Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution invites you to collaborate with the Institution and benefit from its rich resources. WHOI currently has a number of varied technologies available for licensing.

The terms of a license agreement are negotiated between WHOI's Office of Technology Transfer and the interested company.

The "license" is an agreement under which WHOI grants a company the right to "make, use and sell" products based on the licensed invention. A successfully negotiated license agreement helps assure that the technology will be diligently developed for the public benefit. The license agreement also provides a licensee sufficient exclusivity to create a product which will be competitive and profitable.

A WHOI moored surface buoy equipped with meteorological and underwater sensors is deployed in the eastern tropical Pacific Ocean. (Photo by Roger Archibald)

Deep sea mesopelagic fish (photo by L.Madin)

In keeping with the Institution's mission to serve the public good, the Technology Transfer Office works to "transfer" these technologies to private industry. Companies license marketable technologies owned by WHOI in order to develop/incorporate the technologies into products such as oceanographic exploration equipment, medical devices, and advanced research materials.

Licenses usually include a financial incentive for WHOI which helps support the legal costs of patenting inventions as well as the continuing research and academic endeavors at the Institution. Thus, the Technology Transfer Office acts to protect discoveries made by WHOI research while simultaneously helping to make additional research possible, often with a direct or indirect benefit to the greater public good.

At any one time a variety of platform technologies in different areas may be available to form the foundation of a new company. For further information, interested parties should contact the Technology Transfer Office.