Government funding aimed to help patent research technology
This year nearly $130 million of federal and state government funding, supplemented by corporate contracts, will be granted to Utah State University for furthering its research.
Steve Kubisen, newly appointed director of the Office of Technology Management and Commercialization (OTMC), said the income on royalties from research last fiscal year amounted to a few hundred thousand dollars. The low return was caused by a “lack of focus” from the university concerning the OTMC, he said.
“Historically there has not been a lot of activity in this department,” Kubisen said. “Sometimes I meet people at various locations on campus that don’t know we exist.”
Some challenges the department faced were communication failures and understaffing, he said. OTMC had a one-person staff before Kubisen came. The new director said he hopes to change all that.
“My main message is that the office has changed,” Kubisen said. “We are very proactive about patents and commercializing good technologies.”
Brent Miller, vice president for Research at USU, said he shared this optimism for the future of the university’s ability to patent and license its technology.
“We finally have a top-notch staff in place and plan to make this an area of strong service to USU faculty, to help them with disclosure, protection, licensing and commercialization of their intellectual properties,” Miller said.
“The university’s revised policies will make the system and financial returns more favorable to inventors and bring our policies in line with our aspiration for success.”
Kubisen said President Kermit L. Hall presented one of the changes in policy in order to “put focus on support from administrations to count patents as refereed publications towards tenure.”
USU has 60 active patents and 80 current licenses, he said. A patent is a legal document granted by the United States Patent Office that gives the owner “a monopoly” of use for 20 years. In turn, the inventor must disclose how the idea or technology works. A license is what people have to purchase in order to use that idea or technology. The licensing income or royalties are split among the inventor, the department and the university, Kubisen said.
The Baye-Dole Act of 1980 requires universities to set up agencies like the OTMC, he said. It allows government and academic researchers whose work has been funded by federal agencies to share in the financial rewards and file patents under their name. The patent ownership is assigned to the university, he said.
In order to get a patent, the idea must be original, have utility or commercial value, and be “non-obvious to someone skilled in the art.”
The list of current patents at USU doesn’t include any “blockbuster patents,” Kubisen said, referring to the scale of licensing income they provide. Most of the active patents are in agriculture, engineering and food processing, he said.
One such patent comes from the work of Marie Walsh, professor in nutrition and food sciences, and is called “Whey Krunchers.”
Kubisen said this food is similar to potato chips but is made with high protein instead of salt or fat.
Another patent, from John Carman, professor in plant genetics, is for the methodology of asexual reproduction of seeds. It is like “seed cloning,” Kubisen said.
Anyone with a good idea is encouraged to contact the OTMC, although it might not be able to offer a patent because of filing costs, he said. Kubisen would like more ideas to choose from, he said.
“We’re here, and we want to hear your ideas,” he said. “I believe you make better decisions with more options.”
Ideas can be submitted by contacting the OTMC at 570 Research Park Way, Suite 101 in North Logan or visiting the Web site, www.usu.edu/techcomm/.
-kenmhad@cc.usu.edu