Innovation

There are many options as to who you can contact. UiT has several formal cooperation that students can use, some of them are listed below. You can also directly contact us at UiT to find the right person to talk to through: innovasjon@uit.no.

For you information: UiT and our cooperation partners has duty of confidentiality and will therefore not share any of your information.

• Idégeneratoren
• Start UiT
• Norinnova

There is many opportunities to get money for your idea that might not be that visible. Dependent on where you are in the idea phase you will be able to find good schemes that gives you the opportunity to develop your idea.

Get in touch with us through innovasjon@uit.no or read more under: Students: Innovation and Commercialization/Financing

There is many innovation and commercialising courses at UiT. Many courses can be taken without prerequisites, while others demands a background in either, bachelor, master's degree or has prerequisites. 

We have innovation courses at the following faculties: 

• Biotechnology Fisheries and Economics Faculty
• Tromsø School of Business (HHT)
• Humanities, media and art and music subjects (the Faculty of Arts)
• Teacher educations and educations in pedagogy
• Social studies and law (coming)
• Engineering subjects, natural science and technology subjects
• IVT faculty (coming)
• Faculty of Health Sciences
• Marine subjects (coming)
• Transport and safety subjects (coming)
• Researcher education

Read more about innovation courses at UiT by going to: Students: Innovation and commercialization/Competence and education.

Students own their own research results, ideas and inventions. If UiT sees a need to take over students' research results, individual agreements must be done. Such an agreement will regulate the parties' rights and obligations. When utilizing the results commercially, students have the same right to reasonable remuneration as UiT's employees.1/3 model as described in 1.3.2. Remuneration.

Students are not required to report.

When UiT's employees have reached research results that can obtain legal protection by registering with public registers and / or being exploited commercially, he / she is obliged to give written notice of this to the employer on a set form. UiT wants the research results to be used commercially, for example through a licensing or start-up, so that it benefits society and pays off financially. Norinnova AS assists UiT in the work of developing the research results in a commercial direction with the aim of reducing technical and commercial risk towards the establishment of a company or the conclusion of a license agreement / transfer agreement.

DOFI form: UiT and UNN have a common form to be used by employees at both institutions.

The DOFI form is to be filled out and sent to UiT and / or UNN at the following addresses:

UNN's employees: The professional and research center: dofi@unn.no

UIT's employees: SEFU: dofi@uit.no

If there are several inventors, an inventor agreement / Inventors Contribution Agreement (separate form) must be concluded.

Notification form for work results / ideas - DOFI (one form Norwegian / English): PDF - DOC

UiT wants the research results to be used, either commercially (eg licensing or company establishment) or for the benefit of society. The subchapter "commercialization of research" deals with the research results that may mean commercial application. It is about rights and obligations related to ownership, and also about the duty to report and remuneration.

When UiT's employees have reached research results that can obtain legal protection by registering with public registers and / or being exploited commercially, he / she is obliged to give written notice of this to the employer on a set form. UiT wants the research results to be used commercially, for example through a licensing or a company establishment, so that it benefits society and pays off financially. Norinnova AS assists UiT in the work of developing the research results in a commercial direction with the aim of reducing technical and commercial risk towards the establishment of a company or the conclusion of a license agreement / transfer agreement.

A DOFI-form must be sent in

• Notification form for work results / ideas - DOFI (one form Norwegian / English):  PDF - DOC
• Inventors Contribution Agreement (English only): DOC

The DOFI form is filled in and sent to UiT and / or UNN at the following addresses:

• UNN employees: The subject and research center: dofi@unn.no
• UIT employees: SEFU:dofi@uit.no

Watch an innovation breakfast about the subject: Hvordan er prosessen etter innsendt DOFI?

A patent consists of a set of exclusive rights granted by a sovereign state to an inventor or their assignee for a limited period of time in exchange for the public disclosure of an invention. 

For an invention to be patentable it:

• Must be new (not belonging ti the state of the art);
• Must involve an inventive step (not easily conceivable by any person having an expertise in the relevant discipline);
• Must be capable of industrial application (to be used in the industry)

Patenting (the process):

Norinnova always perform a prior art study/patentiability study before patenting

• Free of cost for inventors - Norinnova cover costs
• Process involving patent lawyer, inventor(s) and Norinnova
• Inventors need to support with writing, data and advise
• No publications before patent is filed!
• Includes abstract, posters, presentations etc.
• External collaborations to be secured by confidentiality agreements (CDA/NDA, MTA)
• Norinnova normally prefer PCT (Patent Cooperation Treaty)
• "Buy time" (30 months from filing before national phase)
• Delay major costs uuntil commercial partner is "on board"

The anatomy of a patent

A typical patent consists of four main parts;

1. Front page(s)
2. Drawings
3. Specification
   - A background section
   - A list of drawings
   - A detailed description
4. Claims
   - Claims are the most important part of the document and describe what the patent does or do not cover!

Licensing

A legal agreemment where an invention can be commercialized by a company. It gives the company permission to use the invention to sell.

What happens for the researcher in the event of licensing?

• Potential future income from project; inventors (1/3) and research group (1/3)
• Future collaboration with company?
• Consulting?
• Handling over know-how, materials, protocols etc.
• Support patents
• Confidentiality
• Right to improvements?
• Rights to publish