UT Research Foundation
Office of Technology Transfer
Mission
1. Protect, manage and commercialize UT inventions (intellectual property, or “IP”)
- Establish a culture where intellectual property disclosures are a routine, expected and rewarded product of research
- Manage intellectual property in compliance with the Bayh-Dole legislation and other applicable laws and policies
- Provide intellectual property counsel to UT employees
- Evaluate and manage intellectual property to balance legal costs of protection with commercial potential
- Aggressively market intellectual property to create a favored position for University research, start new businesses, and generate a solid income stream
2. Grow the UT research enterprise
- Support and facilitate faculty-generated research initiatives
- Market University research capabilities to industries and agencies
- Assist in formation and coordination of research teams to compete for large, multidisciplinary, perhaps multi-institutional projects and centers
- Facilitate and coordinate inter-campus initiatives and projects
- Process and administer grants and contracts with terms and conditions that may not be easily accommodated by University
- Foster strategic partnerships and alliances for the benefit of University’s research enterprise
- Facilitate expanded collaborations with the Oak Ridge National Laboratory
3. Develop and support an entrepreneurial culture
- Support innovative entrepreneurial education programs aimed at starting new businesses based upon University intellectual property
- Provide advisory services to support entrepreneurial ventures
- Support new start-up businesses in on-campus technology incubators
- Create a venture fund to provide very early stage capital for new technology start-up businesses founded with University intellectual property
4. Contribute to state and regional economic development
- Partner with the State and the various economic development organizations to create jobs, generate new revenue streams, and make new technologies commercially available to the citizenry
Services
UTRF provides several services to help transform UT inventions into products and services for the market.
These include:
- Evaluation of invention disclosure agreements, including assessment of:
- Its novelty
- The ability to protect the idea
- The commercial potential of the invention
- Funding and managing the patent process
- Marketing the invention to potential licensees
- Negotiating license agreements
- Managing licensee and government compliance issues
- Registering copyrights or trademarks
- Materials Transfer Agreements (MTAs)
- Consulting on intellectual property (IP) provisions in research agreements
- Collecting and distributing royalties
- Supporting start-up companies based on UT technology
- Confidentiality Agreements (CDAs)
- Presenting educational seminars on intellectual property and start-up issues