The Office of Innovation, Partnerships and Economic Development (IPED)is the first point of contact for researchers, industry, and other external parties who wish to establish an industry-academic research partnership, or a research contract/agreement between university researchers and a government or non-profit organization. IPED’s mission is to contribute to, and support, the social and economic prosperity of Northern Ontario and Simcoe County communities through research, education, knowledge transfer, the training of highly-qualified personnel, commercialization, and Centres of Excellence.

IPED is an intellectual property resource for faculty, staff, and students, and an important priority for Lakehead University. IPED strives to encourage, support, and enhance the commercialization of intellectual property and assist its researchers in transferring knowledge and technology to those outside the University community. Critical to these goals are the development and maintenance of research and business partnerships, which include industry, government, and other Universities.

More specifically, the following Innovation services are provided by IPED:

• · Handling of intellectual property protection issues (including patents and copyright),
• · Licensing of University technology,
• · Serving as a liaison between industry, the local community, and the University,
• · Assisting with university-industry-government collaborative programs,
• · Supporting the creation and development of start-up knowledge-based businesses, and
• · Overseeing the overall management of the University's intellectual property.

IPED is also responsible for drafting and negotiating several different types of agreements including:

• · Intellectual property ownership assignments,
• · Licensing agreements,
• · Sponsored research,
• · Industrial grants & research contracts,
• · Confidentiality and non-disclosure,
• · Collaboration and Consortium Agreements, and
• · Material Transfer Agreements.

IPED also oversees Lakehead University’s first business incubator, Ingenuity, which is located throughout the main floor of the Centre for Advanced Studies in Engineering and Sciences (CASES) building. Ingenuity comes equipped with all the tools and resources needed to help students take their business from idea to launch. Ingenuity incubates start-ups through business mentorship and entrepreneurship training. The strategic vision for Ingenuity is to foster an entrepreneurial culture, create employment and self-employment opportunities, and contribute to the region’s economic development by leveraging existing community resources to deliver a range of entrepreneurial activities. Ingenuity provides space and programming to promote and nurture successful start-up businesses. Along with programming geared towards business development, Ingenuity also provides many other tools and resources to benefit their members. For more information on Ingenuity, please visit our website.

IPED is supported in part by the Research Support Fund, a federal funding program for post-secondary institutions in Canada. The Research Support Fund supports some of the costs associated with managing research funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council, and Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. In 2020/21, Lakehead University received nearly $2 million in assistance from the Research Support Fund to support the indirect costs of research, which includes costs for supporting the management of intellectual property, research and administration, ethics and regulatory compliance, research resources, and research facilities.