscription program, CLICK HERE.

• Next Tuesday, December 8th: Tech Transfer Partnerships: Establishing Effective Legal and Operational Structures for Long-Term Success
• Wednesday, December 16th: Post-License Monitoring and Support: Performance and Revenue Enhancement Strategies (and when all else fails, how to pull the plug and take back your IP!)
• Wednesday, January 6th: Successful Outsourcing for Tech Transfer Organizations
• Wednesday, January 27th: “Shrink Wrap” Your University’s Technologies for Industry: Packaging Your Innovations to Minimize Corporate Risk and Extract Optimum Licensing Value

Quantros, a San Francisco-based health care analytics and decision support software and services provider, has licensed IP and associated software developed at the University of Michigan (U-M) for integration into its suite of safety and risk management (SRM) products. The university’s software will enable automated safety data analysis and alert notifications by utilizing a health care provider’s integrated administrative data. The U-M software capabilities expand Quantros’ ability to identify and analyze trends in adverse events and to provide automated triggers that will help clients improve clinical documentation and coding. The technology uses Patient Safety Indicators (PSI) — a methodology developed by the U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) to help hospitals identify potential adverse events by parsing hospital patient discharge diagnosis codes entered into the hospital billing system. By integrating the technology into its SRM products, Quantros will provide a diagnosis-based solution to identify adverse patient events and allow follow-up to evaluate contributing factors, analyze root causes, and assist in pinpointing strategies for preventing future events. The technology has been in use at the U-M Health System for about a year, according to lead inventor Vinita Bahl, DMD, MPP, director of clinical information and decision support services in U-M’s Office of Clinical Affairs. “Utilization of the system has resulted in better identification and awareness of adverse events,” Bahl says. “Coupled with existing improvement efforts, we have observed a reduction in the incidence of several types of events.”

Source: PR Newswire

The University of Manchester (U.K.) Intellectual Property Limited (UMIP) — the university’s commercialization arm — has inked an exclusive license with Link Technologies Ltd. of Bellshill, Scotland, for “exciplex” technology developed at the university. Although detection of DNA by fluorescent labels is widely used, one challenge of these systems is to reduce the background fluorescent signal to improve the signal-to-noise ratio of the assay. To address this problem, Ken Douglas, PhD, FRSC, honorary professor and director of U-Manchester’s Wolfson Centre for Rational Design of Molecular Diagnostics, and Elena Bichenkova, PhD, senior lecturer in medicinal chemistry, developed diagnostic probes using exciplexes, or excited-state complexes, which emit light as fluorescence at a longer wavelength. The university holds patents for the technology covering all major market areas. Under terms of the agreement, Link will produce and sell exciplex-based diagnostic reagents worldwide. The license also initiates a collaboration between the parties to develop the technology, with Link securing the rights to any IP arising from the partnership. Financial details were not disclosed.

Source: BioSpace

Pathogen Detection Systems, Inc., (PDS) a Kingston, Ontario, start-up seeking to improve municipal water quality through enhanced water monitoring and testing systems, has been acquired by Veolia Water Solutions & Technologies (VWS) of Paris, France. PDS was founded in 2003 to commercialize discoveries based on fiber optic sensory technology developed by Stephen Brown, PhD, professor of chemistry, and colleagues at Queen’s University, in collaboration with industry researchers. The patented PDS system provides laboratory-grade testing for E. coli and other coliform bacteria with superior speed, reliability, and productivity to current methods. “This is an extraordinary example of technology transfer from university to industry,” says John Molloy, president and CEO of PARTEQ Innovations, the TTO for Queen’s. “This technology was developed at Queen’s and licensed by PARTEQ to a small group of entrepreneurs that formed PDS. Together we attracted the attention of the world’s leading water company, which is making a considerable investment to take this technology worldwide.” The acquisition by VWS will allow PDS to develop its next generation of water monitoring systems during a three-year, $8.7-million project that includes up to $2.4 million in funding from Sustainable Development Technology Canada (SDTC) — an arm’s-length, not-for-profit corporation created by the Canadian government. PDS has expanded from a single lab to an integrated suite of labs and administrative space in Queen’s Innovation Park, an incubator in the university’s Biosciences Complex that provides direct access to collaborators in the university’s chemistry and microbiology departments. Over the next three years, PDS will more than double its R&D investment in Queen’s, to approximately $2.3 million. The company also expects to grow from two full-time employees and three full-time Queen’s researchers to a staff of 20 by the end of 2009.

Source: Marketwire

The University of Montreal, Canada, and its affiliated institutions have inked a license agreement providing Montreal-based Cognitive Sensing, Inc. (CSI) with exclusive worldwide rights to develop, manufacture, and market four products developed by Jocelyn Faubert, PhD, a professor in the university’s School of Optometry and CSI’s chief science officer. The partnership was facilitated by Gestion Univalor, Limited Partnership (Univalor), which commercializes technologies developed at the university. “Technologies created in [Professor Faubert’s] lab present exciting market opportunities in the medical, sports, and rejuvenation markets,” says Jean Castonguay, CEO of CSI, adding that the company has signed agreements to validate the first applications of the innovations. Under the licensing agreement, CSI will provide financial support for patent protection in various countries in addition to other payments.
The patented technologies include:

• MPI (mild perceptual impairment) device: An apparatus to diagnose and monitor brain trauma, concussions, Alzheimer’s disease, and other neurobiological conditions
• 3D-MOT (3D multiple object tracking): A device to enhance sports performance and to assess, train, and improve perception in people of all ages
• MSRS (multisensory stochastic resonance stimulation): A technology to improve sense and balance through auditory and visual stimulation
• Noisy bits: Software to improve image quality in standard displays and projectors by generating continuous luminance.

Source: Procto-Med

A new software tool, the Competitive Advantage Valuation (CAV) system, was specifically developed to provide the precision you need in IP valuation at a price every organization can afford. The low price has been cut even further under a collaboration with 2Market Information Inc., parent company of Tech Transfer E-News. Readers pay only $380, a full $250 off the regular price.

The CAV Software gives TTOs and other users a single, straightforward method for determining IP value. Created by nationally recognized IP law expert Ted Hagelin, the CAV tool yields clear and logical valuation results through a single program platform for effective negotiation, planning and reporting. The easy-to-use system includes detailed explanations and instructions for each step of the process, and over 75 research resources to obtain the information needed for valuation. For complete details and to order, CLICK HERE.

Scotland’s Aberdeen University has signed a license agreement with ApaTech, a global orthobiologics company, for three technologies in the field of synthetic bone. ApaTech plans to refine and commercialize the early-stage technologies into products for orthopaedic, spinal, and dental surgical procedures to repair and regenerate damaged bone. The agreement allows the company to exploit technologies developed by Iain Gibson, PhD, advanced research fellow, and colleagues in Aberdeen’s department of chemistry and School of Medical Sciences. The technologies focus on three opportunities to improve synthetic bone grafting materials:

• incorporating biologically active silicon and other ionic species into orthopaedic graft materials to enhance bone repair;
• enabling improved MRI imaging of synthetic bone graft materials following surgical implantation to facilitate monitoring during healing; and
• increasing understanding of how biomaterials can enhance bone regeneration.

ApaTech already develops and manufactures Actifuse, a synthetic silicate bone graft material for orthopaedic, spinal, dental, and craniomaxillofacial applications that mimics the body’s natural bony structure and accelerates the growth of high quality bone. Gibson’s synthetic materials could be used to repair and regenerate bone in patients requiring spinal surgery and to treat osteoporosis or bone injuries from accidents or sports. ApaTech hopes to move the technology into the clinic in two to four years.

Sources: Science Business and Aberdeen Grampian Chamber of Commerce

At the University of Maryland’s 2009 Bioscience Research and Technology Review Day, John Fisher, PhD, associate professor in the Fischell department of bioengineering, wowed VCs with his pitch for a tissue engineering bioreactor system that grows bone and other types of tissue for implantation. The technology was one of six innovations presented in a series of eight-minute pitches by faculty members and graduate students at the university’s Professor Venture Fair. “Dr. Fisher impressed the judges with his clearly defined product — the bioreactor system itself — and his ability to position himself within an already vibrant tissue engineering marketplace,” says Gayatri Varma, executive director of the university’s Office of Technology Commercialization.

The pitch competition encourages scientists to consider the commercial potential of their work and challenges them to translate their ideas for a general, non-technical audience. Fisher’s patent-pending bioreactor system improves the efficiency of tissue engineering by addressing many of the shortcomings of available systems, such as the high cost and complexity of the perfusion chamber and the low output of the rotating flask. His approach exposes growing tissue to an increased amount of oxygen and nutrients, making it a more prolific and cost-effective bioreactor than existing models. Fisher and his team have created a prototype in the lab using off-the-shelf products, and Fisher plans to start a company, ProlifiTEC, to bring the bioreactors to market.

Source: Physorg.com

Academia Sinica, the National Laboratory of Taiwan, has signed an exclusive license and commercialization agreement with StemCyte, Inc., headquartered in Covina, CA, and Ewing, NJ, covering certain proprietary methods and IP related to the treatment of chronic stroke with stem cells. John Lin, MD, PhD, professor of neurosurgery at China Medical University Hospital and vice superintendent in the Center for Neuropsychiatry, has collaborated with StemCyte scientists over the past three years on the potential commercial application of adult stem cells to treat chronic stroke, which affects some 15 million people worldwide annually. The team has completed a Phase Ib/IIa clinical trial and is currently completing the Phase II study. Preclinical and Phase I study results suggested significant improvement in patients, and preliminary Phase II indications mirror those results. StemCyte has assembled a racially diverse collection of cell units derived from umbilical cord blood and has successfully developed Taiwan’s leading bank for these cells. The agreement augments StemCyte’s other patented methods of cell collection, storage, and treatment. The company’s involvement in the development of umbilical cord blood-based cell therapies includes the world’s largest clinical study of unrelated cord blood transplantation for thalassemia — a common genetic disease — and trials investigating regenerative spinal cord therapies.

Source: Yahoo! Canada Finance

With the introduction of a single bacterial gene into yeast, researchers from Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands achieved three improvements in bioethanol production from agricultural waste material: more ethanol, less acetate, and elimination of the byproduct glycerol. Bioethanol is produced by the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae from sugars obtained from plant biomass. The same microorganism converts such sugars into ethanol, or alcohol, in beer and wine. The production of bioethanol is increasing rapidly due to its growing use as a car fuel. With an annual world production of 65 billion liters, bioethanol is already the largest product of the fermentation industry. Ideally, bioethanol should be produced from resources that do not compete with food production, so efforts are made to produce second-generation bioethanol using agricultural residues such as wheat straw and corn stover. However, the sugars released from these raw materials form significant quantities of acetate, which can slow or even halt bioethanol production by yeast. Conventional bioethanol production also loses about 4% of sugar to formation of the byproduct glycerol — long considered an inevitable consequence of bioethanol production conditions.

TU Delft researchers solved these issues by introducing a single gene from the bacterium Escherichia coli into the yeast, enabling the conversion of harmful acetate to ethanol. This process replaced the normal role of glycerol so efficiently that key genes in glycerol production could be removed, thus preventing glycerol production as well. “In the laboratory, this simple genetic modification kills three birds with one stone: no glycerol formation, higher ethanol yields, and consumption of toxic acetate,” explains principal researcher Jack Pronk, professor and leader of the Industrial Microbiology Group in TU Delft’s department of biotechnology. A paper describing the invention was published in Applied and Environmental Microbiology. The researchers have applied for a patent on their invention and hope to collaborate with industrial partners to accelerate its industrial implementation.

Source: Bio-Medicine

Research institutions that went into overdrive to get a piece of the government’s unprecedented, $787 billion stimulus package are now grappling with onerous reporting requirements they must comply with or risk losing the funds. “There are about 99 different data elements that you have to report on each quarter for every award,” explains Lynne Chronister, assistant vice provost for research and director of sponsored programs at the University of Washington (UW) in Seattle. The task is a particularly tall order for UW, which had received 331 awards, totaling more than $140 million by the time the first quarterly reports were due on October 10. Further complicating matters, a flurry of final-hour clarifications handed down by administrators of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) caught many universities off guard. “They changed the rules on us right before the reporting, so we had to scramble to make a few alterations,” says Chronister.

Consider, for example, the change ARRA made to the reporting required on project impact. “[This information] was supposed to be no longer than 4,000 characters, and we’d gotten that all together from the faculty by September 24. But then they decided they didn’t have the bandwidth for that and reduced it to no more than 2,000 characters, so we had to have our faculty go back and rewrite,” she says. Despite such complications, UW was supremely prepared for the reporting challenge, having built an infrastructure of committees and teams to manage what the school correctly anticipated would be a windfall in ARRA-funded projects. One of the teams, for example, fashioned a reporting tool or datamart which automatically pulls data from four different information systems operating on campus: human resources, finance, purchasing, and sponsored projects. “The reporting team worked very closely with the team developing our [IT] system. They practically lived together for three months to make sure we had everything in our reporting tool that was required,” says Chronister. “We also have a team of seven people that we are calling ‘team ARRA.’ They field questions from campus, and make sure all the fields are filled in and everything is complete.” A detailed article on ARRA compliance requirements and strategies for meeting them appears in the November issue of Technology Transfer Tactics. For subscription information, CLICK HERE.

Entrepreneurship students at Ball State University in Muncie, IN, will help develop commercial applications for U.S. military projects through Military 2 Market (M2M), a partnership among BSU’s Entrepreneurship Center, the Department of Defense, and the Naval Surface Warfare Center, Crane Division (NSWC Crane), which operates a research-centered facility near Indianapolis. Students will be given access to government patents and IP and challenged to find commercial opportunities for the technologies, explains Michael Goldsby, Stoops distinguished professor of entrepreneurship and executive director of the Entrepreneurship Center in BSU’s Miller College of Business. “This partnership provides students the opportunity to work with some of the best scientists and engineers in the world,” Goldsby says. “Students will develop business ideas around existing applications that are currently being patented. Bridging military technology with entrepreneurship education creates a unique learning experience for our students.”

Next spring, junior entrepreneurship students will write commercialization studies for potential businesses based on the military applications they study. In their senior year, the students will be expected to integrate the technologies into business plans for presentations at national competitions and during E-Day (Evaluation Day) as part of the New Venture Creation course. A key feature of E-Day is a final pass-fail review that requires seniors to put their degrees on the line when their business plans are analyzed by a group of top business leaders just days before graduation. Navy TTOs, laboratory scientists, and entrepreneurship faculty will coach students who participate in the M2M program.

Source: Inside Indiana Business

Researchers at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem have developed an environmentally friendly method to prevent biofilm that uses heterocyclic compounds to disrupt cell-to-cell communication, interfering with biofilm formation. Unlike the use of antibiotics, which often induce formation of resistant strains, the compounds do not need to kill the microorganisms that cause the biofilms. “Just a few weeks ago, a study published by researchers from the University of Colorado showed that showerheads may be dangerous for our health due to contamination with biofilms — or aggregates of bacteria or fungi,” says Yaacov Michlin, CEO of Yissum Research Development Company, the university’s TTO. “This invention is exactly the solution for such problems as well as many other problems related to home and industrial use that affect us daily.”

Biofilm-related problems cost industry tens of billions of dollars annually by corroding pipes, reducing heat transfer or hydraulic pressure in industrial cooling systems, plugging water injection jets, and clogging water filter and pipes. The compounds developed by Doron Steinberg, a professor in the Faculty of Dental Medicine, and Morris Srebnik, a professor in the Institute of Drug Research, and colleagues will be used to coat pipes, filters, membranes, air conditioning ducts, and other surfaces in contact with water that are prone to biofilm formation. The coating is environmentally friendly and effective against both fungal and bacterial biofilms. The technology can be used for industrial water treatment, prevention of biofilm formation on filtration membranes, paints and coatings, irrigation pipelines, and swimming pools — applications where it’s expected to lower costs of desalination and water recycling processes by reducing energy consumption due to corroded or clogged pipes. The technology also can be used in simple household cleaners.

Source: Earth Times

A new Software-as-a-Service tool that in less than 20 minutes provides crucial information needed for determining the FDA classification and regulatory pathway for medical device technology has just been released by e-Zassi, and is being offered with an introductory discount in partnership with 2Market Information Inc., the parent company of Tech Transfer E-News.

Within minutes, the US FDA Regulatory Calculator provides users with a potential FDA predicate, regulation product code, and the classification and regulatory pathway associated with a medical technology. With this new tool, you’ll save hours in initial research and eliminate the need for outside experts early in the process. Understanding the classification and regulatory pathway of new medical device technologies is critical to early business planning, market assessment, and understanding of FDA requirements. Typically, this takes in-house staff or outside consultants many research hours, can delay product development, and eats up additional time and money. The new tool puts regulatory pathway information at your fingertips early in the device development process, minimizing the potential for miscalculations with due diligence and helping to guide your commercialization and clinical trial strategy. For complete details, and to receive a $125 discount (E-News readers pay only $375), CLICK HERE.

Research conducted at the University of Warwick, U.K., could accelerate the commercial development of technology that uses waste carbon for “green” domestic heating products and automobile air conditioning systems. Adsorption technology, which uses heat from a gas flame or engine waste to power a closed system that contains only active carbon and refrigerant, has long been considered a more efficient way to drive heat pumps or air conditioning. The process alternately heats or cools the carbon, either extracting heat from the outside air and forcing it into radiators or hot water tanks or extracting the heat from inside a car to cool the air. Until now, the big problem with the technology has been its size. An automobile air conditioner requires roughly 300 liters of volume to operate, and domestic heat pumps must be even larger. University of Warwick researchers miniaturized the technology, creating adsorption-based equipment that is up to 20 times smaller than previously possible. Bob Critoph, professor of engineering and lead researcher on the project, says the technology will create heat pumps that will reduce domestic fuel bills and CO2 emissions by more than 30%, compared to the best condensing boiler. In auto air conditioning systems, the technology is expected to reduce both fuel consumption and CO2 emissions by nearly 5%. The researchers have entered a technical partnership with Centro Richerche Fiat (Fiat Central Research) to develop the technology. A spinoff company, Sorption Energy Ltd, also is being established by Warwick Ventures, the university’s TTO, and H2O Venture Partners. Critoph expects to have an automobile air conditioning system that uses the technology ready for market in less than three years, with a gas heat pump to follow.

Source: GreenWise

Small amounts of oil leave a fluorescent sheen on polluted water that’s hard to remove — even when the water is aerated with ozone or filtered through sand. Now, a University of Utah engineer has developed an inexpensive new method to remove oil sheen by repeatedly pressurizing and depressurizing ozone gas, creating microscopic bubbles that attack the oil so it can be removed by sand filters. “We are not trying to treat the entire hydrocarbon [oil] content in the water — to turn it into carbon dioxide and water — but we are converting it into a form that can be retained by sand filtration, which is a conventional and economical process,” says Andy Hong, a professor of civil and environmental engineering. In laboratory experiments reported in Chemosphere, Hong demonstrated that “pressure-assisted ozonation and sand filtration” effectively removes oil droplets dispersed in water, indicating it could be used to prevent oil sheen from wastewater discharged into coastal waters. Hong says the method — for which patents are pending — also could be used to clean a variety of pollutants in water and soil, including so-called “produced water” from oil and gas drilling sites on land; water from mining of tar sands and oil shale; groundwater contaminated by MTBE, a gasoline additive that pollutes water through leaking underground gasoline storage tanks; “emerging contaminants,” such as wastewater polluted with medications and personal care products; and soil contaminated with polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs, from electrical transformers), polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs, from fuel burning), or heavy metals.

The method uses two existing technologies — ozone aeration and sand filtration — but doesn’t just bubble ozone through polluted water. Instead, the system uses repeated cycles of pressurization of ozone and dirty water so the ozone saturates the water, followed by depressurization so the ozone expands into numerous microbubbles in the polluted water — similar to the foaming of a carbonated beverage that’s opened too quickly. The tiny bubbles provide much more surface area — compared with larger bubbles from normal ozone aeration — for the oxygen in ozone to react chemically with oil. Hong’s study showed the new method not only removes oil sheen but also leaves any remaining acids, aldehydes, and ketones in the treated water more vulnerable to destruction by pollution-eating microbes. The water is clean enough to be discharged after the ozonation and sand filtration, Hong says. With success in the laboratory, Hong now plans for larger-scale pilot tests. “It is economical and it can be scaled up,” he says. Meanwhile, the University of Utah Research Foundation has signed options to license the technology to Miracotech, Inc., of Albany, CA, and 7Rev, LP, a Salt Lake City VC group.

Source: The University of Utah News Center

Partnerships in tech transfer can succeed wildly or fail miserably, depending on how they are structured, nurtured, and operated. To optimize the results of your partnering agreements takes diligent work before and after the deal is inked. That’s why our Distance Learning Division has scheduled a targeted 90-minute session — with the top tech transfer official from the National Institutes of Health and a TTO exec who’s a partnering veteran — to help ensure you make the most of these opportunities. Join us on Wednesday, December 8th from 1:00 pm – 2:30 pm EST for Tech Transfer Partnerships: Establishing Effective Legal and Operational Structures for Long-Term Success. You’ll receive loads of practical guidance from two outstanding speakers: Mark Rohrbaugh, PhD, JD, Director of the National Institutes of Health’s Office of Technology Transfer, and Gary Breit, Executive Director of the University of Manitoba Technology Transfer Office. For complete program details and to register, CLICK HERE.

Also coming next month: Post-License Monitoring and Support: Performance and Revenue Enhancement Strategies (and when all else fails, how to pull the plug and take back your IP!), Wednesday, December 16, 2009 ~ 1:00-2:30 pm (EST). CLICK here for details.