Technology transfer
The inventors view
There are difficulties for academic researchers to finance the commercialisation. Grants for technology transfer are needed.
The manufacturers view
There are difficulties to finance the commercialisation as both test optimization and validation processes are very costly and quite hard to get funded. Also material and equipment can be expensive.
Comments from the Expert meeting
The term “Technology transfer” includes several different components and meanings. In the following discussion it is defined as the process of implementation of a method which will most often result in a commercial product.
Technology transfer matters concerning FP-projects
Today there is a paradox in the work on disseminating results from the FP-projects as you have to use the grants before the project ends. Usually the researchers do not get any results to disseminate until the project has been finalised. The dissemination would be more effective if the money could still be used for , e.g., a year after finalising the project. Today, it is difficult to get hold of the outcome of FP-projects. As public money is used for funding, the results of the projects should also be public.
The management of the FP-projects is very important and needs to be a larger proportion of the project budget. The management should be designed to be compared with the management for large projects within companies. Smaller and more focused projects with about 7-8 partners could also improve the efficiency in implementing new techniques.
The technology transfer from the FP-projects would probably also improve if there were more interactions between the FP-projects and the final users during the whole project. There should also be more discussions about technology transfer matters within the advisory boards and steering committees. The research within a project can give rise to several potential products, not only from the planned results. The process of technology transfer should start before the end of the project otherwise it is a risk to lose everything accomplished in the projects.
General aspects
Development of a new method in co-operation with a customer is a possible way to finance the development/technology transfer. A crucial point is of course that the product is promising enough. The development process requires training between laboratories. The process of scaling up the production of a method takes years.
There is not just a particular step or part of the development process that should be reformed to improve the technology transfer but there are scientific, economical, commercial, technical, political as well as legal obstacles for an efficient transfer of in vitro methods today.