Industrial Collaborations and Innovation
Transfer of knowledge and technology to the industrial sector is an integral part of the institute’s activities.
Globally, 11 research projects in collaboration within the industry were active in 2020, including the new AiCuries-ICIQ joint unit, a unique model of collaboration in an open innovation environment.
Projects with Industry
| Research Field | Type of companies | Earnings in 2020 | R&D Projects | International Projects |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Catalysis/Homogeneous Catalysis/Synthesis | Pharmaceutical, fine chemicals | 885.800 € | 6 | 5 |
| Pharmaceutical Solid State | Pharmaceutical, fine chemicals | 497.000 € | 3 | 1 |
| Heterogeneous Catalysis | Materials, petrochemical | 70.500 € | 2 | 2 |
Evolution of revenues from industrial collaborations
ICIQ’s High-Throughput Experimentation platform (HTE) platform is extremely useful to find the best conditions for a given chemical reaction in an accelerated way. In 2020 the HTE platform tested its applicability to guide the choice of conditions in trials of forced degradation of active pharmaceutical ingredients (mandatory trials for any new drug or new formulation of generic drugs to be launched on the market).
As for 2020 highlights related to ICIQ’s Technology Development Units, Crysforma participated in online fairs and brokerage events such as CPhI, Open Innovation Forum (Biocat), and Biofit. Moreover, Crysforma launched a Google Adwords campaign to promote its services and contacted its clients in order to showcase their company logo on Crysforma’s web page. In 2020, Ertflow kept on its research activities in the frame of the VIROFLOW (MSCA-ITN-EID) project in collaboration with the biotechnological company, AiCuris.
During 2020 CSOL carried out 8 projects directed to the further development and valorization of technologies originated in ICIQ’s Research groups, with the objective of transferring these technologies to the industrial sector. The main areas were new catalysts and reagents, technologies related to polymerization, and the prototyping of a photoreactor. These valorization projects were possible thanks to funding received from Fundació Obra Social la Caixa. Moreover, CSOL carried out R&D projects funded by other entities: Comunitats de Tecnologies Emergents BASE3D (Generalitat de Catalunya and ERDF) and an ERC-PoC project awarded to Prof. Melchiorre (European Research Council). CSOL also worked on a contract project with AiCuris.
Regarding ICIQ’s protection of results, 3 new patents were presented as priority titles. In fact, we had 17 patents active in 2020 and 7 patent families were transferred to the industry. ICIQ’s patent portfolio can be reviewed here.
In 2020, ICIQ’s second spin-off company, Treellum Technologies SL was created. Treellum Technologies is focused on the development and commercialization of photoreactors to ensure reproducible experiments.
ICIQ’s spin-off company Orchestra Scientific, continued the development and construction of an economically affordable, modular and eco-friendly technology to separate CO2 from biogas and capture it from industrial emissions.