Technology Transfer and Commercialization Organizations

The Evidence Network provides assessments of the performance of technology transfer and commercialization organizations. These may be independent nonprofit organizations or they may be connected to universities or governments with mandates to help the private sector exploit public sector research results.

Technology transfer and commercialization offices focus on providing firms with access to intellectual property for commercial exploitation. In this respect, these entities serve as gateways, for example, providing databases of intellectual property, information on research and technology development programs, linkages to or among experts, and financing. They also undertake to facilitate information exchange by providing linkages between interested parties, with technology transfer and commercialization as the objective.

Challenges

Technology transfer and commercialization entities are under particular pressure to demonstrate their performance in their important role linking public investments in research and development to commerce. Both public and private commercialization stakeholders directly depend upon them, and hold strong interests in their performance. While some of these entities have been successful in raising monies through licenses and royalties, this is typically not the case. As a consequence, their ability to articulate their mission and service performance, not just financial performance, is critical to their stakeholders.

The Evidence Network's solution

To measure their service performance, The Evidence Network survey questions elicit the effectiveness of making intellectual property or intellectual property services available. We provide, for example, survey questions that focus on the effectiveness with which research information, access to personnel, or other linkages are effected.