1. 42 Years Experience
of
Technology Licensing
Katharine Ku
Stanford University
November 15, 2012

2. Philosophy
• Do what’s “best for the technology”
• Foster good industrial relations
• Be a business-driven office, not
legally driven
• Plant as many seeds as possible

3. History
• Started in 1970
• Approx. 8,300 cumulative disclosures
• Approx. 3,000 active cases
• Executed over 3600 licenses
• Approx. 1200 active licenses

4. Notable Stanford Inventions
1970 – OTL Established
1971 - FM Sound Synthesis ($22.9M)
1974 – Recombinant DNA ($255M)
1981 – Phycobiliproteins ($46.4M), Fiber Optic Amplifier
($48.4M), MINOS ($4.1M)
1984 – Functional Antibodies ($318.9M)
1987 – Selective Amplification of Polynucleotides ($20.3M)
1990-1992 – DSL ($29.6M)
1993 – Microarrays ($2M), MIMO for
Wireless Broadcast ($0.12M)
1994 – In vivo bioluminescent imaging ($7.2M)
1996 – Improved Hypertext Searching (GoogleTM)($337M)
2004 – Refocus Photography ($0.15M)
2013 – the next big thing ???

5. The upside...
• OTL has generated ~$1.47B in
cumulative gross royalties
• $920M were three big inventions
• Over $1.2 billion stayed at
Stanford/inventors
• OTL has given $46.2M to the
Research Incentive Fund

6. Sobering Statistics
• 3/9300 is a BIG WINNER (these three
inventions generated 67% of the cumulative income)
• 20 cases generated $5M or more
• 68 cases generated $1M or more in
cumulative royalties
• $17.6M in unlicensed inventory
• The University cannot count on royalties
for university operating expenses

7. 1970’s
• First year $55,000
• 50-70 disclosures a year
• Inventions of note:
• Music chip
• FACS
• Hybridomas
• Staff of 3

8. 1980’s
• Dramatic increase in revenue
– DNA cloning invention
– Software
– HIV, the “web”
• Broke even after 15 years
• Biotech emerging
• equity discussions: conflicts of
interest
• 622 licenses/staff of 18/$14M

9. 1990’s
• Change in patent policy
• New view of equity
• Google, DSL technologies disclosed
• Wireless inventions appearing
• DNA patent expired
• Income ~$25M-$61M-$40M
• Staff of 24, $3M patent expenses

10. 2000’s
• Google IPO
• Lots of start-ups at the beginning;
the crash
• Functional antibody royalties start
• Interest in online education begins
• Income growing ~$65M, 33 staff
• $4M in patent expenses

11. Present
• Innovation is key
– StartX, Biodesign, SPARK,
Entrepreneurial classes
• Acceleration to industry
• Rise of China
• Income: $76.7M, staff of 40, $8M
patent expenses

12. Future
• More pressure to patent/more
expenses
• Pressure to do deals
faster/streamline
• More interest by entrepreneurs to
start companies
• Income cliff 

13. Stanford “Best Practices”
• Stay centered
– Education and research come first
• Do what’s best for the technology
– Don’t chase the $$$
• The dollars will come if you do a good job
• Plant as many seeds as possible
– Some will bear fruit