Attending payed off! With our project group (Frederik, Wesley, Safia, Nadia and I) we attended a lecture organised by the Nobel Nightcap (SNNC) on innovation. Håkan Borg and Daniel Carlsson told us about KTH innovation, a university based organisation that provides early start up coaching entirely for free. KTH recognises the fact that employees and students are in a valuable position to make new discoveries and doesn’t want to capitalise on that. The opposite is true: in order to stimulate future development based on these insights, they allow the inventors to retain their intellectual property. This agreement is called the Professors’ Privilege. And because there is this desire of KTH associates to further develop their ideas, there is also the free coaching service by KTH innovation that helps making these ideas reality. No equity, just good promotion for the support and quality that KTH provides.
On a different note: after the lecture I grasped my opportunity to speak to Håkan (who has experience as a IP lawyer) about how to further develop CityLights. He told me that KTH innovation is there for the very young ideas like these to help figure out whether there is a market for them and if so help them on the way to success. They have the experience in house to help you (in a bit of a soft money way) to realise the future you are dreaming of. An arrangement I feel I could only dream of ;)! If you’d also be interested to find out more on this, check out their website: KTH innovation.
