The Technology transfer follow-up committee was set up for analysis of transfer actions in order to find the best transfer strategy. Projects such as start-up creation, industrial partnership, open source diffusion and others are examined by an advisory committee, which provides feedback and recommendations for the choice of strategy and allocation of resources. The composition and work of the committee have already proved to bring added value to the performance of the public research oganisation regarding technology transfer.
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Follow-up Committee Oversees Tech Transfer Projects
1. Technology Transfer Follow-up Committee
FITT
– Fostering Interregional Exchange in ICT Technology Transfer –
www.FITT-for-Innovation.eu
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2. A committee to follow-up transfer actions
Technology transfer actions concerned:
Startup creation projects
Industrial partnerships with transfer of assets (license or assignment)
Industrial partnerships with transfer of competences (expertise)
Participation to standardization actions within a transfer action
An open source diffusions of an important INRIA code base
Exit solutions for open source consortium led by INRIA
Committee is advisory for the INRIA Transfer department:
go/no go (initialization and follow-up)
transfer strategy adoption
asking for an opportunity/feasibility study
allocation of resources for maturation if needed
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3. A committee to follow-up transfer actions
Composition:
3 INRIA people
1 INRIA -Transfert
4 senior private experts:
two competitiveness clusters: Systematic, Minalogic,
1 private company – Mandriva
1 from EPFL (Switzerland)
national agency for innovation – OSEO
When: one meeting every two months
Process:
Template description of the project built by the researcher, TT officer and Sectoral
TT Associate (available in the FITT toolbox)
Submission sent a few days before the meeting (no late submission)
A collaborative tool allows the follow-up by all the staff concerned
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4. Template description
Three types of description:
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5. When & where?
Timing
Follow-up committee created in January 2009
5 meetings held in 2009, 5 meetings expected in 2010
45 transfer projects analysed in 2009
Location
in Paris
organised at the national level, the committee reviews and follows up all
technology transfer operations of the eight INRIA research centres
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6. Who?
Stakeholders
Before the committee meeting: researcher(s), a regional TT officer, the
responsible of technology transfer in an application domain
Preparation of the transfer case: file should be understandable and
analysable by the committee (no oral presentation of the case by project
leader)
During the committee meeting:
People from INRIA: Transfer and Innovation director, Transfer Strategies
manager, Technological Development director
IT-Translation director: specialized in start-up creation
Private sector experts: 2 people from “Competitiveness clusters”
(System@tic, Minalogic), 1 from EPFL (CH), 1 private company CEO,
1 person from OSEO
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7. Pros & Cons
PROs CONs
Transfer oriented mind
An approach which is not easily scalable
Continuous process (no call for projects)
Synchronization to be done with other
committees
Co-design and follow-up logic
Difficult to choose the experts, who must
Project management goal and early analysis
be legitimate to “kill” the transfer projects
Not a funding booth
Risk of excessive formalization of the
process.
Reduction of uncertainties
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8. Why ? (1/3)
Rationale:
The Technology Transfer Follow-up Committee has been created
in order to:
Have a clear and coherent view of all the transfer operations conducted
by a large PRO (managing 170 research teams)
Impose professionalization of the different stakeholders, who are now
obliged to follow a path with clear guidelines, avoiding evident don’ts
Have an access to advice from experts from the private sector (closer to
the market than the TT officers)
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9. Why ? (2/3)
Rationale:
The Technology Transfer Follow-up Committee analyses and
Does a follow-up: according to their maturity, transfer project are meant to be
submitted more than once, which ensures the control of implementation of
recommendations made by the committee
The new dynamics has been created and it results in collective brainstorming
sessions to decide on the best transfer strategy to be applied (which is not
always the one that guarantees the best ROI)
TT officer and researchers are not left alone facing
difficulties of transfer operations.
Source: Microsoft Office Images Clipart
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10. Why ? (2/3)
Impact:
Committee started slowly as at first TT officers
could feel excluded from the decision process
and were afraid of a “selection”
After a couple of months, the majority of TT
officers understood the advantages of submitting
their transfer projects to the committee, which
showed to deliver useful recommendations and to
do a real follow-up.
Transfer projects submissions are now too
Source: Microsoft Office Images Clipart numerous: people got convinced of the
committee added value!
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11. Lessons Learned
Added value of private external experts having experience in technology
transfer at large
A formalized process allowing people to brainstorm on elaborated transfer
projects in search of more professional behaviour (asking themselves a lot of
questions on the strategy)
The need to go beyond evidence or conditioned reflex and to adopt a real
strategy which can be followed up
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12. Suggested Readings
Link to bibliography:
Link to code book:
Opportunity Assessment
Transfer strategy
Start-up creation
Exploitation
External experts
Link to related websites:
www.inria-transfert.fr
www.inria.fr/valorisation/index.fr
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