The Commission of Experts for Research and Development (EFI), a body that encourages Germany’s Federal Government, highlights in its 2026 annual report that IP transfer makes up a crucial traffic jam in the start-up process. If a start-up’s copyright rights are not protected, it does not have actually the foundation required for developing a viable service model and raising external capital. Complex contractual models and partially diverging expectations between the university and the start-up entrepreneur typically cause lengthy negotiations. Usually, the transfer of such rights currently takes around 18 months– and in individual cases far longer. In the dynamic international start-up landscape, this represents a considerable competitive disadvantage.
As Dr. Ronald Kriedel from the Center for Entrepreneurship and Transfer (CET) at TU Dortmund University underlines: “Fundamental modification will only happen if we choose an approach that no longer undertakings to decrease or exclude all the possible risks related to the transfer of rights but rather acknowledges and promotes the chances. The new requirement is a real advancement that will not only help us to shift scientific advancements and findings to start-ups quicker and effectively but likewise add to their industrial success.”
Developing legal certainty through lean processes
Ina Brandes, Minister for Culture and Science, states: “North Rhine-Westphalia’s science and research landscape offers optimal conditions for spin-offs and start-ups: a density of universities and research organizations special in Europe and strong industrial partners. I am convinced that we can utilize this property much more effectively. To do so, we require standardized processes with clear and easy rules that rapidly create legal certainty and are hence attractive to external investors.”
With this in mind, the team at TU Dortmund University has actually developed a new standard for IP transfer. It establishes a lean, transparent and at the very same time flexible process that is customized to the particular start-up job. A water tight and clearly structured contract of just a few pages controls the transfer of IP rights in a start-up’s different development stages. In the future, the entire negotiation procedure ought to be finished within 3 months at a lot of. Thanks to safeguarded intellectual property rights, start-ups will end up being appealing to external investors faster.
Proven in practice
The new IP transfer basic significantly streamlines and accelerates the whole start-up process. It is a key part in increasing the variety of tech-driven start-ups over the longer term and has actually currently been shown in practice: Simplyfined, a start-up from TU Dortmund University, has successfully concluded the new agreement on the transfer of intellectual property rights. The young business has filed a patent for an ingenious procedure for developing bio-based raw materials from veggie oils as an alternative to petroleum for the chemical market. The raw products are for that reason more sustainable and more eco-friendly and will, in the long term, contribute considerably to securing the independence of Germany’s chemical market.
Dr. Thomas Seidensticker, one of Simplyfined’s creators, discusses: “We are grateful that TU Dortmund University has started this journey with us to make IP move a lot clearer and more effective, also for future spin-offs from deep-tech start-ups. The people accountable at TU Dortmund University have completely remodelled the previous process, and the outcome is a structure that will benefit us as a start-up.”
In the future, universities and start-ups beyond the City of Dortmund could also gain from the contractual model established by the group. At the Ruhr Innovation Lab run collectively by TU Dortmund University and Ruhr University Bochum too, the transfer of copyright rights is really important for transposing knowledge from the universities into start-ups and in this way also into the economy and society.
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