Research Roadmap

Before you share your research findings to an external partner, you need to make sure that you are legally supported by Amsterdam UMC. The type of legal support can vary per proposal type. You can think about advice on grant agreements, consortium agreements, non-disclosure agreements, letters of intent and other legal documents.

It may be necessary to protect your idea, knowledge or findings beforebringing them into the public domain. The intellectual property protection can have many forms, the most known one is filling for a patent. IXA is the expertise office to best advise you for the best IP protection strategy.

Here you can find more details about the patent application process, rules and rights regarding rewarding of the inventors in case of commercial exploitation of the patent.

Even with a patent, you still need proper arrangements in place before sharing your knowledge outside Amsterdam UMC. For instance, if a company or other entity shows an interest in your research results or project close a Confidentiality Agreement before disclosing any details. Once signed, this document, also referred to as a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) or confidential disclosure agreement (CDA), enables open discussion while protecting the rights of each partner.

Patenting before publishing

Be aware that it is not possible to receive patent protection after details of an innovation have already entered the public domain. This includes scientific literature. Rule of thumb is patentingbeforepublishing! Under the proper circumstances, you can start publishing your results while still in the application process for a patent.