From Lab to Market (Technology Transfer Professional Development Workshop)
About this good practice
University of Athens (NKUA) researchers were lacking basic knowledge concerning IP protection and commercialization processes and options. Therefore, a need arose to concisely explain these issues so as to set the basis of the conversation. This gradually led to the development of a model describing the sequence of actions and the options for each action for both IP protection and commercialization.
What initially started as a set of predefined answers for a Q+A session was gradually transformed into the first version of a technology transfer model that integrates lean startup principles (Develop+Protect+Commercialize model). Since mid-summer 2020, the model was used in awareness-raising actions that evolved into a 2-day workshop entitled ‘From Lab to Market’. The first PDW in its current form was conducted in January 2021.
Currently, the Professional Development Workshop “From Lab to Market” was triggered by the need to make University of Athens (NKUA) professors and researchers who intent to commercialize their research, more coachable in order to benefit from technology transfer activities. The aim of the workshop is to help researchers accelerate the commercialization process and to mitigate the associated risks. During the workshop researchers initially get to a basic understanding of TT, and in turn they go through the three streams of the D+P+C model. Several case studies also support teaching plus a technology transfer ‘treasure hunt’ type of business game.
Resources needed
Currently this PDW is conducted by Dr Yiannis Dimitrakopoulos (Head of Technology Transfer at NKUA) and Ass. Prof. Antonis Livieratos and requires a classroom for two days. This is one of the activities of NKUA’s Archimedes Center and to that end it has not been budgeted separately.
Evidence of success
When Archimedes Center started to conduct this PDW (Jan 2021), NKUA had zero patents and zero spin-offs. Today (Dec 2023), NKUA has developed a portfolio of 49 patents and 4 spin-offs. It should be noted that the here-presented PDW is the entry point of NKUA’s professors and researchers into the technology transfer process.
Potential for learning or transfer
Despite considerable evolution on how TT is practiced, it remains largely legal-centric and highly inefficient. The three streams of the D+P+C model align the three primary risks with which a TTO must cope: a) the technical risk (Develop stream), b) the intellectual property risk (Protect stream) and c) the market risk (Commercialization stream). As these risks are not independent to each other, the applications of the D+P+C model highlights the interrelation among streams and the need in creating feedback loops within and among streams.
The D+P+C model is a framework that can be used to raise awareness, educate and coach researchers. Moreover, it can be used as a basis for establishing KPIs for a technology transfer process. To that end, it can be transferred as an integrated framework or simply as a PDW.
The development of a web page and the publication of a research paper (see below) aim to transfer the D+P+C framework.