Oxford University and Technikos sign £12 million deal

Oxford University has signed a £12m private equity deal with London investment group Technikos to help fund its new Institute of Biomedical Engineering.

The deal includes the provision of commercial and financial advice and assistance in return for shares in future companies spun out from the IBME.

The institute, part of the university's Department of Engineering Science, will occupy part of a new £50m building on Oxford's Medical Research Campus expected to open in late 2007.

Research in the institute will focus on cardiovascular engineering (devices and computer modelling), e-health, bio-signal processing, tissue engineering and stem cell culture.

Technikos will work with Isis Innovation, Oxford's technology transfer company, to support IBME with identifying IP or technological projects of commercial value, assist with the commercialisation of those technologies and contribute investment capital to spin-outs while advising on management and marketing. In return, Technikos will obtain 50 per cent of the portion of the equity in any biomedical engineering spin-out allocated to Oxford University in such deals. The City firm will also receive half of the university's share of royalties from licensing out such technology.

IBME director Dr Fred Cornhill said: 'This deal is part of our active development programme which is enabling us to build a global centre of excellence in biomedical engineering. Oxford's collaboration with Technikos makes available valuable business expertise to researchers within the institute. We are in an increasingly commercial age, and to ensure the IBME is at the forefront of biomedical engineering and research and development, we need deals like this.'

has over the last six years realised £45m by selling shares in spin-outs. On average the company files one new patent a week and spins out a new company every two months.