University College Cork, Teagasc, Cork Institute of Technology and Institute of Technology Tralee have joined forces to launch a consortium with a combined research revenue of $160m.

The TTOs of four Irish institutions – University College Cork (UCC), Teagasc, Cork Institute of Technology and Institute of Technology Tralee – yesterday launched a new consortium dubbed Bridge Network, according to the West Cork Times.

The consortium represents a combined research revenue of €145m ($160m). It will enable the sharing of technology transfer expertise across the four universities, helping to boost research commercialisation through the generation of spinouts, licensing and collaboration with industry.

The initiative is funded by state-owned enterprise support agency Enterprise Ireland and its Knowledge Transfer Ireland program, which also manages the capital allocated to TTOs through the Technology Transfer Strengthening Initiative.

The network is also set to establish a program to foster connections between spinouts, VCs and angel investors as well as institutional investors and national agencies. The four partners further hope to sign up entrepreneurs as mentors to early-stage spinouts.

Pat O’Shea, president of UCC, said: “By working together, the Bridge Network of the four technology transfer offices is an exemplar of effective collaboration, creating best practice for commercialisation of research through sharing of expertise while managing IP effectively.

“There have already been many success stories from our technology transfer offices, and together we are in a position to accelerate and drive further success in this area.”

Declan Troy, director of technology transfer at Teagasc, said: “Teagasc has a long history of impactful research across all facets of agriculture and food research from primary production to high value functional foods.

“As part of Teagasc’s commitment to deepening and extending this impact, membership of the Bridge Network under the leadership of UCC affords a platform to exchange best practice and attain maximal efficiency and client satisfaction in the transfer of new research and technology into the hands of the producers and companies.

“Furthermore it has greatly increased our researchers appreciation of maximising such impact thereby stimulating a greater level of meaningful engagements with Teagasc and the Irish agri-food sector.”