A set of Facilitators that drive the Technology Transfer Offices (TTO) in the actual effective and efficient practices of TT

Abstract

The objective of this article is to present a set of “Facilitators” that drive the Technology Transfer Offices (TTO) in the actual effective and efficient practices of TT. People perfectly recognize that life quality depends today on their science and technology regional advances. An increase in the economic and cultural levels (progress) is only possible if the development of human resources have a high priority. The Technology Transfer has a central position in these problems and the cooperation between R&D institutions and enterprises, from its surrounding environment, is one of the most important instruments to govern the process. Today, the science becomes a more important human activity, and questions related to the science are criteria of its maturity [nov91]. This scenario of science and technology change/evolution, seen in conjunction with the R&D institutions and companies, as key players in scientific and technology system, begins to takes effect in those institutions. It instigated scientific interest to figure out if the actors that participate in this process, the used mechanisms and the procedures are aligned toward the most adequate direction. Moreover, today, it is impossible study the relationships between the most important actors without taking into account the most important interface structure to manage the processes - the TTO. In some cases called Office of Technology Commercialization (OTC) – meaning an increase in commercial philosophy leading by profit. The article shows the results of a research that gathered information from some US TTOs, most of then in the State of Texas. We describe a master plan that explains the high-level view in management of technology transfer (TT). We show this plan as steps in a TT process, each step with its facilitators. The collection of facilitators reflects an overview and translation, to our Master Plan, of what is largely understood as the actual best practices. One of the most important result of our research was the compilation of 271 rules referring to 43 facilitator distributed in seven groups of facilitators. The methodological procedures consisted of documental analysis, interviews and surveys to validate the facilitators and its rules.