Worldwide Impact
The International Technology Transfer Institute (ITTI) Clinic's mission is to advance science, technology, and innovation in developing countries via advocacy, education, and capacity building in intellectual property (IP) management, technology transfer, and patent information systems. ITTI Clinic students construct patent landscapes, forge international networks, formulate strategic plans, draft reports, author publications, present at professional meetings, and engage in detailed strategic discussions with key organizations such as the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, United States Patent and Trademark Office, the World Bank, the World Intellectual Property Organization, and the World Health Organization.
The ITTI mission is to help improve the marketplace distribution of technology in countries with low market flow, with the longer term goal as the establishment of globally connected innovation ecosystems. ITTI focuses on helping academic and governmental research organizations build TTO intermediaries to manage both the acquisition of proprietary knowledge to augment technology development and the transfer of new technologies to the marketplace once they are developed. Providing the education and training necessary to build TTO intermediaries is a major part of ITTI’s program.
Listen to Professor Stanley Kowalski on The Legal Impact podcast discussing COVID-19
ITTI project activities fall into two broad categories: (1) Patent Landscape Projects and (2) IP and Global Development Projects. Whereas these can be discrete modules for an entire semester, i.e., solely patent landscape or global development projects, there can also be significant overlap and synergy between the two modalities. For example, by integrating patent information, analysis and presentation with IP and innovation management strategy for a developing country or region, a more comprehensive approach to the complex challenges of IP and international development can be conceptualized: a patent landscape of a neglected disease vaccine can illustrate how a methodical and strategic approach to IP management and technology transfer capacity building could accelerate access to advanced innovations in health.
Specific, measurable, student learning outcomes include greater knowledge of the role of IP in economic development; students learn and practice skills, such as complex interdisciplinary research, to formulate policy and propose strategic options which can then foster equitable and sustainable application of IP to the development of emerging economies. Also, ITTI projects stress the importance of teamwork, including the ability to work together towards a common goal.
This Clinic is taught by Professor Stanley Kowalski.
