Research Agreements
Under Research Agreement the contractor (here: the University) provides research results for a third party ( procurer ) .
The following are advised to be set in the Research Agreement
- determining exact and detailed research tasks to be performed by the university divided into milestones related to expertise and timeframe;
- future plans regarding intellectual property rights prior to signing the agreement (Background IP);
- future plans regarding intellectual property rights provided by research activity set in the agreement (Foreground IP);
- confidentiality rules;
- conditions of publishing research results;
- determining technological, business and economic risk sharing;
- liability and compensation.
Under Research Agreement it is advised to ensure that the third party finances at least the following
- expenses related to all persons involved in implementing the project (including social affixes charged to the employer);
- expenses of tools and materials necessary to implement the project and other related fees (including tool amortisation and travelling expenses);
- expenses related to utilizing tools of the university (especially tools of high value)
- overhead, as set in related rules;
- VAT (if relevant).
Intellectual property in Research Agreements with enterprises
- In order to establish claims the rate of intellectual contribution (authorship ratio) have to be taken into consideration regarding intellectual property rights. The corporation, if interested in future commercialization, usually receives primary optional rights for commercialization of the research results of the project in the market. The university usually receives a royalty honour from the incomings of future commercialization and is at the same time granted utilization rights also applicable for alliance for those areas of utilization that are external to the economic interest area of the enterprise.
- The university beholds authority rights of software produced within the framework of the project or research programme by providing non-exclusive, free of charge or royalty based licence according to the Research Agreement guidelines regarding the commercialization area. Utilization authority is exclusive only when the software is created independently within the framework of the project or research programme and if the development of the software is not based on a formerly existing software.
- The researchers at the university shall be granted the opportunity to publish their research results of the project or research programme following the reasonable deadline of filing a patent application.
- Throughout forming intellectual property rights related conditions it may be decisive whether the research programme subject to the agreement is prepared by the university/customer independently or in cooperation of parties.
Intellectual property in Research Agreement with public-funding and non-profit institutions
The university usually beholds the rights regarding free of charge usage, business utilization and free publication of research results in Research Agreement made with public-funding and non-profit institutions.
Employees
Researchers involved in the research activity within the Research Agreement shall in all cases be employed by the university. If a person who is employed by a third party works on the infrastructure of the university, which is an extraordinary case, the person’s data, place of work, duration of work are transferred to the head of Technology and Knowledge Transfer Office. Data has to be shared for the sake of proper confidentiality.
Other types of agreements:
Updated: 2019.08.13.
