The National Institutes of Health launched a new site on Tuesday, the electronic Research Materials catalogue (eRMa) that aims to streamline the federal government’s technology transfer process.
The new site will quicken the licensing process by providing a website for companies to find and license unpatented materials using a ready-to-go contract. A company will be able to pay online through Pay.gov and receive the materials from the lab quickly while also providing a faster turn-around time. The catalogue was developed to simplify the process for companies to find research materials available from NIH labs.
eRMa was designed and developed by the Office of Technology Transfer (OTT) at NIH with support from the NIH’s National Cancer Institute Center for Cancer Research.
“To stay competitive in today’s world, on-line ordering is a requirement. With the launch of this first-of-its kind system, OTT is demonstrating its intention to meet that challenge,” said Mark Rohrbaugh, director of OTT.
NIH researchers make unpatented materials available to companies through internal use licenses executed by the OTT to support the continued advancement of scientific research.
The NIH Office of Technology Transfer administers approximately $97 million annually in royalty payments from about 500 companies that reported product sales of approximately $6 billion last year. The OTT manages the patenting and licensing of the wide range of inventions made by NIH and FDA scientists as mandated by the Federal Technology Transfer Act and related legislation.
