What should a researcher know about patents and other intellectual property rights to be able to profit from his or her research inventions? That was a central question in workshop III: the commercial value of research. A brief but clear overview of the patent application procedure was presented. The participants were also taught some ‘tips & tricks’ on how to keep control over their invention. And, they got to hear first hand from experts whose daily work includes the exploitation of research inventions.

Mantra

In addition, these experts found it necessary to spend quite some time on convincing the participants of the importance of patenting research outcomes. The well-know mantra of the pharmaceutical industry that without patents there are no investments and thus no new medicines and treatments, was repeated more than once. And a simple addition sum was presented to show the amounts of money that can be at stake for the researcher: in the race to patent and develop a new drug, one day delay – the PhD visiting his or her grandmother – could well cost that person ten thousands of Euros.

No idea

But was this what the participants wanted to hear, and did it help them to get more insight in how, and when, to apply for a patent? Not really, according to the questions of several participants at the end of the presentations. These questions were very basic, looking for advice on what steps to take in what stage of the research project. Or, how to get in contact and work with industry? “We have no idea how to go about this”, was the remark of one researcher. The answer was short and simple: contact one of the valorisation managers at your institute or NGI Centre.

Access

It is to be hoped that these managers can also help researchers to secure access to their inventions for future research, for themselves and other researchers at public institutions, here and in developing countries. According to the experts, it is mainly the task of the government to provide funding for development-focused research where valorisation is not an option. However, I think that valorisation managers have a role to play as well, by using licensing strategies that can help public research institutions in developing countries to access patented inventions at our universities.

[Bram de Jonge, Ph.D. student at the Centre for Society and Genomics, based at Wageningen
University and Research Centre]