News

COMMERCIALISATION SUCCESS

Omodo GmbH

Brunel concludes Major Licence Agreement in the Sustainable Manufacturing Sector

The Brunel Commercialisation Office has recently concluded a licensing agreement with a German company, Omodo GmbH that owns patent rights to a process called Zelfo. This process has the potential to treat sustainable composites and use the composites to replace products that are at present manufactured with conventional synthetic polymers.

Over the next twelve months Dr Karnik Tarverdi of Brunel’s Wolfson Centre for Materials Processing and Centre for Phosphors and Display Materials will be collaborating with Omodo to develop advanced materials preservation and processing techniques. It is expected that, as a direct result of Brunel’s contribution to the collaboration project, the background Zelfo Intellectual Property will become significantly more valuable since the composite could be used to manufacture products and parts of components that have eluded present conventional processing techniques using Zelfo.

The resultant enhanced process technology will enable the production of complex three dimensional products, which could have application in a diverse range of product sectors such as electronics, house hold and office environment, prisons and others. Immediately following the collaborative project, the plan is for Omodo to conclude multiple licence agreements with companies in all of these sectors.

Under the deal between Brunel and Omodo, the University will earn royalties on every unit of product sold by licensees incorporating the Omodo technology. Because of the large number of potential applications for the technology, it is expected that the financial benefit to Brunel should be quite significant.

Arjo Wiggins

The prospect of an enhanced commercial income stream into the University has been advanced recently with the signature of a highly significant assignment agreement for Brunel’s printed circuits technology with the French multinational, Arjo Wiggins.

The technology behind this agreement is the use of offset lithographic printing for the production of electronics. The research team from the School of Engineering and Design, (Blue Ramsey, Peter Evans, Gareth Hay, Darren Southee and David Harrison), have printed conductors, sensors, displays, and power sources using this technology.

Brunel has transferred this particular IP twice before, firstly to a Scottish start-up and, after that, to the British Technology Group (BTG). The latter recently underwent a restructuring and transferred the IP back to Brunel.

“Being able to generate income into the University from the same piece of IP from multiple partners is quite an achievement”, notes Adrian Simon, Director of Commercialisation.

This time it is hoped that the IP will not revert back to Brunel. Our partner on this occasion, Arjo Wiggins, is a truly large player in the worldwide paper market, with activities around the world in product sectors as diverse as design, communication and marketing to security (banknotes), decorative papers for laminates (furniture and flooring) as well as paper used in the production of synthetic leather. “Arjo Wiggins has been a really important collaboration partner for Brunel in joint research projects across a number of years”, says Professor David Harrison.

The Brunel technology is currently undergoing tests in the US in a product that is still under wraps, but that will be launched later in the year.

Adrian Simon notes: “Our intention is that this deal will be the first of hopefully many with important multinationals in our areas of expertise and marks the first tangible success for the newly formed Commercialisation Office.