If a company sponsors my research, is it automatically able to license any resulting inventions?

Whenever Wake Forest accepts sponsored research funds from a company, there is a sponsored research agreement (SRA) that discusses what rights, if any, the company has to inventions created. Those rights are negotiated by the Office of Research before the company sponsors the research. When you submit the Invention Disclosure Form, it is important to inform OTAM of the sponsor for the research so that OTAM can determine what rights the sponsor has. The sponsor is almost always owed a report. Sponsors also usually have an exclusive option to obtain an exclusive license. This means that OTAM has to negotiate with the research sponsor first. Sponsors sometimes can have much more exclusive rights to inventions which may make it very difficult to move the technology to market. The best way to avoid the sponsor getting very broad rights to your inventions under the SRA is to let the Office of Research know that you don’t want the sponsor to have broad rights at the time the Office of Research is negotiating the SRA.

I have a manuscript prepared on results from a project that was funded by XYZ Co.; why can't I submit this paper for publication?

If you prepare any publication based on results from research covered by a Sponsored Research Agreement (SRA), the SRA usually stipulates that the sponsor may delay publication for a predetermined amount of time if the manuscript discloses information on a patentable subject matter that requires protection.  This gives the company time to take appropriate action to protect intellectual property that might result from the research that the company helped fund.  Even under SRAs, companies should not be able to postpone publication indefinitely. A delay of 60 days is not uncommon.