Category Archives: Technology Transfer

Tesla's Patent Move That Universities Must Also Make

Posted on June 15, 2014 by Gerald Barnett

Tesla Motors, the electric car manufacturer, has released all of its patents to its competitors. A search at the USPTO for patents and patent applications assigned to Tesla Motors returns 169 issued US patents and 231 published applications. No doubt … Continue reading →

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A maintenance update

Posted on May 29, 2014 by Gerald Barnett

I had a bit of a problem with my WordPress installation after an update of MySQL. I repaired a couple of tables, and things appear to be back on line.

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Seeking that "Oh, Ass" Moment

Posted on May 4, 2014 by Gerald Barnett

The Oh, Ass Moment In The First Men in the Moon by H.G. Wells, the narrator, Bedford, a would-be businessman partnered with Cavor, an inventive genius with no social aspirations, finds himself in a bit of a pickle on the moon, … Continue reading →

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Graphene, or 7300 patents waiting for commercialization

Posted on April 22, 2014 by Gerald Barnett

The BBC is running a cluster of stories today on graphene, a material consisting of a single layer of carbon atoms. The UK angle is that graphene was invented in Britain, but Chinese and American organizations have flooded the area … Continue reading →

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Building Pillar One: Freedom To Innovate

Posted on April 5, 2014 by Gerald Barnett

Of the seven pillars of university new innovation practice, freedom to innovate is the most important. University policies on research and invention were at one time liberal. That is, faculty and students had the freedom to publish, experiment, discuss, collaborate, … Continue reading →

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The Future is Uncertain, and the Exit is not Always Near

Posted on March 19, 2014 by Gerald Barnett

Pitchbook is out with figures for private equity exits in 2013. It is well worth the effort to download a copy of the report from Pitchbook. Highlights include–it’s taking longer to get to a private equity exit, but Q4 of … Continue reading →

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The Seven Pillars of New University Innovation Practice

Posted on March 14, 2014 by Gerald Barnett

Here are the Seven Pillars of the New University Innovation Practice.  Freedom to innovate is not new–it is the form of practice that university faculty developed over the course of 75 years, and was the source of “successes” that were … Continue reading →

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Replication: The Technology Transfer Problem

Posted on March 9, 2014 by Gerald Barnett

Steve Fiori on the SCISP listserv called the list’s attention to a blog post by David Funder, a research psychologist at UC Riverside.  Funder’s post discusses a recent NSF workshop that took up the issue of replication of research results. … Continue reading →

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Shocking, Isn't It?

Posted on February 28, 2014 by Gerald Barnett

That last post pulled a set of things together. Let’s break them out as shorter pieces for folks with less time to read. A Utah state audit found that the University of Utah had inflated its economic development figures. USTAR, … Continue reading →

Posted in Bozonet, Metrics, Technology Transfer | 1 Comment

The Paradise of University Rhetoric About Science and Innovation

Posted on February 28, 2014 by Gerald Barnett

Ian Sample, writing for The Guardian’s ShortcutsBlog, describes how MIT grad students in 2005 created a “fake science report” generator that produced bogus scientific articles for presentation at conferences. Now anyone can download the generator: But this is the hoax … Continue reading →

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