TechTransfer communication & events

‘Connecting Science and Society’ is the mission of VUB TechTransfer. To emphasise the fact that we can only do this together with the research groups, companies, other knowledge centers and all our stakeholders, we changed this tagline into ‘Together we connect science and society’ in 2020. This is also in line with the new ‘TheWorldNeedsYou’ campaign of the VUB. The TechTransfer Communication & Events cell informs the research community of all support and other aspects concerning the valorisation of their research and brings the university’s knowledge and expertise under the attention of companies, governmental organizations and society. We also take care of connecting parties through the organisation of (digital) events. With the final

Due to the COVID-19 crisis we had to go radically digital. MS Teams became a new daily tool. Events, info sessions and workshops were organised digitally. Recordings were often available afterwards.

vubtechtransfer.be: the website is the central point of all our information and is held up to date with news items, events, info on project calls and crisis communication on COVID-19. Communication site on WeAreVUB: on this new VUB intranet a communication site was launched for the Vice-rectorate Innovation & Industry Relations and for VUB TechTransfer. News items are posted regularly and are also available through the WeAreVUB-app.

Info sessions on project calls: the communication cell supported 6 info sessions that were organised by our business developers for different project calls (VLAIO, FWO, Innoviris).

Kanaal Z: 10 episodes on Z-Innovation to turn the spotlight on the services of VUB TechTransfer, innovative VUB research and interaction with industry and society. And how this co-innovation leads to a positive impact on people’s lives. Episodes can still be watched on VUB Youtube (Innovation by VUB experts).

Knowledge for growth 2020: first digital edition together with TTO Flanders. VUB presented several licensing opportunities and three IOF research groups in life sciences joined the partnering & matchmaking.

TechTransfer Week: first digital edition with three days of online info sessions about Intellectual Property rights and project funding in Brussels, Flanders and Europe. About 150 researchers logged in to follow the sessions. For the launch of the TT Week three introduction videos about TechTransfer, Foundation and Crosstalks were published on our MS Stream channel, as well as the recordings of the sessions.

VLIR-brochure with impact cases: 45 success stories of university innovations in healthcare, energy, food, etc. are bundled in this brochure in collaboration with VLIR and TTO Flanders.

• 14,226 people visited our website and looked at 52,265 pages (2.23 pages per session which is higher than average) • 51 newsletters (TechTransfer News) were sent to more than 4000 subscribers with an average open rate of 36% • VUB TechTransfer reached more than 400 followers on Twitter, about 140 more than the year before