CTCO TRAINING IN TBILISI

17 Dec 2007

The STCU’s Chief Technology Commercialization Officer (CTCO) Program began in Georgia with the first training session for CTCO candidates from invited Georgian scientific institutes occurring on 18-30 November in Tbilisi. This Georgian participation is part of the expansion of the successful CTCO Program first established in Ukraine earlier in 2007, and also recently started in Azerbaijan. The CTCO Program seeks to establish technology transfer officers in selected R&D institutes, in cooperation with those institutes and with national science authorities. The goal is for these CTCO candidates to become the central point within their institutes for beneficial commercial technology licensing and business development.

The first phase training focused on technology management and was delivered by the Georgian National Intellectual Property Center, National Institute of Intellectual Property and Law (Ukraine), and the Center for Small Business Development “Kharkiv Technologies” (Ukraine). The Georgian and Ukrainian experts offered lectures, role-playing activities, and case studies on intellectual property management, business plan writing, technology cost evaluation, and negotiation of licensing agreements. The Georgian CTCO participants are now conducting (as homework assignments) technological audits and commercialization planning in their institutes.

The next training phase is planned for January 2008, to review and assess the homework assignments.