Spin-Outs: Creating Business from University Intellectual Property

“It is commonly thought that universities exist primarily to educate their students. In truth, most universities seem to spend more time conducting research than in straight instructional tasks. This is especially true in the more advanced graduate level areas. Consequently, universities produce a lot of fundamental knowledge that simply didn’t exist before. This book is on the moving of this knowledge or intellectual property that might be used as the foundation for starting new businesses. It is based on the quite successful program set up by the Department of Chemistry at the University of Oxford. The benefits of setting up such companies are diverse and apply to all involved. The student or researcher may be able to start a company that uses the universities IP as a foundation. These students are thus employed and producing products useful to our society. The university does well by receiving license fees or royalties on research that otherwise might be filed away in a dusty corner. The author was head of Chemistry at Oxford and subsequently was involved with several of the start up or spin out companies that were formed. He thus has experience on both sides of the situation and clearly knows what he is talking about.”