Biomedical Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
Complicating this is the fact that the research leading to the
development of the contact lens tissue transfer technique was
performed at a university with a clear and distinct intellectual
property policy. The decision to pay for a patent is therefore one to
be made by the university's technology transfer office rather than the
individual inventors. The technology transfer office for the University
of New South Wales, NewSouth Innovations Pty Ltd, has no current
listingfortheavailabilityofthistechnology(
http://www.nsinnovations.
com.au
). The Australian Patents Database shows two lapsed
applications for something called an 'Occular Regeneration Method'
under the name of one of the inventors, yet no further information is
publicly available relating to the application. What the commercial
prospects are for the technique are thus largely unknown.
4.3
So where are the commercial opportunities?
The four examples discussed above highlight one key feature of the
commercial prospects of adult stem cell research: that the primary
commercial avenue lies in licensing proprietary techniques.
Interestingly, while there are some indications that off-the-shelf
products are in development, the clearly preferred model for any
clinical application from adult stem cells is in the autologous market.
This marked preference for autologous treatment methods could be
regarded as both the natural evolution of over two hundred years of
scientific and technical knowledge about how the body repairs itself
and also a function of the more recent clinical history of transplantation
medicine that has focused on overcoming barriers to tissue grafts.
Regeneus has the most clearly defined commercial model so far,
working on building partnerships with client services providers in
order to distribute their trademarked product. The Regeneus model
is a quite typical pathway for a biotechnology company: spinning out
a patentable process from university-based research into a viable
commercial idea that can then either be further capitalized as it
develops or sold on to a larger company as the management and
market development gets more complicated. This is the classic model
of the scientist-entrepreneur made famous by the success of Genentech
