University College Dublin’s (UCD) technology transfer office at NovaUCD has announced the launch of a new online licensing platform (http://licence.ucd.ie) to promote and license technologies developed at the university. The platform provides three options to potential licensees to access UCD technologies: ‘buy it now’; ‘obtain a non-commercial licence’; and ‘make an inquiry’. The technologies included under the ‘buy it now’ option can be broadly classified as research tools, such as cell lines, vectors or certain software, with relatively low inherent value. Until now members of UCD’s technology transfer team spent significant time negotiating bespoke licences for such technologies. In order to streamline this process UCD partnered with Aficionado Technologies Ltd, a UCD spin-out company, to develop and launch the UCD Online Licensing Platform to license such technologies on a non-exclusive basis, to multiple users, for a relatively small one-time payment, in a seamless manner. The easy-to-navigate and search engine optimised platform incorporates a simple, non-negotiable, one-page licence agreement for the ‘buy-it-now’ technologies available on the platform. The platform also incorporates Stripe to accept, manage, and track online credit card payments thus eliminating the need for back office tasks such as manual invoicing or processing of payments. This considerably reduces the time required to complete licensing deals. Potential licensees can also use the new platform to seek non-commercial licences to certain UCD technologies (mainly academic users). In addition, inquires to the technology transfer team can be made through the platform, in relation to other UCD technologies, such as patented inventions, which require more bespoke licensing negotiations. UCD has now licensed the technology behind the UCD Online Licensing Platform to Aficionado enabling it market the platform to other technology transfer offices in Ireland and internationally. Dr Kevin McCarthy, CEO and founder of Aficionado, said: “We are very happy that the UCD Licensing Platform is now live, available to the public and showcasing the available licensing opportunities. The Aficionado Licences product is a welcome addition to our suite of university resource management software and we would like to thank NovaUCD for their help in the creation and development of this solution.” The platform has already generated inquires from Ireland, the UK, continental Europe, the US, South America, Asia and the Middle East, and a number of commercial and non-commercial licences have already been executed through the platform. The UCD Online Licensing Platform has also been shortlisted for a Knowledge Transfer Ireland (KTI) 2015 Impact Award, in the Knowledge Transfer Initiative category. This award category recognises the most innovative and creative initiative in knowledge transfer that was implemented by the Technology Transfer/Industry Liaison Office at a state-funded RPO within the last year. The winner of this category, along with a Knowledge Transfer Achiever category, will be announced at the KTI ‘Licensing Intellectual Property–Strategies and Pitfalls’ workshop to be held on November 13 at Killashee Hotel, Naas, Co Kildare.