Tech Launch Arizona (TLA), the commercialisation office of University of Arizona (UA), published the results for the 2016 to 2017 academic year on Monday, revealing another record-breaking 12 months.
TLA’s figures are up across the board on last year’s numbers and present continuous increases since the office was created five years ago.
The office announced a total of 261 invention disclosures (up from 250), 334 US patents filed (up from 278), 105 total executed licences and options (up from 97) and 15 new spinouts (up from 14).
The university also celebrated a strong year for its Tech Parks (TPA), which have aligned its economic development efforts with UA’s research focus in areas such as advanced energy, bioscience and defence.
TPA’s incubator, Arizona Center for Innovation, meanwhile welcomed a total of 13 new startups, most of which are affiliated with UA.
David Allen, vice-president of Tech Launch Arizona, said: “We are delighted to see the response of the UA research community to the commercialisation services we have developed.
“Continued invention growth has enabled TLA to build a network of domain experts and commercialization partners who bear witness to UA as a dynamic socket for innovation and commercialization opportunity.
“By combining a core ability to identify, protect and package nascent technology with a responsive network composed of UA alumni and friends, we have developed and scaled a nationally recognised engine for university commercialisation.
“Maintaining the level of growth we have seen over the past few years will be a challenge, but our increased recognition will help attract the attention and resources necessary to make it happen.
“We are going to continue to streamline our processes, engage inventors, and develop external participation on the work of commercialisation.
“By bringing UA’s wicked cool inventions to the world, we contribute to realizing the vision of research creating impact.”
The new spinouts include:
- Acrete, which is working on a concrete replacement material that uses fly ash;
- Avery Therapeutics, which is developing a treatment for heart failure;
- Catalina Pharma, which is creating a therapy for hypothermia caused by anaesthetia;
- Coherent Light Science, a developer of software for chips used in research into optical network technologies;
- Desert Saber, which is working on interactive training software for the mining sector;
- Entemia, which is commercialising a learning management system for UA’s College of Medicine;
- FishFail Technologies, which aims to integrate student information systems and learning management systems;
- Helm Technologies, a producer of small animal cage dividers;
- Lum.ai, which uses natural language processing to search big data based on casual relationships between entries;
- Lunewave, which is set to market a radar that relies on a 3D-printed type of lens called Luneburg lens;
- Magpi, which is working on technology to increase the precision and robustness of images from MRI scanners;
- Nanosonic Bioregants, which is manufacturing reagents that have applications in a wide range of clinical areas, from medical imaging to DNA sequencing;
- Palo Verde Networks, which is working on a way to detect signal quality in networks;
- TPhotonics, which has created a type of laser that is tunable and pulsed; and
- Vap Media, which will offer a variety of content for educational and entertainment use.
