In mid-October, the Office of the Inter-Ministerial Joint Conference on the Implementation of Intellectual Property Strategy released the second batch of typical cases of the construction of an intellectual property power, and the reform model of ownership of post scientific and technological achievements of "empowerment + transfer + agreed income" was selected as the only case in Anhui, adding another national-level institutional innovation achievement to the China (Anhui) Free Pilot Zone.
Why can this reform model, pioneered by USTC, stand out and become a national-level institutional innovation achievement?What does it have to do with Hefei?
"Divide the land" or "divide the grain" first
In 2017, after graduating from the University of Science and Technology of China with a Ph.D., Xia Yulong chose to stay at the university to engage in scientific research. He never imagined that he would step into another "river" of his life.
In June 2023, Zhongke Nengda Electronic Technology Co., Ltd. was established in Hefei, and 33-year-old Xia Yulong served as the company's technical director. The "light" in the eyes of this young scientific and technological worker has changed.
In the laboratory, Xia Yulong focuses on the theoretical research of electromagnetism and regards publication as a harvest and achievement. Now, he is focusing on the application of electromagnetic technology in specific scenarios. For example, wireless charging of mobile phones, capsule endoscopic robots, and so on.
Although it is still in the field of electromagnetic technology, the track has completely changed. Xia Yulong said that this change is not only based on the team's deep technical accumulation, but also determined by an innovative work carried out by the University of Science and Technology of China.
In February 2020, the Ministry of Science and Technology and other 9 departments issued the "Pilot Implementation Plan for Granting Scientific Research Personnel the Ownership or Long-term Use Right of Scientific and Technological Achievements", and USTC was selected as one of the pilot units in the country, pioneering the "empowerment + transfer + agreed income" model, which opened up a new path for the transfer and transformation of scientific and technological achievements.
This is the innovative work that Xia Yulong said. Specifically, in the transformation of scientific and technological achievements, after empowerment, the ownership part of the school is transferred to the inventor on the basis of the agreed income, and the inventor obtains all the scientific and technological achievements as shares, and the school enjoys the future benefits of scientific and technological achievements through the transfer agreement.
In fact, "empowerment + transfer + agreed income" solves the problem of "land distribution" or "grain distribution" first.
In the past, land and grain belonged to the state, and peasants distributed grain according to their work through labor, and their enthusiasm could not be fully mobilized. ”
Once, this analogy on the Internet resonated with many science and technology workers. In the transformation of scientific and technological achievements in colleges and universities, the same principle applies. In the past, the "transformation first, then reward" was equivalent to "grain distribution", while the "first confirmation of rights, then transformation" established by USTC is equivalent to "land distribution". It is clear that "land is divided first, and grain is distributed later", which fundamentally breaks through the barrier of scientific research personnel's "reluctance to transfer".
Not only that, when scientific researchers use the "empowerment + transfer" of post scientific and technological achievements for investment, they actually have complete ownership of the post scientific and technological achievements, the transformation process is simplified, the efficiency is high, and the state-owned assets can also enjoy the future benefits brought by the development of the transformation company through the way of "agreed income".
Driven by this new model, a number of scientific and technological achievements that were originally placed on the "shelves" have undergone rapid changes.
"Turn" out of 35 companies.
After the launch of the empowerment reform pilot, Wei Feng, the business director of the Office of Science and Technology Achievement Transfer and Transformation of USTC, has become even busier, receiving entrepreneurial inquiries from school teachers almost every day.
Wei Feng told reporters that within two years after the reform, USTC transformed 38 achievements through empowerment pilots, involving 154 intellectual property rights, and transformed 35 companies, covering chips, biomedicine, anti-corrosion materials and other subdivisions.
contrast, you can better understand the concept of numbers. According to the statistics of USTC, the number of achievements transformed through the empowerment pilot method in the two years after the reform is about three times the total number of achievements transformed through intellectual property valuation and shareholding in the five years before the reform.
Anhui Keang New Material Technology, established in Hefei in 2021, is one of the beneficiaries of the "empowerment + transfer + agreed income" model. After the launch of the empowerment reform pilot, the "new aerogel preparation technology" of the team of Academician Xie Yi of USTC was selected as the first batch of empowerment projects.
Through the empowerment reform pilot, the school has given part of the intellectual property rights of the scientific and technological achievements to the scientific research team, and we can directly raise funds, set up a company, and start to transform. At the same time, the school does not need to invest in shares immediately, and the decision-making risk is controllable. Zhang Shangquan, chairman of the company, said. Today, dozens of aerogel products from this company have been successfully introduced to the market.
As Zhang Shangquan said, before the reform, the transformation of post scientific and technological achievements into shares must be approved in accordance with the procedures, and the transformation cycle of scientific and technological achievements is longer. After the reform, through "empowerment + transfer + agreed income", the transformation and disposal of scientific and technological achievements will be directly approved by the school, and the approval time can be shortened to 2 months at the earliest.
In April this year, Anhui Zhongke Yineng Technology Co., Ltd. was established in the Silicon Valley of the University of Science and Technology through empowerment reform, and the company's related technologies successfully solved the common technical problems of the industry that were identified at an extremely early stage of the existing electrical safety risks, filling the gap in the market.
Capital is the "lifeline" of enterprise survival and development. In the view of Qiao Yiqiang, general manager of the company, the empowerment reform of China University of Science and Technology has clarified the property rights of patented technology, which is easier to attract the attention of social capital, and scientific researchers can quickly carry out industrialized operation in accordance with the market-oriented model to make the enterprise bigger and stronger.
The data is the best proof of this. As of November 2023, 35 companies established through empowerment reform have an intellectual property valuation amount of about 200 million yuan, a valuation of about 1.9 billion yuan of corresponding equity of intellectual property rights after financing, and a cumulative market value of about 7.8 billion yuan.
In 2023, under the leadership of Professor Zhu Qi of USTC, Xia Yulong and his team will finally embark on the journey of transforming scientific and technological achievements.
As we all know, it is difficult to transform scientific and technological achievements, and it is even more difficult to rely on scientific researchers to "go it alone". Soon, Xia Yulong and the team ushered in an important partner.
The road to transformation is not "lonely".
Gui Wanru, general manager of Zhongke Nengda Electronic Technology. He is 13 years older than Xia Yulong, although he is also from a scientific research background, but he has been in the enterprise for many years and has accumulated rich experience in operation and management.
In 2019, Gui Wanru came to Xia Yulong's Applied Electromagnetic Laboratory to study for a doctorate in engineering, and the gears of fate began to turn. In February this year, he and Professor Zhu Qi "hit it off" and resolutely joined the achievement transformation team.
There are many advantages for scientific researchers to start a business, but the shortcomings are also very obvious. In this regard, Xia Yulong felt deeply, "When we first started a business, what made it more difficult for us was actually writing a business plan, building an equity structure and other things other than technology. ”
The addition of Gui Wanru just makes up for this and becomes an indispensable "puzzle piece" for the team. Four months later, Zhongke Nengda was established in Hefei.
At present, we are doing prototype development, and some social capital is also in the process of docking. Gui Wanru said that the empowerment reform gives scientific and technological achievements the opportunity to go out of the school to transform, but industrialization is a long process, if only rely on enterprises to "fight alone", the risk of failure is very large.
In Hefei, the transformation of scientific and technological achievements is not alone. Wang Ruifang, a member of the Hefei Science and Technology Achievement Transformation Class, is currently working in the Office of Achievement Transfer and Transformation of the University of Science and Technology, and her main job is to discover, promote and serve the transformation of scientific and technological achievements of school teachers.
The project is a relatively long chain from the laboratory to the market, involving many links such as empowerment process, business plan writing, financing, equity design, etc." Relying on Hefei's perfect service system for the transformation of scientific and technological achievements, Wang Ruifang does her best to provide scientific researchers with a full chain of scientific and technological achievements transformation services.
Not only "door-to-door service", Hefei also invested real money**. In addition to the establishment of the "Kunpeng Plan" jointly funded by the University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei has set up a "early, small, and independent" seed** to provide financial support for start-up technology-based enterprises and excellent scientific research teams.
Including seeds, the "jungle" built in Hefei can support the growth of enterprises in different periods. Gui Wanru said that they have declared Hefei seeds, which is a strong support for the early development of the enterprise.
Through the empowerment reform, a number of scientific and technological achievements have gone out of USTC and thrived on the industrial soil of Hefei. Since the pilot of USTC's empowerment reform, 35 enterprises have been established, of which 30 have landed in Hefei, continuously injecting new forces into the city's high-quality development.
More than 50 years ago, USTC and Hefei "joined hands" to go to the sea of stars of scientific and technological innovation. Time flies, but the original intention is still the same. Nowadays, the school and the local government are working together to promote the "two-way force" of science and technology innovation and industry, which will surely achieve a win-win situation for both parties. Reporter Ge Qingzheng