U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
NATIONAL INSTITUTES OF HEALTH NIH News
NIH Office of the Director (OD) <http://www.nih.gov/icd/od/>
Office of Technology Transfer (OTT) <http://www.ott.nih.gov/>
For Immediate Release: Monday, November 28, 2011
CONTACT: Bonny Harbinger, 301-594-7700, <e-mail:harbinger@xxxxxxx>
NIH ANSWERS CALL TO STREAMLINE TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER PROCESS
Cutting-edge website reduces response time for unpatented materials from six months to a few days
The National Institutes of Health is launching the electronic Research Materials catalogue (eRMa)( www.ott.nih.gov/erma/) to streamline the federal government's technology transfer process. This project addresses one of the important directives in a Presidential memorandum related to the commercialization of federal research and support for high-growth business potential. eRMa was designed and developed by the Office of Technology Transfer (OTT) at NIH with support from the NIH's National Cancer Institute Center for Cancer Research.
More than 6,000 researchers at NIH laboratories help to drive the research and discovery process. These NIH researchers make unpatented materials available to companies through internal use licenses executed by the OTT to support the continued advancement of scientific research. Examples of materials include mouse models used to develop new cancer therapies and cell lines used to test new therapies for chronic diseases, such as high blood pressure. An NIH internal use license is a contract that governs the transfer of tangible research materials from NIH to a company for commercial research use.
The new system will streamline the licensing process by:
-- Providing a website for companies to find and license unpatented materials using a ready-to-go contract.
-- Allowing a company to pay online through Pay.gov(https://www.pay.gov/paygov/) and receive the materials from the lab quickly.
-- Providing faster turn-around time and simplifying the process for companies to find research materials available from NIH labs.
"To stay competitive in today's world, on-line ordering is a requirement. With the launch of this first-of-its kind system, OTT is demonstrating its intention to meet that challenge," said Mark Rohrbaugh, director of OTT.
For non-profit research organizations interested in obtaining NIH materials through a material transfer agreement, the NIH will launch the Transfer Agreement Dashboard in December. This web-based system will have a broad array of beneficiaries including NIH scientists and technology transfer staff as well as researchers and technology transfer offices at universities and non-profit research institutions.
The NIH Office of Technology Transfer administers approximately $97 million annually in royalty payments from about 500 companies that reported product sales of approximately $6 billion last year. The OTT manages the patenting and licensing of the wide range of inventions made by NIH and FDA scientists as mandated by the Federal Technology Transfer Act and related legislation. For more information, visit <http://www.ott.nih.gov> or <www.ott.nih.gov/erma>.
About the National Institutes of Health (NIH): NIH, the nation's medical research agency, includes 27 Institutes and Centers and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. NIH is the primary federal agency conducting and supporting basic, clinical, and translational medical research, and is investigating the causes, treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases. For more information about NIH and its programs, visit <www.nih.gov>.
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