OTTBD News Items

5/9/12
National Institutes of Health unveils NCATS – National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences
The NIH has launched a novel initiative titled “Discovering New Therapeutic Uses for Existing Molecules” to help match researchers with a selection of compounds from pharmaceutical industry partners including Pfizer, AstraZeneca, and Eli Lilly and Company. The National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS) will direct researchers’ attention to a pool of more than 20 valuable compounds that have already cleared several key steps in the development process, including safety testing in humans but are no longer actively pursued by the pharmaceutical company.

For the initial pilot phase NCATS will provide up to $20 million to fund two- and three-year staged, cooperative agreement research grants for pre-clinical and clinical feasibility studies. The academic research partners will own any intellectual property they discover through the research project with the right to publish the results of their work.

For more details about this program visit "Discovering New Therapeutic Uses for Existing Molecules" or contact The UMDNJ Office of Technology Transfer and Business Development at OTTBD@umdnj.edu.

02/29/12
Biosearch Technologies Acquires Worldwide Rights to Non-FRET Probes Patents: Biosearch Technologies, Inc. (Biosearch), a leading supplier of sophisticated oligonucleotide components to the rapidly growing molecular diagnostics industry, today announced that the company has acquired worldwide rights from the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (UMDNJ) to United States Patent 6,150,097, titled "Nucleic Acid Detection Probes Having Non-FRET Fluorescence Quenching and Kits and Assays Including Such Probes," as well as counterpart patents in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, and Japan, that disclose and claim, inter alia, probes having quenchers and fluorophores that are not FRET pairs, as well as their use. In addition, Biosearch has acquired rights to sublicense the non-FRET probes patents to companies that may wish to commercialize current and future non-FRET probe-based products. See FULL PRESS RELEASE

12/13/11
Foundation Venture Capital Group a Model for Other Universities
Foundation Venture Capital Group (FVCG), an affiliate of the Foundation of UMDNJ/New Jersey Health Foundation, is the focus of the lead article in the most recent edition of the newsletter Technology Transfer Tactics/. The article describes how administrators at the University of Michigan decided to use money from their $7.8 billion endowment to fund start-up companies and turned to FVCG for advice. FVCG, which has become a model for other universities, works closely with Vince Smeraglia, director of UMDNJ's Office of Technology Transfer and Business Development, to invest exclusively in research at UMDNJ by funding new life science companies. The article quotes Smeraglia and FVCG president James Golubieski. The two explain the wisdom behind creating a venture capital fund using endowments and describe the risks and rewards of investing in early-stage technologies.

Licensing

What is Involved in the Licensing Process?

The university owns all intellectual property associated with inventions developed with university support and it is ultimately the university's decision about how and to whom we license an invention. In practice, however, the faculty member will frequently be the best source of information about industrial firms interested in the technology and may have already initiated some interaction. We welcome the inventor's input and will actively engage you in this process should you choose to be involved.

Licenses to university inventions developed with university support will involve one or more of the following features: access to the Invention (which may be exclusive or non-exclusive), a license fee, a royalty on sales, an obligation to support the patenting process, a requirement to exercise due diligence in marketing the invention, and sometimes an obligation to support further research in the inventor's lab.

In recent years it has become possible to involve both the University and the inventors in the formation of small companies, as one means of developing inventions. This frequently results in both the University and the inventor receiving an equity position (stock ownership or a partnership position) in the company. Such events may also generate outside employment and a conflict of interest for the faculty member and trigger the Attachment A procedures of the Outside Employment Policy of the University. The University is generally supportive of this method of developing IP, and this office can assist in the entire process.