To better serve the institutions’ innovative faculty and researchers, Johns Hopkins Technology Ventures (JHTV) will fully transition to its online inventor portal on March 1. This portal will be the sole pathway for submitting invention disclosures.
About a year ago, JHTV launched the inventor portal as a new disclosure option to increase the processing efficiency of the more than 500 disclosures it receives each year and to provide inventors with a hub through which to access a historical record and the status of disclosures. Since its launch, the share of invention disclosure submissions made through the portal has climbed to 40 percent, indicating an overall preference for the new format.
“Our priority is to move invention disclosures from submission to a final outcome as quickly as possible while ensuring each receives proper attention,” says JHTV administrative manager Janice Ankeny. “We designed the portal with researchers and faculty in mind. It eliminates delays and has the added benefit of increasing transparency for faculty and researchers.”
FY 2017 invention disclosures
Barbara Slusher, M.A.S., Ph.D., professor of neurology and director of Johns Hopkins Drug Discovery, is an early adopter, having submitted five disclosures through the portal.
“What I like about the inventor portal is that when I have a question about something I filed, I can go to my inventor’s page where it has all of the information I need in one place,” Slusher says. “The system works very well. It keeps everything in check — tracking when you have uploaded information, alerting when more information is needed and showing the disclosure review status.”
The decision to concentrate disclosure activity in the portal, eliminating other options like emailed Microsoft Word and PDF documents, is based on the overwhelming advantages of the portal:
Time-savings:
- Eliminates submissions of incomplete disclosures
- Fewer fields on the invention disclosure form
Convenience:
- Access to all intellectual property disclosure records in a central hub
- Increased database accuracy through self reporting updates to contact information
- Accepts electronic signatures and uses system prompts to finalize forms
Compliance:
- Reduces follow-up times for missing grant information
Customer service:
- 75 percent reduction in system entry time increases JHTV capacity
- Increases rate by which technologies reach IP managers
- Facilitates creation of marketing summaries for Technology Publisher