A new ambition for technology transfer

Today, we’re excited to announce a new Inteum. Inteum and FirstIgnite are joining forces and becoming one company, with one purpose: accelerating technology transfer.

Amazing things are happening in research right now. With AI, researchers can explore data at a speed and scale that weren’t possible a few years ago. Scientific and medical advances are producing discoveries that could change people’s lives.

As research moves faster, the work of technology transfer grows in importance. Each disclosure your office evaluates, each company you bring to the table, and each license you negotiate moves a discovery closer to the people it can help. That work depends on expertise and trusted relationships that only your people bring, and the flow of discoveries ready for it keeps growing. To bring more of those discoveries to market, your team needs more time for its highest-value work: working with researchers on their discoveries, building relationships with industry, and negotiating the agreements that move discoveries forward.

Applied AI makes that possible. Agents trained for technology transfer can take on work under your team’s direction, giving your people more time for the relationships and decisions that move inventions forward. With better analysis, your office can pursue more promising inventions, focus resources on the strongest opportunities, and build the industry partnerships that get discoveries to the people whose lives they could change.

To deliver on that promise, agents need to put technology transfer expertise to work in the context of your institution. The information your team has built up and the processes you use every day shape how that work needs to be done. Deep integration with your systems allows agents to apply their training to your information and workflows.

That’s why we’re bringing Inteum and FirstIgnite together. Inteum has worked alongside technology transfer offices for more than thirty years, and hundreds of institutions rely on Minuet to run their operations. FirstIgnite brings applied AI for technology transfer, with agents already at work assessing technologies and identifying industry partners. Together, we’re building the new AI-powered platform for technology transfer, with expert AI agents designed to work alongside your team.

These are the four demands we believe every office should make of AI.

Do the work. An agent should complete real assignments and deliver finished work you can review and use. If you ask for an assessment, you should get analysis supported by evidence, with conclusions you can check. Judge the agent by the work it accomplishes, including the time you spend reviewing and refining it.

Work in the context of your institution. Agents should be built around the work you need to accomplish, following your workflows and business rules in the systems you already use. They should draw on the relevant institutional information your team uses, within the permissions you set, so you can put their work to use once you’ve reviewed it.

Protect your information and keep you in control. Agents must follow your data and compliance policies. You should set the rules for what they can access and do, including where you require approval, and be able to inspect an audit trail of every action. Your data should never train AI models without your permission. Providers should retain it only as long as needed to deliver the service. You keep authority over decisions and commitments.

Help advance more discoveries. The time and analysis agents provide should help you pursue more inventions and sustain the work needed to bring them to market. We want that to lead to more technologies licensed, more companies launched, and more industry partnerships built. Judge each agent by how its work contributes to your institution’s goals and mission to get discoveries to people who can benefit from them.

The FirstIgnite Technology Assessment Agent is already available in Minuet, preparing reports on an invention’s commercial potential and patentability. We’re developing further agents for prospecting, agreement compliance, and disclosure intake, extending the work you can assign from the first review of a disclosure to the obligations in a signed license. We’re building each of them to meet these four demands.

It’s early days for AI in technology transfer, and we have big ambitions for where we can apply it next. We’d love to hear how you’re thinking about AI and share more of what we’re building. Reach out to us directly, join us for our live event on January 19, 2027, or come and meet us at AUTM 2027.