Unknown Speaker 0:00 Welcome to the smooth today's webinar technology transfer of global present perspective presented by Autumn. My name is Samantha Spiegel, autumns professional development manager and I will be your staff host for today. All lines have been muted to ensure high quality audio and today's session is being recorded. If you have any questions for the panelists, we encourage you to use the q&a feature rather than the chat feature. And if you have a technical question or comment, then please feel free to use the chat. Before we begin, I want to take a quick moment and thank autumns 2021. Online Professional Development sponsor, we appreciate your ongoing support. And now since we have a large panel with us today, I have the pleasure of introducing you to Anji Miller, who will kick us off with some team introductions, and then the discussion will begin so Andrea will pass it off to you. Unknown Speaker 0:48 Thanks, Sammy. I'm we're really pleased to have a full global panel today. What I'll do is just quickly run through the panelists. I won't go into a lot of detail, but um, you can find additional information if you'd like to know more about any of the panel members. First we have Dr. Andrew Bailey, he's a senior manager within the innovations research contracts and innovations department at the University of Cape Town is responsible for IP protection, implementation of IP policy, as well as tech transfer and commercialization of IP developed. We have also Milton or Stella's lawyer, patent attorney and partner at the IP firm Leon intellectual property in Brazil. Milton has a long track record and experience in the field of intellectual property competition, law and innovation and has authored several books. We have also Dr. Perry show Sam is the former Chairman and Managing Director of the National Research Development Corporation in India. He has a long track record with over 37 years of experience across the innovation value chain. And this is through working with different government institutions. We then also are privileged to have Mr. Samuel MK president and CEO of the Korea drug development fund foundation. This is a government agency that supports academia and industry in research and development of innovative drugs. And he has a long again career and he's an entrepreneur in biopharmaceuticals and to set up several companies within Korea and the US. We also have Dr. Ivy Chang, she's a director. She's the Director for center of innovation and commercialization at the University of Malaya Malaysia. As a cancer formula pharmacologist by training IV is also the associate professor at the Department of Pharmacology within the same university. And then we have model writing Dr. Making transduce mechanism licensing a new ventures manager for Kentucky commercialization ventures and is responsible for the commercialization efforts for regional public higher education institutions in Kentucky. Megan is also the current chair of the autumn Equity Diversity and Inclusion committee and is a member of the autumn Central Regional Planning Committee. Unknown Speaker 3:22 Think we're ready to start our discussion. Do Unknown Speaker 3:25 you Why don't you introduce yourself as well and then I cook up? Unknown Speaker 3:27 Yeah, I am the Senior Business Manager at LifeLock and healthcare, biomedical charity and we are dedicated to getting technologies to impact patients lives we also provide funding. And I'm also a member of the Equity Diversity and Inclusion committee at Wharton. Unknown Speaker 3:48 And Angie, also Ludo LifePak Fellow Program which is in conjunction with the Autumn Fellows, yes, anybody's interested in learning more about how to have a fellow at your institution, please contact Andy for more information. Unknown Speaker 4:00 Thank you, Megan. Unknown Speaker 4:01 And with that, let's kick this off. So we are all in the field, colloquially known as technology transfer. So Andrew, can you give me a little bit of information on what is a tech transfer? Unknown Speaker 4:15 I think, you know, there are a range of different components to take transfer from sort of aspects that are quite sort of traditional within a university such as publishing papers, attending conferences, your graduate students learning new knowledge and going off into business. But I think generally within tech transfer, we generally focus on intellectual property that's been protected in the forms of patents, sometimes registered designs, and ultimately it's about either licensing to existing companies or trying to develop a technology within us startup company, if that's a preferred route, Unknown Speaker 5:03 okay, great. And so IV, do you all have startup company route? And what do you do to help your startup to go through that valley of death where they need to have that funding to get the technology to the point that it can be commercialized? Unknown Speaker 5:21 Can I respond? Unknown Speaker 5:25 I began mucho Yes. Unknown Speaker 5:30 Yeah, the major challenge in transfer of technology is the valley of death. Of course, all technologies will pass through the valley of death. But technologies, which have got a support from the stakeholders, mainly, if the intrapreneurs or the startup companies, they're able to raise the required resources, during their journey, particularly during the Valley of Death Valley of that basically refers to the technology readiness level, you know, most of the technologies which are coming from the academic institutions, or the universities are at a TRL, four level, you know, if you want to really commercialize the technology, transfer the technology successfully, the technology should be ideally, it TRL, the technology readiness level six and above, you know, the gap between the TRL four to PRL six, that's what we call in India, of course, in many countries as well, the valley of death. So, what it means basically is that you need to scale up your idea, develop your prototype, validate that prototype in actual field conditions, get the feedback from the users, and once it is accepted, then you can fully commercialize it. So that is what we understand as far as India is concerned, Indian perspective is concerned, the gap between fear will four to six, there is what we call valley of death. That is the stage at which you need lot of funding for scale up prototype development, validation and market acceptance, you know, so that is a major and critical phase in the technology transfer. Unknown Speaker 7:26 All right, great. Thank you and IV to chime in on that. Did your institution offer any funding or any support for these technologies or innovators to get that value of debt? Yes, Unknown Speaker 7:39 the government of India? Unknown Speaker 7:41 I'm sorry. Do you mind if I ask if you chunk the answer for that one? Unknown Speaker 7:46 Okay. Okay, please. Sorry. Unknown Speaker 7:50 Sorry, that, sorry, that but yeah, absolutely. In unison lay on Malaysia, we do have funding to support those aspiring entrepreneurs are researchers with some innovations at the fundamental level. So as Dr. From India just mentioned, normally we have at university levels with the postgraduate students, we have innovation up to TRL. Three, that is the most common. So to make them pass through that beyond four or five or six, we provide accelerating, we call it accelerated program. So this is a program that not for everyone, only for those who have a great idea. Who willing to go through that hurdle. So in that in this program, we do give funding funding is one thing, but we also give the support, because in Malaysia, not everyone's knows what to do is not within our regular universities, our program, so intrapreneurship doing the market research, or even to work to engage with the industry, similar industry to get an understanding how do we develop products. So that kind of connection engagements, we start exposure, we really emphasize everything. Recently, we do have a problem like that. And we think it's really useful to let the students or our researchers to have an understanding what is needed out there so they can develop the right product for the market, and sometimes not the partner, the industry partner will be the recipient as well, in addition to other markets out there, so we do different things in university level. I think because of this COVID Also our Malaysian Government has given a great emphasis to push more innovations through the valley of death. Unknown Speaker 9:50 Okay, thank you. I agree and Sam will continue working drug development as well. And more of the industry side. Can you tell us a little bit about what industry is doing? Partnered with academic centers to get these technologies out the door. And you're muted. Unknown Speaker 10:11 Yeah, I'm okay Elon on innovative new drug development area. So it's not easy to take transport to industry. So on according to our statistics, only a cable point poor presenter of a project could be transferred to industry is a very low number of tech transfer successfully doing in Korea. So we have the very thoroughly surveyed what happened in academic academia as problems. So we found out something so later, I will tell the details about that. But anyway, we invested a lot of product project, for example, that's about more than 100 project we invested and only five project was successfully transferred to the industry. So it's one of my problem at this moment. So I'd like to listen, the How to Improve such high and double success success rate. That Thank you. Unknown Speaker 11:17 Absolutely. So Angie, you also work in cancer research with Dr. Berg, what kind of success rate are you are seeing what the transfer technologies Unknown Speaker 11:26 does vary? I mean, the thing is, we've it the number is low, for sure, because the thing is, it is where a lot of technologies really, even if they are addressing a particular need, there isn't that actual pool, you know, for example, there isn't industry or there isn't sufficient funding or support to take it all the way through. And this takes a lot of time. The problem is also a lot of the time to technologies are coming from academia where there is the pressure to actually publish as well. But as the way we've tried to address this is by having, we have like a philanthropic fund. And this is funding that does not take rights or anything for translational research, but it varies from early translational research all the way up to phase one. And it is where we will fund technologies that address for example, a rare condition so rare in that rare space, because as well as the valley of death, the rare spaces even it's even deeper than than anything else, because you know, the market size isn't there. But what we try to do with any other aspect is anyone that we're working with, for example, academia, and they have research is getting there early to try and really shape the research so addresses and de risk the way that Pharma would like it to, because there is a difference in how academic research is conducted. And then also how it's addressed from pharma from the pharma side. So it this will help it to be more attractive. But it's a problem. I think that's universal. And it's small steps any way that you really can uplift the research, encourage the researcher, but also fulfill the fact that the researcher has a different drive, because they need to publish academia is university is based on the need to publish and that doesn't necessarily go hand in hand with protecting technologies. Unknown Speaker 13:25 Thank you, Andrew and John Milton, one of the things that we've seen in the last year, Rick COVID-19, people have been a lot more keen to just get things out the door. So when it comes to intellectual property protection, what have you all been seen when it comes to something like creature bugs, which we've been dealing with for many years, and something like COVID-19, which just had such a massive, quick impact on our global world? Yes. Unknown Speaker 13:52 Indeed, we have some initiatives in Brazil related to fast tracks from the Brazilian patent trademark office in the initiative to get that, get them before we have any kind of results, technical results, we are collaborating with all the France pharmaceutical centers in order to make available in try to make that license. I've been to Brazil, but it's a tough, really tough path that we are facing right now, because of the government and political issues that are involved with the COVID-19. And besides that we are I believe that we are in the right beginning a better understanding of the tech transfer in Brazil. Since we are passing through the moment that is related to the volume of patents to the quality of Pattinson dedication and thought the people that needs to have a good path in self filing, fundraising, everything in our office, since we are facing the problem that I move many countries and jurisdictions also face of them that are above the tech transfer culture. Is the question, do I need to transfer the technology? Or can I do it by myself without receiving that kind of technology? So with the free information that is available right now, instead of paying for them, so it's a cultural problem that we face in Brazil, related to collaboration, I would say that it said that, I think is the main word that I can get right now related to the stage that Brazil is facing related to the development of the technology transfer culture. Unknown Speaker 15:42 All right, thank you. And Sam, you're talking about collaboration? Which what a collaboration Do you all have with your institution or within South Korea? Do you go outside of the borders of your country? Or do you mainly try to collaborate with others internally? And you're muted? Unknown Speaker 16:01 Yes, both of that internal collaboration, as well as foreign collaborations both of that we pursued in Korea, collaboration is basically academia and industry is a basic collaboration style. But frankly, speaking Korean government, who did it encourage academia and academia, collaboration is much more important. We strongly believe, for example, chemists develop some kind of a good the drug candidate, then he needs support from a biologist, and he needs the CMC engineers. So could Yang gamma to like to support such high ndaba academia, academia, collaboration, that's first hurdle to overcome. The second is academia to industry, the collaboration in that sense, the curriculum with the provided the special r&d grant to such kind of a collaboration. And third one is a Korea to foreign collaborations. So our organization KD the F, they usually open such as C and D, fair, C, and D stands for connected development fair. So we surveyed all all the Institute in academia who carries a promising components and we introduce that kind of component to Korean industry or Korean academia. So in during that kind of operation, I met life our Can I met and so it's a very useful experience for us to do something. So in this case, we have a lot of examples in Lara, we experience EPL need that then I will share. So our experience with you. Unknown Speaker 18:05 Alright, thank you. And Dr. purshottam, we've been talking a lot about drugs and pharmaceuticals, what sort of things are you are dealing with non patentable, what technologies? Do you look forward to copywriting? And how do you get things out the door that aren't patentable? Unknown Speaker 18:23 Yeah, non patentable technologies, which comes out of inventions generally, we also transfer them through the process of the Noho transfer, that means they are not supported with a pittance. No. So, that is one aspect. The second aspect is that we also protect them under trade secrets. So, there will not be any IP for it, but the knowledge what the researchers have generated, that can be transferred to a licensing agreement through an agreement contract agreement. And that contract agreement is enforced by the contract law of the country. And I would also like to add the Indian experience in developing and transferring code related technologies. In fact, what we observed is that if the technologies are developed based on the demand of the country or demand of the society, I think they are very easy to transfer. During the last eight to nine months time. Indian laboratories and academia have developed more than 300 technologies related to COVID, like ventilators, masks sanitizers, so many technologies related to COVID. So all these technologies were developed very fast, and they were also transferred very fast within the three to four months time, more than 300 technologies are transferred development transfer. So the point I would like To make is that if we develop technologies based on the demand by the society demand by the people, it is very easy to transfer, the success rate of such kind of technologies will be much higher. Unknown Speaker 20:15 And so Android to that point, so even if end users are making the demands that they want to see this product, what are the incentive for your academic researchers to work with the tech transfer office, and to get those technologies properly protected? Unknown Speaker 20:31 I think one of the major attractions is the sort of seed funding the seed innovation funding that a couple of the other panelists have discussed, we often find that just through sort of funding calls, we attract a lot of researchers who we don't necessarily interact with, usually, to our office and find that they do have patentable inventions. You know, I think that with the shortage of funding, generally, that people are now perhaps more interested in getting involved in this sort of more innovation space. So beyond the basic research, which which is great for us. And often, you will find that there's still an opportunity to publish something that one of our academics picked up on was, we've done some work around technique, anomic evaluation, and just showing them that, you know, this commodity enzyme that you're producing, using your plant expression platform, is actually not, you know, it's too expensive on a platform to actually justify the product, however, a different niche enzyme that was animal derived, very much more expensive, you could rather use plant expression, you obviate the animal sort of concerns and linkages there. So I think it's also so funding, understanding things like the technique economics, which is, say, a new way of looking at the research, they actually landed up getting a publication out of that, comparing the different things and it was very well received, because it's actually something that is not, you know, commonly picked up is that translational aspect in a more sort of pure science journal. You know, I think that, researchers, I don't think you'll necessarily win over everyone. But there definitely is an increasing interest, and especially if you can find sort of funding. And I think the other thing that's important is to unlock the sort of route to market for them. So they can then see the opportunities and the pathways. And one is very fortunate, you know, with a lot of philanthropic funders in the health space, that there are large sums of money and large collaborative projects that can be supported in what I would call translational research, or, you know, the innovation space. And certainly the I think the researchers have been very happy to be involved in those projects and derive satisfaction from it. Unknown Speaker 23:31 All right. And so obviously, we know that money talk. So it seems like it's sort of a global language if you're offering your researchers funding, and they're more likely to work with you. But another area that we see that is within the government laws. So here in the United States, we have the by Dole Act, which is for federally funded projects, the University has a requirement from the federal government, their attempt to commercialize research is federally funded. Milton, can you talk a little bit about what happens in Brazil? Are there any government incentives or requirements for working with government funded research? Unknown Speaker 24:08 Yes, sure. Yes, we had the 2014 innovation law in Brazil, in order to stimulate the relationship between the roasting companies and government, the temporalis. And market was not enough. So recently in 2016, we have another law that there is a memory of often innovation law. In our by 2018. We have the new decree that regulates this innovation more soon after about the revision now, I would say back to the the the struggle was the reverse to the companies. It was basically the kind of funding in the way the research as universities could benefit from the funding. It talks about we're about to shoot because not really clear about the results of the the outcomes of the technology of the block and make meet some of the companies maybe became away from the Rubenstein standoff, meet them approach easy in an easy way. So I believe that the struggle is now fix it. But now we need to develop the culture of this new innovation. Now, that is recent Indian immigrants, this, it's really something even wrong with the policies of the intellectual property innovation policies, acting universities, they are changing, even versus thinking about not leaving any kind of ownership of the inventors, but to stimulate the inventors to open startups in use some kind of spin offs to understand why they understand that this business is not research. So they want to collaborate the most think about the market. And I think it's a really nice initiative in Brazil, therefore, we must give some time to see if it's going to be enough, or it's meant to be adequate to stimulate innovation to get into the market through the innovation law. Unknown Speaker 26:20 Right. Thank you. And so I, we I know that you were a faculty researcher yourself. So as a faculty member, did you have a desire to see your work commercialized? Or what are some of the ways that we in the tech transfer office can incentivize our faculty? Unknown Speaker 26:39 Yeah, made? Yes. As a researcher myself, I think we often think, what's our main purpose in the university, right? Besides teaching and research, as everybody in any other words, publication is our our, our currency, but I think this has changed, especially with the COVID. Now with the soft the cow, so fast pacing, kind of changes in innovations. I think even in Malaysia, we felt the past one year, we felt a little cheeky among academics. Firstly, it's because because of economic funding for research is low getting lower. Second, the industry is demanding for innovations, right? We never have such many inquiries from local industries, local, lots of stuff up there. They're small, medium enterprises, local enterprises come forward said, I need to do some alpha points, you know, technologies simply because the government funds to assist them to upgrade their business. So they're looking for this kind of expertise. So from from a research point of view, this is a goldmine. This is a place where we can first get some funding to do our own research. At the same time, click Create co create a product with the industry, we have intellectual property protected, because it will be shared. And we can throughout the process, we can we can send out to those for internships or not to the company to the company. So we are trying to take advantage of the situation to leverage on what kind of the performance as academics, at the same time, fulfill our responsibilities to to our country to industry to society. I think that is the current change we are seeing. I'm can say this is a very natural kind of progression. Because for a few years now Malaysia is trying to push this kind of initiative push. So this is just to go beyond academic work. But we do work very well. Not until this field with these few months. You can see how more open I think because everybody's looking for opportunity. Everybody's looking for an outlet, right? Where else can I go? Whether you're looking for funding or looking for innovations. Students are looking for scholarships, we need to find to those no places to go after graduation. So all these when you put all this together, it seems it's a perfect, most perfect, almost perfect solution. If we can bring forward collaboration with industry early on to I think to someone say this now to make sure we are doing a demand driven research. I think in that manner. It works for Malaysia, I hope you will continue to work for Malaysia. Unknown Speaker 29:23 Alright, thank you. I agree. And so Dr. Prasad from moving on from that. Are there any initiatives in your country that make your national patents or inventions interesting to the global industry sector? So how are you attracting partnerships beyond the borders of India? Unknown Speaker 29:43 So Ministry of Science and Technology, Government of India has a very ambitious program to promote innovation in our country, and also to partner with many global leaders. In this area, so we have established so many programs even to partner with USA Euro, even South Korea, there are a number of programs partnership programs at university level at government level, these programs are there. And apart from that, the government of India is also establishing lot of incubation centers say we found. And of course, most of us agree that technologies which are commercialized through incubation centers are likely to be sustained in the market for a more period, then, the technologies which are not transferred through incubation centers, because majority of the technologies they pay during the early stages of the lifecycle. If these technologies are matured, or supported in the Incubation Center in the release phase, that is where they're likely to be successful and sustainable in the market. So government of India has come out with a national science technology and innovation policy, though we do not have any similar act like Beardo layak, which has transformed the US technology transfer scenario. We don't have that kind of a policy, but we have a policies brought out by each department of our ministries like food, agriculture, chemicals, transport energy, almost every ministry has got a program to promote innovation, and to increase to support innovators. And we have come out with a policy like startup India, that making India you know, a Clean Cities like that there are so many innovative programs led by the Government of India. So it's a wonderful times in Indian history, for technology transfer, technology commercialization. So things are going in a very positive direction. Yeah, look forward for more partnerships with all the panel speakers who are representing Malaysia, Brazil, South Korea, US, UK. And this is a best time for all of us to collaborate. And the COVID has really established and proved through collaborations, we are able to bring over vaccine to control to prevent COVID-19 across the globe, India, Amazon as a global leader in manufacturing COVID-19 vaccine, we already supply not only meeting your Indians requirement, we are also supplying COVID x into about 40 countries or neighboring countries. Unknown Speaker 32:45 Wonderful. And that's that's exactly what we want to encourage is that global collaboration, one of the things that when we do that we have to consider our intellectual property. So Milton, when we fire alone in our own country, we give this right only within our own borders. So what are some of the ways that you are trying to do more global cooperation through better patent protection? Are you working with more PCT? So how are you are seeing the ability to actually do this collaboration Quantico protecting your IP. Unknown Speaker 33:20 As we are trying to push more PCT applications from Brazilian residents in universities, we are doing that through big incentives from the government to raise fees for the preliminary examination that is championed by the Brazilian faculty in my caucus as official preliminary examination office for the BCP. So it's getting cheaper to file a PCT application, but with the format we are trying to make beverage backed into applications based on disclosure, usually known as zooids. Really criminal GAAP and the target we face is not the really broad draft technique of the main patent application in Visio, the first one, so sometimes it lacks form from the school enough disclosure. So, sufficiency of MDM, you can see some problems through the future PCT and future national phases and what we brought there the whole transfer tech transfer process, since you do not have anything relevant in order to be transferred, besides the knowledge, you know, we have the knowledge in specific fields, but even so, if you not do protected you fail in the tech transfer with the companies and other countries. So the best things that we are doing right now in the resume is focus on the They initiatives from New Zealand but in my office in order to educate people in mastering the doctorate degrees, to assist universities, abroad, all the territory, so we have this academy and if often you're busy going back into my office, nothing's entitled to do master's degrees and PhDs in order to facilitate and help them advance this to facilitate the tech transfer. It's a full educational process process for that, and also working on infrastructure and to get rid of the backlog is the meaning for itself divisible by three Mark office in order to stimulate the grid patterns, because we know that a lot of patterns are mathematically in Brazil, that was filed by Brazilian researchers. And we really want to stimulate the good ones. Now that not too many, but we have it. So I think then the government initiatives in order to go outside of museums based on those specific subjects in incentives from the government for family, Unknown Speaker 36:06 right, and so Andy, I want to bounce it to you. So Milton mentioned training, and education at the university level. And just after that, until you work with the fellowship program in tech transfer, how do you see your fellow has been able to adapt to working with global technologies and global audiences? Unknown Speaker 36:25 Oh, the Thanks, Megan, that's a great question with the fellowship program that we run. Ideally, what we want to do is not only these are scientists who want to become technology transfer professionals, so they understand the technical side of any technology that's coming out. But also, we want them to understand the value of translating any technology from the lab. So it does impact the end user. And the idea is that with these individuals, once they are trained, they can go into the Technology Transfer offices and change the culture. So it's not just research, because I'm a researcher, it's it's looking deeper into why you're conducting the research. But also working with the Technology Transfer Office at a very early stage, rather than trying to backfill or shape, something that has been supported for how many years, it's really working with the Technology Transfer Office, so that you can have, you know, you can tick all the boxes, the boxes for the academics so they can get their promotion, their their publication, but also that industry will be or whoever is going to take it to, you know, from the next inflection point, it can take it on, and work with the academic to really impact those that need it. So it's really ticking all the boxes. So you have the individuals who can really educate the academics, because obviously, as a researcher, your primary aim is not going to be to understand patterns, you really want to know how it will help you fulfill your aims for whatever area you're researching. And it that's where the Technology Transfer Office and technology transfer professionals come into play. Right, Unknown Speaker 38:11 Andrew? Andrew, we all know, we want our innovators to work with our office. But sometimes they come to us and they ask for a release of ownership. Or sometimes we find that the technology is not compelling. We think we can move forward with and we offer every day. So back to the innovators. When do you think that this is a good thing? And when do you think that the implication as a result of doing this? Unknown Speaker 38:37 Yeah, it's an interesting question. within South Africa, we have a similar sort of Bayh Dole Act. So it's the IP rights from financed r&d Act, which basically, if a project is not fully costed puts the ownership of the intellectual property in the university's hands. Now, if the university decides to give up that IP, we've got to offer it to the national IP management office, ie government first. The intention there is that they would take it on to commercialize if it was sort of important in South Africa and for societal, you know, benefit. We find, however, that typically our referrals will have been prompted by either poor examination outcomes with with a patient or are conducting market research and approaching sort of a substantial number of people in industry to determine their their interest and, you know, finding that it's not so great. It's just not economically viable. That Take an economics can be another thing that that sort of rules that are the I think they typically haven't taken up IP, we've had one case where we had motivated saying that we didn't see strong market potential. And they accepted that. And then our chain goes on to say that you then offer it to whoever partially funded the project. And then finally, to the inventors. So a lot of it, you know, it was internal funding from the university. So in this case, went straight back to the inventors. And what was good about that is that it gave them the opportunity that if they really believed in the IP, and that we were so wrong about the market, they actually, you know, take it forward themselves and get rights to to the IP, we typically, you know, would only make provision to recover any sunk payment costs if they were successful in their commercialization. So, you know, I think that it's, it's good in the the inventive, they strongly believe in it can take it forward. I think that typically, with with our office and and the sort of funding that we've got available, we personally, would have done our very best to try and commercialize it, and there'd be a very clear reason for something having gone. So I think that that would typically dissuade the researcher from from picking it up. And it's also the patent costs, because you know, the, you will find that in the earliest stages, maybe they will pick it up. But when you starting with sort of national phase costs, in that we've even had a spinoff company that has come back to us and said, Actually, now that we've incorporated and are commercially commercializing some of the other IP, we don't want to take on this sort of particular IP, right? Because we just can't see the return on investment, and, you know, the payback of, of the patent costs. So, yeah, I think for them, it ultimately becomes a bit of a, a, an academic decision, I mean, an economic decision. I think also that, you know, it would be very different in a regime where, say, your university optionally takes the IP, you know, I know that some of the UK universities, and he made may know this better than the me that, you know, the IP, the tech transfer office can be brought in to help with the commercialization of the IP, but they need not be, you know, with us, it's sort of like a given, we've got to do it. And within the IPR act, we're also compelled to commercialize the IP, so we've got to do something with it, we've checked, we report, you know, every six months. So, you know, there's that sort of monitoring. But I think in a situation where you've got that, that freedom to choose, I think your concern is that the opportunity is picked up, that the researcher really has that understanding of the route to market and the network. And that's what I would fear that if if a person had the choice that and they just didn't, you know, they they didn't fully appreciate the complexity of bringing something to market. But yeah, that that's where you could encounter travel. Unknown Speaker 43:49 So and you can you answer that a little bit with the perspective of the European universities as well, which I know do have much more frequently the university second right to the incubation only with the inventors permission. Unknown Speaker 44:02 Yeah. Because in the UK, the inventors choice that Andrew mentioned, that's relatively new. And it is usually those with the network, and the, you know, the expertise to actually take it forward. They can change their minds, and sometimes they do change their minds and come back in Europe, obviously, it's very different. And it's, it's quite varied. You have you have the establishments where you have academics who are very, very well versed in the commercial world, and really do have the network to take it forward, but also have the option to take on the technology. And that's quite normal. Because for whatever reason, the institution just does not have a desire or feel that it's not best place for them to take it forward. So you have that quite a lot. But then you have the other end where technology's really, you know, because there isn't that infrastructure there. And it really the support to take a technology for it just doesn't really happen so much. It's really where it would end up, basically just being published. So it really does range in Europe, it really does range on what's available. With regards to taking the technology forward. I think it's, it's, it's easy to underestimate. And even if you do have the network, you may be able to get it to the next point. But will you be able to take it even further than that. And this is one of the issues that is a problem, particularly if you filed patents, it's patentable protection. So you filed and the clock is ticking and the you know, the expenses, because obviously, when you if you file, you know, first you file in your country, and then you're going through the PCT stage, to two and a half years, when it's really getting really expensive. This is where it will force your hand. And you may realize at that point that you've either file too early, or you really do not have the resources and expertise to take it all the way. Unknown Speaker 45:54 Absolutely. And so I believe we all know that we have to make considerations and we don't have to find define and take everything to a certain level, how do you offer some balance which things that they want to pay for and move forward with in which then integrate Unknown Speaker 46:11 it in my music, university, things are a bit simpler, because most of our researchers are using federal grant funds, either from the government's for research. So we that we think our policies, university will have the ownership the priority or the shapes, of course, when we do that, university, in ultimately will have the obligation to follow the pattern and to do commercialization on behalf of the researchers or inventors. So when when assuming when the commercialization happens, then we will, we will negotiate on the sharing between the inventors and the universities, most of the time, those funds that goes back to universities will come back into research program. So in other words, we are going back the cycle again. So now that is the most common scenarios. So when, when, for example, the let's say there's a scenario when there's a matching fund from from industry. So the fun is some mix is no longer, purely 100%. Federal but mix between government and also industry, that is where we will have to draw the agreement, who's going to bring the commercialization forward. But in a lot of cases, when there is a real product or there's innovation at the end of the project, the priority will be given to the industry upon industry to drive that. But if the if the innovation is big enough that we can even go further than that, we can do a partnership with either as a startup or whatever vehicles that the team decided to do University. Currently we are in the position where we will support to make the process further as much as possible. So we are not going to be the barrier, we will not be the barrier. So if anything, we rather to take a step back and let them move forward. Because ultimately, this is the best case scenario for us is one of the best case kind of highlights for r&d in universities. So it's very rare that the researchers sometimes we have one or two, they're very, very good in the healthcare business know how and they know how to they already make your startup we partner with a network. In that case, we we do get me what university offer is we will give the majority to the you allow the researchers to do what they want to do we make it a little bit of maybe when they already where they say they will do a start up, maybe after 10 after they stabilize, maybe it will still get some bit of royalty. So but the majority of the of the funds will go back to the inventor or the star itself. So it's really case by case depending on on the request from the from the researchers. So we it's not really written in code now policies, but we try our best to facilitate the commercialization. Unknown Speaker 49:11 Absolutely. And so we know that it's very expensive to do all this innovation. So Samuel, how did you decide what to fund? And how much money do you estimate goes into a technology before it actually goes to the market? Unknown Speaker 49:27 It's very difficult question. Can you ask? For example, the most difficult issues the challenges is how to evaluate the valuation of the project is the most difficult to question. So that's the major deal breaker for academia projects with industry academia expect a bigger amount of money or bigger asset value spatter industry D didn't declare it as a precious project. So that's the biggest problem at this moment. So the kiddie that we are some matchmaker, we invest in r&d grant to the academia. So we have to get back from the kind of a project. So we act like how can I express that some matchmakers? So we persuade each of them, but it's not easy. So we decided that the we utilize the outside evaluation forms. So we send that project to the evaluation pumps, then the evaluation, company A make a valuation to that project. And that's the starting point of negotiation between industry and academia. So that is exactly the challenge is to me, and challenge it to the older researchers to the Damia. But we will find the best way to solve the kinds of problems the slowly Unknown Speaker 51:10 All right, wonderful. And so we know that our field has been changing and modifying over time as we get more and more tech clients for offices and universities across the world. So Dr. pisode them What do you think tech firms but will look like and five years from now, where do you see the PIO going within India as well as within the rest of the world? Unknown Speaker 51:30 Yeah, Magna is very wonderful question. And we need to probably emulate Yes, in creating such kind of ecosystem in India. I think in your country, the widow lay Act has brought that kind of a transformation to open a transfer offices because the IP rights were given to the universities for the research conducted by the federal funding. So in India, we have about 1000 universities, both in private and government. But it requires a lot of capacity building initiatives, I think, the autumn should play a major role in India, to build such kind of infrastructure, sustained epic capacity building training programs, the critical mass of the Technology Transfer professionals needs to be enhanced in our country as well, because India has got one of the leading the country in the education sphere, education sector, so many universities, millions of students are being graduating every year, a lot of opportunities exist. Now, the one of our department for biotechnology and the Ministry of Science and Technology has taken a lead to establish technology transfer offices, particularly in the biotechnology space, but there is a need for replicating such kind of a programs in other areas as well. For example, if you look at our medical technologies 80% of our India's needs of medical equipment are being imported, no US foreign exchange we are spending. So there is a need there is not that there is research is not happening, research is happening, but it is not optimally funded. Government needs to provide good research funding research grants, compared to many countries, India spends 1.7 2.8% of our GDP, whereas all advanced countries, US Europe, China, Japan, Germany, well, they spend much higher even Israel. So that is one aspect of that and the critical mass has to be enhanced. And of course, now, many universities the government of India has also recently brought out a new education policy in which research innovation and entrepreneurship startups are being given a major focus major emphasis, so to meet all those objectives, the universities how to come out with such kind of a tech transfer offices is a wonderful opportunity exists for autumn and similar kinds of organizations, global organizations to partner with India, Indian universities to establish tech transfer offices. I see. As of now we have about maybe 100 tech transfer offices just before the talk, I was trying to assess how many tech transfer offices we have in our country. No, but these tech transfer offices spread across research laboratories universities, but there are manned by one or two people. They don't have adequate skill sets to assess the commercial viability of a patent filing patent. We have enough expertise in our country now. There are so many patent attorneys. The patent offices have been equipped with technology examiner's but what is required is how to as our friend from Korea said their commercialization date is hardly 5.4%. India also maybe many developing countries are in that range or even less than that. So if you want to enhance the rate of technology, commercialization, or commercialization of IP, the tech transfer offices may very, very important role. And we need to provide a lot of incentives to the tech transfer offices, the inventors so that all these technologies, whatever technologies are being developed, they will reach to the marketplace. Unknown Speaker 55:30 Right, thank you. And I think that you're right, that we really need to find ways to help capture it for officers to support those innovators. So were you part of the International Development Committee that Adam offers? What are some of the things that you and your committee are doing to encourage global collaboration and tech transferred training across the world? Unknown Speaker 55:52 One of the things that we've been looking at is a sort of World Cup type of contract conference, where a number of tech transfer organizations sort of collaborate and host a conference that then sort of moves around the world. And I think so within an organization that I'm involved with in South Southern Africa, so the Southern African Research and Innovation Management Association, for a long time, it's it's very dominated by South Africa, but it has membership from SATA countries. And, you know, we found that we've always had our conference annual conference in South Africa. And we started to sort of move it to the neighboring countries. And I think what's great about that is that people from a particular country can attend in far larger numbers, because it doesn't involve sort of, you know, distant travel or, or whatever, it may be more peripheral to their interests. So you link in a lot of sort of government, people, people who are actually very important, as you know, has been said by other panelists about just, you know, properly incentivizing the space, providing funding, that that sort of thing. And I think that it just gives a different perspective. The other thing that I think is is great is that we've been writing either country or regional profiles, and they they come out on the autumn Mela. I think it's called autumn insight. And I think that what that's doing is giving us all quite an interesting sort of international flavor of where challenges are common, because as the different panelists have been speaking, you know, I'm saying, oh, gosh, yeah, that's, that's a problem for me, as well and in my environment. And so it's seeing those, but importantly, learning from others in terms of how they've overcome particular issues. And also, especially in terms of sort of funding schemes that one could potentially propose in your country to try and sort of support and, and drive innovation. So, you know, I think the International Committee is, is in a relatively sort of early stage of its development. I think that although there's sort of reasonable representation, you've got individuals who are probably spanning quite a large space, like one person for Europe, and the two of us for all of Africa. And I think that that's where it would be great to sort of grow the membership of the committee on the manner in which that network works. But maybe that that is where, you know, it links in with with this other conference. And what I think that is great with autumns approach, through that internationalization committee is to not try and establish autumn in every single country, but rather to link in and strengthen and support the local networks or whatever that are there. And that to me, is really useful. And you also, importantly, pick up the little nuances that are necessary for tech transfer or implementation in a particular region or area. Unknown Speaker 59:58 Right, Andrew? Thank you, Anna. Hi. I agree, I think that it would be great if we were able to tap in obviously, we've heard from other panelists today, that tech phones for officers are something that are becoming more prominent each one of your institutions. And so I would be remiss if I didn't take a moment to ask as the chair of the EDI committee, what are you off doing to increase inclusion within your tech transfer officers? So, Andy, I'm gonna start with you on this one. What do you see as some of the ways that we can quickly encourage more inclusion, especially amongst people who don't look like the mainstream in our countries? Unknown Speaker 1:00:37 Think there's so many things we can do, I think we should talk about it a bit more. It's really what's missing, you know, why, why is? Why aren't we seeing that? And why? You know, I think role models, celebrate successes, let others know about it, so that you can learn from the past, but also things that didn't work, you know, the failures, talk about those as well and learn from those. I think it's also where truly I think it's rather than saying we support whatever it is, it's making it happen, and doing whatever is needed to make it happen. Where are the bottlenecks and the blockages, it's really facing those and really trying to address them so that we do have more innovations, we do have more collaborations, I think, the good thing, if we can say there is a good thing with regards to COVID is that we have a panel like this, because technology has allowed us to globally really come together and have these sort of conversations, it really will break down a lot of barriers. Hopefully, you know, those who attend and really listen to this webinar will understand some of the challenges that other areas within the globe are facing. So that really you can look and understand that you have technology, you've had a look at your local market, there isn't someone who's us grabbing it or wants to collaborate, there is someone somewhere else, and there are channels that you can reach out to them and really understand like and see is someone working with something that can work with the technology that you've got there to take it forward. I think there's so many, so many ways that we can just address this, but I think the main thing is communicating and really need getting out there so that we can address it. It's not just one person fixing it. It's everyone working together to fix it. And I think hopefully, this this webinar is the beginning of conversations like this, whether it's through a webinar, or whether it's through a conference, like Andrew mentioned, or initiatives like that, or is it really just having a look at your LinkedIn network, and connecting with some of those individuals and having a conversation to see, can you work with me to try and address this? Unknown Speaker 1:02:46 Absolutely. And that's something we want to emphasize here on this webinar is that we are all available via LinkedIn, we're happy to chat with you and continue this global conversation. And truly having a network really does make the difference between failure and success. So as you're trying to increase your global communication and your global collaboration, reach out to people around you, not just in your country, but across the entire world. To find ways to have these kinds of conversations, I guess you could say today, all of us had the same kind of issue. If we struggle with funding for our innovators, we struggle with finding partnerships and collaboration to move them out of academia. But in a good way, we've also seen that best collaboration can truly make a difference around the world. And by being a more inclusive community, we can continue to grow that network and continue to help people who may have been historically disenfranchised, to be composed of us, and to create problems and solutions that don't have to pastor but instead that we can have a quick global response to something to help save lives. So I want to take a moment again, to thank all of our panelists for being here today. Some of you might not realize this, but this was truly a global effort, which means that with a global timeline, so some of our panelists have been to many, many later hours and they would normally be so again, thank you all so much for your time and your consideration. And if anybody who wants to clap with that, we're very much available. So let me I'm gonna turn this over to you for closing. Unknown Speaker 1:04:18 Thank you. Yes. And on behalf of autumn, I just want to thank all of our distinguished panelists for sharing such an informative discussion with our attendees today. And thank all of our attendees for joining panelists. I agree with Meghan, thank you for staying up late getting up early. We appreciate you all being here with us today. For our attendees. As a reminder, a recording of this webinar will be available within a few days of viewing this event through your autumn Learning Center. And you can visit the autumn website to view this recording or purchase any past webinars that you may have missed. Please remember to complete the webinar evaluation that will be sent to you. This helps us to serve your needs in the future. And finally, don't forget to register for the autumn annual meeting if you have not yet done so it is being held virtually this year. So we hope to see a large global community joining us for that. And with that, thank you again and have a great rest of your day and evening. If it is later in the day for you than it is for me. Thank you all Transcribed by https://otter.ai