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Home > Resources > Our Process

Our Process

We encourage you to contact UM Tech Transfer during your discovery process to ensure you are aware of the options that will best leverage the commercial potential of your research. Tech Transfer staff members are trained to assist you with questions related to marketability, funding sources, commercial partners, patenting and other protection methods, new business start-up considerations, University policies and procedures, and much more. Our team approach provides you with an assigned licensing specialist supported by internal legal assistance, and, if a new business start-up is being considered, a new business development specialist as well.

The process of technology transfer is summarized in the steps below. Note that these steps can vary in sequence and often occur simultaneously.

1. Research: Observations and experiments during research activities often lead to discoveries and inventions. An invention is any useful process, machine, composition of matter, or any new or useful improvement of the same. Often, multiple researchers may have contributed to the invention.
2. Pre-Disclosure: An early contact with UM Tech Transfer personnel to discuss your invention and to provide guidance with respect to the disclosure, evaluation, and protection processes described below.
3. Invention Disclosure: The written notice of invention to UM Tech Transfer that begins the formal technology transfer process. An invention disclosure remains a confidential document, and should fully document your invention so that the options for commercialization can be evaluated and pursued.
   • If you believe that your invention has the potential to be protected via patents, the disclosure form, should be submitted as soon as possible, preferably a minimum of three months prior to publication as our ability to obtain foreign protection is lost upon publication of the invention.
   • Government sponsors, and usually industrial sponsors, must be informed if an invention is developed during a project. Tech Transfer will work with you to notify proper parties.
4. Assessment: The period in which you and your UM Tech Transfer representative review the invention disclosure, conduct patent searches (if applicable), and analyze the market and competitive technologies to determine the invention's commercialization potential. The evaluation process, which may lead to a broadening or refinement of the invention, will guide our strategy on whether to focus on licensing to an existing company or creating a new business start-up.
   • Assessment typically takes from 1 week to 3 months and we will keep you informed during the process.
5. Protection: The process in which protection for an invention is pursued to encourage third party interest in commercialization. UM Tech Transfer will work with a patent attorney and you to determine whether to file a patent application. Patent protection, a common legal protection method, begins with the filing of a patent application with the U.S. Patent Office and, when appropriate, foreign patent offices. Once a patent application has been filed, it will require several years and thousands of dollars to obtain issued U.S. and foreign patents. Other protection options include copyright, trademark and trade secrets.
   • Inventors work directly with patent attorneys to provide needed insight into the inventive elements as well as how best to make and use the invention. They provide insight and analysis of other relevant “art.” Inventors provide all potentially relevant art to the attorney. Inventors review the completed patent application for accuracy and for supported claim coverage. They also report dates for all public talks, abstract submissions, and manuscript submissions undertaken between the date of disclosure to UM Tech Transfer and the date the patent application is filed.
   • For additional information, see the Patents, Copyrights, & Trademarks section.
6. Marketing: With your active involvement, UM Tech Transfer staff identify candidate companies that have the expertise, resources, and business networks to bring the technology to market. This may involve partnering with an existing company or forming a start-up. Your active involvement can dramatically shorten this process.
7. Selecting a Partner: UM Tech Transfer will seek to identify the most appropriate licensing partner(s) for the University technology taking in to account, for example, the potential licensee's overall ability to commercialize the technology for the benefit of the public, the ability of the licensee to obtain funding to support development of the technology, the ability of the licensee to leverage its other activities to assist in commercialization of the technology, the licensee's potential to provide management and technical personnel, the licensee's business plan for commercialization, prior and ongoing relationships with the licensee, the willingness of one or more University inventors to work with licensee, ability of the licensee to accept license terms required by the University, etc.
   • Start-Up: If creation of a new business start-up has been chosen as the optimal commercialization path, UM Tech Transfer business development specialists will work as business formation consultants to assist in planning, creating and funding the start-up.
   • Existing Business: If an interested existing business is selected as a potential licensee, UM Tech Transfer licensing specialists identify mutual interests, goals and plans to fully commercialize this technology.
   • For more information, see Commercialization Approaches.
8. Licensing: A license agreement is a contract between the University and a third party in which the University's rights to a technology are licensed (without relinquishing ownership) for financial and other benefits. A license agreement is used with both a new start-up business or with an established company. An option agreement is sometimes used to enable a third party to evaluate the technology for a limited time before licensing.
   • The inventor's involvement in the licensing process is very important. It is often the inventor's knowledge, contacts, sustained effort, and ongoing interactions with his/her technical counterparts in the licensing company that closes deals and turns invention into product. Licensing is a team approach involving both the Tech Transfer office and the inventor.
   • For details on the various agreements, see the Types of Agreements section.
9. Commercialization: The licensee company continues the advancement of the technology, and makes other business investments to develop the product or service. This step may entail further development, regulatory approvals, sales and marketing, support, training, and other activities.
10. Revenue: Revenues received by the University from licensees are distributed to schools, colleges, departments, and inventors to fund additional research and education and to encourage further participation in the tech transfer process. For additional information, see the Royalties and Revenue section.