EVENTS

Turning research into commercial opportunities can be complex, with licensing and spin-out deals often slowed down by lengthy negotiations, inconsistent processes and uncertainty about what’s needed at each stage.

The Deal Readiness Toolkit is designed to make research commercialisation faster, simpler and more consistent. Developed by the SETsquared Partnership with funding from Research England, it brings together practical how-to guides, standardised legal templates and checklists to help academics, technology transfer professionals, lawyers and investors navigate the process of spinning out or licensing research and securing or investing in new ventures.

Join the team for a practical, hands-on session exploring how to use the Toolkit effectively. Through a guided walkthrough of its resources and features, you’ll learn how to find the right tools for your needs, apply them to real-world commercialisation activity, and take a more structured approach to preparing and progressing deals. Whether you’re an academic exploring the commercial potential of your research, a technology transfer professional supporting a deal, or a lawyer or investor involved in the process, you’ll leave with practical knowledge you can put to use straight away.

The session will focus on:

• Getting hands-on with the Deal Readiness Toolkit: exploring its guides, standardised legal templates and checklists
• How to use the Toolkit to support research licensing and spin-out deals
• Finding and applying the right resources at different stages of the commercialisation process
• How standardised documentation and a structured approach can reduce unnecessary negotiations and help deals progress more efficiently
• Practical tips for integrating the Toolkit into your own work, whether you’re developing, supporting or investing in a research-based venture

Agenda

12:00 Welcome and session introduction
12:05 Accelerate commercialisation with the Deal Readiness Toolkit: practical walkthrough
12:50 Q&A and closing remarks

Meet the speakers

Diana Galpin, Enterprise & Knowledge Exchange, University of Southampton and Director & Management Board Member on SETsquared 

Diana is Director, Enterprise & Knowledge Exchange at the University of Southampton with overall responsibility for business collaboration, consultancy, IP management, commercialisation and business acceleration. Diana qualified as a barrister with a civil practice, then moved in-house originally to a high-tech start-up before joining Southampton in 2003 to support research and innovation. Diana has experience in a number of industry sectors including healthcare and pharmaceuticals, aerospace and defence and IT. She has led a number of industry/university collaborative initiatives, has extensive experience of international collaboration and considerable experience dealing with IP, high-tech start-ups and investment deals.

Diana is the University-appointed Director of SETsquared Limited, Southampton Asset Management Limited, University of Southampton Holdings Ltd and ECS Partners Ltd. She was also Director on Curve Therapeutics Limited until it achieved its £40.1m funding raise in January 2024. She is also a Trustee for the charity Sail Training International, which enables her to combine her passion for sailing with her business and legal expertise to support opportunities for young people to build confidence, broaden their horizons and international friendship through sail training. Diana has been on the partner board of VentureFest South for 4 years and is a firm believer in collaboration across the region to help businesses start, scale and grow.

 

Andrew Wilson, RTTP, Head of Commercialisation, University of Bristol 

Andrew is currently Head of Commercialisation at the University of Bristol. He has over 20 years’ experience in research commercialisation, principally across health and life sciences, where he has supported the creation of a large number of spin-out companies. The University has launched 130 spin-outs in total, which have collectively raised over £2bn across a broad range of technology areas including quantum, advanced therapies and engineering biology.

 

 

David Woolley, Head of Technology Transfer and IP, University of Southampton

David was originally an Armed Forces engineering officer following graduation; he left to join business school and subsequently worked in the BBC’s strategy directorate in the late 1990s. His move into higher education came after a short spell in a new BBC commercial group looking to licence technologies and create corporate ventures from its own R&D department. At Southampton, David has worked most frequently on commercialisation activity with the Engineering, Electronics and Optoelectronics Research Centre departments. Recently, he led the University’s Spinout Equity Review.

 

Nathan Guest, Corporate Partner, Head of Digital & Technology, VWV

Ranked in Legal 500 as a Band 1 Lawyer, Nathan is an award-winning lawyer who has spent more than 25 years advising corporate clients on private equity and venture capital investments, mergers and acquisitions and management buyouts. He acts for UK and international companies, although the majority of his clients are SMEs/owner managed businesses, entrepreneurs/founders, spin-outs, start-ups and scale-ups.   Nathan founded and leads VWV’s national Digital & Technology sector and the firm’s Venture Capital and Private Equity work and is the Client Partner for most of the firm’s emerging tech and life science clients.

Nathan regularly provides “Lawyer-in-Residence” services to SETsquared Bristol, SETsquared Bath and Science Creates Incubators and also delivers workshops to other incubators, including the Stevenage Bioscience Catalyst and Pioneer Group.  Along with VWV colleague Sarah Webb (Partner, IP), Nathan was a core member of the co-creation team that developed the SETsquared Impact IP / Deal Readiness Toolkit, and also participated in both the Investor and HE outreach sessions.

Arne Scott, CEO, Dimension Biotechnologies 

Arne is CEO of Dimension Biotechnologies, a spin-out from the University of Bristol focused on detecting disease in the body’s microvascular networks using biochemical fingerprints on red blood cells. Arne is a biotechnologist who completed his PhD in the lab of Professor Dek Woolfson in the School of Chemistry in 2019. He went on to co-found Bristol spinout Rosa Biotech, where he served as CTO from 2021 to 2023, before co-founding Dimension in 2024 alongside a clinical team from Bristol Medical School.

 

 

 

Ready to streamline your next commercialisation deal? Join us to explore the Deal Readiness Toolkit and discover how to put it to work.

Register your space