Innovation amplified in one Penn stroke

The upgrade to University of Pennsylvania’s (Upenn) tech transfer programme has concluded with the official launch of the institution’s new research commercialisation initiative.

Called the Penn Centre for Innovation, the new organisation was formally opened by Pennsylvania president Amy Gutmann earlier this week. The updated programme consolidates the university’s existing Centre for Technology Transfer with other groups on campus working on the commercialisation of Upenn technologies under one roof.

At the official launch, Gutman said: “The new Penn Centre for Innovation that we inaugurate today embraces great teamwork as an organizing principle and is part of a major plan to advance innovation at Penn. Innovation is the key to new products and processes, new opportunities and sometimes entirely new industries. Over the past six years commercialisation agreements at Penn are up more than 600 percent and startups have more than doubled.  The Penn Centre for Innovation will do even more to accelerate this impressive momentum.”

Upenn is already a major player in terms of tech transfer. Ranked second in the world earlier this year by Global University Venturing, the institution brought in $86.9m in revenues through its tech transfer and licensing efforts during 2012-13, and launched 26 spin-outs – the highest number of any university seen by GUV for the period.