In a recent post, I offered a full text version of Marcel Mongeon’s opinion piece from Research Money on the current challenges facing technology transfer in Canada. Technology Transfer Tactics, a monthly newsletter/ezine for technology transfer professionals, posted a commentary on Marcel’s piece on their blog. In my opinion, they completely sensationalized what Marcel was trying to say. To readers who have arrived here from Technology Transfer Tactics – technology transfer in Canada is not dead – but it is struggling a little bit – as is the entire Canadian research scene.

Interestingly, a somewhat similar conversation has been flying around on the ACCT Canada’s TT-CAN listserve over this very same topic and Marcel’s op/ed joined the discussion midway. It was unfortunate that the discussion occurred during BIO because I am certain that many more voices would have been heard. Some of the participants were vehemently offended by Marcel’s statements, but since technology transfer is a small community in Canada, many are aware that he likes to stimulate discussion to help us brainstorm new ways of looking at the challenges that we collectively face. (I include myself as a technology transfer professional, because ultimately communication is a form of technology transfer and I often work with university TTOs on various projects – see the spin-off company report for the Universities of Manitoba, Regina and Saskatchewan.)

FYI – the original discussion revolved around how Canadian universities could develop more partnerships with SMEs (small to medium enterprises) and what barriers impeded these relationships. Some of the barriers that were identified were challenges in negotiating contracts, intellectual property issues, and speed of research deployment.

Here was my foray into the email discussion (bear in mind that this is my interpretation of what Marcel was trying to say):

I think Marcel was trying to be provocative with his title.

My interpretation was that we need to focus instead on building relationships between university researchers and companies (because obviously the SME perspective is that university-industry partnerships, even highly leveraged ones, are a pain in the a** for the companies on a whole host of levels). Changing this perception wouldn’t be a bad idea, would it?

We have become too tied to our metrics, which unfortunately focus almost exclusively on the number of licenses, patents, and cash the technology transfer or commercialization activity generates. However, if perhaps we shift the university focus from trying to capture immediate value to building relationships, we will engage our faculty more effectively, invite industry partnership and . . . voila . . . technology transfer.

Most blue sky innovations don’t get commercialized because there is no receptor available, but if the receptors are in place at the start, there ultimately will be more transfer. (Yes, I know that some of these great ideas make fabulous start up companies.)

I’m not advocating giving everything away, but I have observed inflated expectations of value at the TT level - seeing a pre$ valuation of $3m on a spin-off idea with no real business plan is one immediate way to tell a potential investor that they better look for a more realistic company/university to partner with.

One of the greatest challenges for UILOs/TTOs is the question of who they serve. Is it the institution’s researchers? The inventors? The institution? The research funders? Or is it the companies they deal with? With so many masters, no wonder adequately measuring the outcome and success of technology transfer is a confusing process.