KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — New technologies can be commercialized more quickly under a plan adopted Friday by the University of Tennessee Research Corporation and Lockheed Martin Energy Research Corporation.
Dr. David Patterson, who chairs UTRC, and Homer Fisher, UT senior vice president, signed a memo of cooperation with Bill Martin, Lockheed Martin vice president of technology transfer, in a ceremony at UT-Knoxville.
Fisher, vice chairman of UTRC, said UT and Lockheed Martin formed a partnership last year to encourage joint research. The new agreement allows new technologies developed from joint research to be licensed and patented much more easily.
“This agreement builds on the strengths that Lockheed Martin and UT have in bringing forward new technologies through the process of patenting and licensing and, ultimately, getting them to the commercial application stage,” Fisher said. “We are very pleased to see our relationship moving toward more cooperation and better technology transfer.”
Fisher said potential joint projects include advanced manufacturing technologies, waste management and environmental restoration, biological and health science and information technology.
Martin said the agreement will help UT and Lockheed Martin work with other companies even in cases not involving joint research.
“If there are technologies — one from Lockheed Martin and one from UT — that an outside company needs to secure, they can now deal with one document and one negotiation instead of two,” Martin said. “Whether the research is done jointly or not, this enables us to license our intellectual properties together.”
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Contact: Homer Fisher (423-974-3211)
David Patterson (423-974-5227)