Knowledge Transfer and Innovation: How to make it effective, with examples based on Nano-Commercialization Professor Peter Dobson Academic Director, Begbroke.

Knowledge Transfer and Innovation: How to make it effective, with examples based on Nano-Commercialization

Professor Peter DobsonAcademic Director, Begbroke Science Park

[email protected]

What is Innovation?

• Invention happens and IP is created, Patents filed etc…

• The IP has to be converted into a business or a product: this is the innovative step.

• Managing innovation is a new and poorly understood topic.

• We introduced Enterprise Fellowships to do this in Oxford, and in 3 years out of 17: 7 started companies, and 7 are now full-time Technology Transfer specialists

The Innovation chain

Research

Inventive stepPatents

Spin-out company

CompanyExpands

(sales/marketing)

Productspurchased

Partnership(s)

Products BProducts A

Innovation occurs here!

Transfer of Intellectual Property in Oxford University

Government

Charities

Industry

Assignment of intellectual property rights

New sponsored research

Research funding source

Inside the University Outside the University

Research Services40 Staff

85% Graduates33% Post grad degrees

IP Due Diligence Team

Isis Innovation56 staff

75% Graduates50% Science doctorates

Spin-outs

Licences

Consulting

Innovation at Oxford“Innovation is what happens between invention and revenue generation”

Invention by academic

Spin-off Company

LicenceDeal

Deviceor materials

supplier

End-user

Flotationor acquisition

Departments

OxSec and Venturefest raise awareness

Isis Innovation

Begbroke Science Park: space and industrial links

Continuing Professional Development

KTN and KTP activities

REVENUEINVENTION

Said Business School, MBA etc….

Enterprise Fellowships were created to help start the innovation activity.

How do we encourage innovation?

• Enterprise Fellowships (Begbroke)

• Oxford Science Enterprise Centre (Business school)

• Courses introduced in the undergraduate curriculum

• Creating a new ethos for invention and innovation

Enterprise Fellowships• Industrial Research Fellow

exploit recent research by post-grads/docs• Business Development Fellow

assist Isis Innovation team with the above, with help from Business School

• Knowledge Transfer Fellowwork with Continuing Professional Development to develop new modular courses in topical key areas.

All of these were given training and mentoring by a team of experts

2003/4/5 Enterprise Fellowsexamples of the industrial fellow activities

• Terry Sachlos: Formed TEOX Ltd, Synthetic bone structures

• Tiancun Xiao: Formed Oxford Catalysts plc, novel low Temp catalysts

• John Topping: Formed MFN, thermal control layers

• Cathy Hua Ye: Artificial tissue plans still in progress

• Stephen Bell: Artificial flavours & fragrances, license deal

• Jamie Patterson: Novel imaging techniques, formed Eykona Ltd

•Tim Rayment: several patents then joined a company

•Wolfgang Denzer: formed Oxford Medical Diagnostics Ltd

•Chris Padbury: filed patents, now works for TTP,Cambridge

•John Laczik: formed a diffractive optical element company.

2003/4/5 Enterprise Fellows

• Terry Pollard: assisted several industrial fellows, moved to Oxford Catalysts now back with Isis Innovation.

•Liz Kirby:based in Isis and developed courses on IP, now at Reading KT office

•Andrea Mica: worked with Isis now with IP Group plc

•Giles Dudley: Business development with Isis, now at Edinburgh Univ Innovation

Knowledge Transfer:

•Stuart Wilkinson: NanoBasics and NanoCert courses, now at Isis Innovation

•Jenny Knapp: ClimateBasics and other courses, now at Bristol Univ tech transfer.

•Simon Nee: GRID-service course, now in banking..

Business development

During the Innovation Process: Can we shrink the timescale?

Form partnerships with other companies

Use toll manufacturing

Use other sales/marketing

This is a complex subject but one key to this is to establish the market needs and aim for early revenue generation

Science Parks in Europe

• Some are pure “real estate” with provision of space and minimal management

• Some are embedded in University buildings• A trend is for them to be incorporated within a

University campus setting but fully independent, with help provided to companies regarding facilities and guidance.

At Oxford (Begbroke) the latter is our model and we are learning more about the optimal solution

Begbroke Science Park

• Purchased 1998 with 7500m2 lab/office space.

• Initially mainly Materials Dept. and spin-off activities

• Has a incubator for spin-off and spin-in Companies

• Investment ~£35M (2005) from University, JIF, SRIF, Industry sources

• Prof Peter Dobson Academic Director (2002)

6 miles north of Oxford

city centre

Initial Focus on Advanced Materials, Nanotechnology and Environmental Technology

Another 9000m2 of laboratory and office space will be built in the next 3 years

Begbroke aerial 2008Centre for Innovation and Enterprise

Advanced Processing Laboratory

Institute of Advanced Technology

Centre for Innovation and Enterprise at Begbroke

Mixed types of space

Flexible terms for rental

Close proximity to world-class Materials facilities

Further information:

[email protected]

Institute of Advanced Technology

• Business- focused nanotechnology activities• New energy technologies, hydrogen/solar• Sustainable materials technologies, aero/auto• Environmental management and Water research• All are University inter-departmental

Focus to be “solution driven” problem- solving utilising interdisciplinary teams

Can we embed industry and business personnel in University?

• There is a need to define and match expectations.• The possible benefits for academia are obvious, but are

there benefits for business?• Yes, on a collective basis, but remember that managers

are more focussed on their unit’s performance and absence of valuable people is not attractive.

• Very difficult for SMEs• How can we compensate for this?• What happens next? Some very successful examples of “visiting professors”

giving very useful course enrichment and experience to students.

Embedding University personnel in Business and Industry

• Gives new insight for academics• Do they contribute or are they a drain on

resources? • SMEs are likely to be attracted to the idea• What happens after the attachment?My personal experience was life-changing, I left

Imperial College and joined Philips.Others have gone back to academia and

undertaken more applied research and engaged in teaching with more of a “business focus”

Outline of Nano-Commercialization

• Introduction to nanoscience and nanotechnology

• Oxonica, a company based on making and designing nanoparticles: its history and the lessons that were learned

• Innovation and the possible routes to commercialisation.

• Regulation and safety

Nano-science vs Nano-technology

• New awareness of chemistry, physics and biology especially at the molecular level

• Optimism of what is possible

• Concerns for the impact of scientific research

• Improvements to existing products in terms of performance or value

• New functionality paradigms

• Improve our control and understanding of processes and “life”.

Quantum Corrals: works of art but are they useful?

http://www.almaden.ibm.com/vis/stm/corral.html

They enable us to visualise where electrons are in 2-D structures

Nanotechnology: Fact or FictionGlass that cleans itself

Nanorobots on the loose

Less polluting fuels

Fact

Fact

Fiction

Safe Sunscreens Fact

Matching expectations of Scientists and Technologists

• Scientists view things on a short time scale! Their measure of success is simple: publications in top peer-reviewed journals

• Technologists have a longer, more tortuous time scale. Measure of success is to manufacture and sell into a market

How Oxonica started: the original vision

• Research on manufacture of luminescent nanoparticles in the late 1990s at Oxford led to belief that we could offer low voltage nanoparticle phosphor materials to the field emission display industry.

• This idea was flawed, because industry wanted a complete solution and not a small part of the solution.Note a field emission display needs electron emitters, the phosphors, a screen, fully integrated into a product.

• Attention was then given to nanoparticle sunscreens and diesel fuel catalyst additives. The former had strong internal University IP, the latter did not.

Oxonica plc• University of Oxford spin-out formed 1999 after 7 years background

research• Focus on Energy, Environment and Healthcare• “Solution Provider” ethos• £2.3M from Angels and DTI awards• £8.2M from Institutional Funding• Revenue generating from 2002• Tailoring nanoparticles for customer applications, building revenues

based on IP generation• Floated on AIM 20-7-05, market cap. £35M• Took over Nanoplex (US) 20-12-05• Deal with a Turkish oil company broke down in 2007, reduced

valuation.• ~40 Employees, strong commercial and industrial experience.• Current shares trade at ~20p (September 2008)

Early Oxonica products

Grown by colloidal solution growth

Size-tuning of optical properties

Quantum dots are still looking for a high value application!

Nanophosphor particles Y2O3:Eu

Mild anneal

High temperature heating

Detail of surface

Field Emission Display

This technology did not “take off” largely because the emitters were not reliable.

It taught us a lesson: Think about providing the complete solution.

The early lessons

• Discard the idea of pushing clever nanotechnology

• Try to provide a complete solution to a market need

• Quantum dots were “fashionable” but where is the market? (this is true today!)

Phase 0 Idea

Phase 1Feasibility

Phase 2Proof ofConcept

Phase 3Scale-up

Phase 4 Pre-

commercial

Phase 5Commercial

Sunscreens

Fuel EmissionCatalyst

Early RevenueGenerators

Printing Inks

TCOs fordevices

Biodiagnostics

Oxonica product pipeline

New product concepts forHealthcare & Environment

Biodiagnostics is risky unless you have quantified the market need and supply chain

TCOs have become a very important market need

Transparent conducting oxides

Cleaning up diesel exhaust with “Envirox”

Examples of diesel exhaust particles

These are regular carbon particles bound together by thick unburnt

hydrocarbons.

Based on a Cerium Oxide nanoparticles dispersed in hydrocarbon solvent

Fuel-borne additive

Nanoscale particle size ~20-40nmExtremely high catalyst surface area

Direct addition to diesel fuel:Fuel-borne catalysis

Approx. 5ppm Cerium OxideLow application rate – only 1 litre of

Envirox to 4000 litres of fuelNo engine modifications required

Hong Kong Field Trial – Cummins Engine

1.05

1.15

1.25

1.35

1.45

1.55

Apr-02

May-02

Jun-02

Jul-02

Aug-02

Sep-02

Oct-02

Nov-02

Dec-02

Jan-03

Feb-03

Mar-03

Apr-03

Fu

el C

on

sum

pti

on

km

/litr

e

Additised Group Unadditised Group

Pre-trial period Trial period Post-trial period

Envirox™: Fuel Economy Performance

Has Envirox worked?

• Yes, it has proved its value in conventional diesel engines (up to 14% improvement in fuel consumption and reduced particle emissions) and turbodiesels.

• But, it is not effective in high sulfur content fuels (surely sulphur should be eliminated before point-of-sale?)

• It may yet find other applications as an “in situ” combustion catalyst

Optisol TM®

• The “driver” for this product was the evidence that most “transparent” sunscreens in the 1990s posed a health hazard.

• Nanoparticles of titania are used so that they appear transparent to visible light on the skin, but block UV

• The titania is doped in a special way so that it does not behave as a photocatalyst (that would cause skin damage)

• The new titania particles prevent the formation of “free radicals” and hence the formulation lasts much longer in sunlight and protects the skin.

Other thoughts to improve sunscreens (1999-2000)

• Could we convert uv light to visible? ZnO could be used as a “convertor”

• Was the idea of using TiO2 doped to make it p-type a general solution?

• Could this be used to make other uv protective layers in the paint and plastics industries?

Titania sunscreen nanoparticles

150nm

3+

Mn2+

Surface Mn2+ free radical scavenging

Mn2+ Mn3+ + e-

Mn2+ + OH Mn3+ + OH-

Mn3+ + O2 Mn2+ + O2

Rutile P42/mnm Titanium Oxide lattice

k

E

Conduction Band

Valence Band

Mn3+ level

Schematic band structure

UV light

h+

e-

New doped titania products

• Enhanced performance for many other cosmetic foundation formulations

• Possible use as a uv protective agent in coatings and polymers: “Solacor”®

Doped Titania for UV protection

Sunscreen/cosmetics Paints/coatings Polymer additive

Establish materials supplier, probably different for each application

Formulate and sell direct

Partner with established company

Saves investment, makes use of sales/distribution, but

could lose “value”

Retains control and value, but requires

investment in sales/distribution

Oxonica, new lessons!

• Make use of core technology to provide solutions

• Provide solutions where there is a market need• Early revenue generation is essential• Balance the team, remember sales/marketing,

but keep a strong technical base• Collaborate with universities• Form strategic alliances to speed time-to-market

and reduce costs

Overall ConclusionsHow can we speed up Innovation?

• Never “push technology” but look for market-led solution provision

• Develop a balanced team, especially help with sales/marketing, but do not neglect the technical team

• Try to shorten the time from invention to revenue generation by partnerships

• Treat investors’ money as your own and respect their risk and confidence

So how do we decide on the optimum route?

• License deal?This has advantages for a swift form of revenue generation, but it needs careful choice and decisions about exclusivity

• Spin-off company?Probably the best option for very novel and disruptive technology.

• Form partnerships?Need to have good reasons: access to markets could be quicker; access to scaled-up manufacturing…..

Regulation and Safety

• There are concerns about safety of nanoparticles “the new asbestos?”

• There are responsible programmes to investigate these issues, eg: NANOSAFE2, DEFRA, …..

• Funding is probably inadequate, and SMEs have substantial burden if they mount a programme. (Oxonica has done a lot of testing and been involved in most of the safety groups)

• There are important implications for founders of companies using “nano”, and in any case, a medical application will have to comply with FDA regulations (used as the “gold standard” by many countries)

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For further details contact: [email protected]