Partner with external organisations

Start putting your research into practice with the insights and practical support that can help you build productive, lasting collaborations with external partners.

Why partner?

An external collaboration can give you access to the people, processes and funds that:

move your research from discovery to practical use
help you test the commercial potential of an idea or proposition
keep your teaching at the cutting edge of your field
create opportunities for your department and students to work on groundbreaking innovations
enable you to inform public discourse and influence policy

Benefit from our team’s expertise

Our team manages partnerships with some of the world’s leading companies, as well as small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs), public and third sector organisations, NGOs and charities.

Their experience working in universities, multinationals, startups, innovation agencies and the public sector is combined with expertise in:

energy, resources and the build environment
pharmaceuticals and healthcare
new technologies
engineering and high value manufacturing
transport and urban services
creative industries
public and third sector

It’s this understanding of both the academic and non-academic worlds that means our partnership managers are ideally placed to shape a relationship that works both for you and your partner.

Strategic collaboration

Whether you’re already working with a partner or are thinking about an external partnership for the first time, there’ll be a way of working that suits you. We use recognised and bespoke tools to make sure each partnership is built on shared objectives and follows an agreed action plan.

You’ll then have a single point of contact who’ll keep it on track and look out for opportunities to extend the relationship further.

Learn more about how we can help you:

Take the first steps

If you’re new to this kind of collaboration, our Innovation Challenges and panel discussion events may be a good place to start. These bring together academics and external partners to explore how UCL’s expertise could help solve challenges facing individuals, organisations and society.

We also offer training to introduce you to the key concepts in setting up partnerships, such as managing your intellectual property (IP) and outlining the support you can access.

Find potential collaborators

Our partnership managers are experts at finding the right partners and identifying funding opportunities.

Innovation networks and research showcases are great ways to find collaborators and seed partnerships.

To receive regular updates about potential partnership opportunities, sign up for our opportunities bulletin.

Work out the details

If things look promising, you’ll want to start building your partnership right away. There are a number of tools we can use to help you, including:

facilitated round tables to define research questions in more detail
detailed road-mapping to ensure the emerging partnership aligns with everyone’s priorities

Our Partnership Managers can advise you on which tool is appropriate and help you get things organised.

Formalise your partnership

Once you've decided what your partnership will look like, you may want to make things formal through a contract, memorandum of understanding (MoU) or other form of agreement.

We can connect you to the right people to turn your partnership into reality, including addressing IP, legal and contractual questions.

Building a partnership

Collaborate on research and development: Funding is available to support partnerships that put your research to use and increase its impact. These range from testing the commercial potential of an idea to embedding existing know-how into a business through a Knowledge Transfer Partnership (KTP)
Residencies and secondments: You can bring industry expertise into UCL. Or arrange an outward secondment, putting your research into practice within a partner organisation.
Providing consultancy services: We can help you work out what skills and experience you’ll need to become a consultant. Then we can also get you ready to share your knowledge with partners from commercial enterprises to public sector organisations, charities and NGOs.
Student projects or placements: If the programme you’re teaching has an assessed or capstone project, you might consider running this in association with an external partner. We can help identify partner projects and advise on processes and templates.
Commercialise your research: If you’re working on an idea that shows potential, you might want to learn how to commercialise your research. You can get the advice you need to form a spinout company and understand the value of protecting your intellectual property (IP).
Joint funding applications: Pairing up with an external partner is a great way to develop joint funding applications to Innovate UK, Research England, the Research Councils and others. Our team can bring together partners for the important early discussions.

Start the conversation

Partnerships can come in all shapes and sizes, and support many different outcomes.

See how we can tailor our support to your research. Contact a partnership manager in your sector.

Academic spotlight

Dr Keri Wong

Keri is Associate Professor in Psychology at the IOE, UCL’s Faculty of Education and Society.

Working with west London charity Jamal Edwards Delve, Keri and students from her Psychology with Education BSc co-designed a series of mental health and life skills workshops with young people.

Read about Keri’s experience of working with Jamal Edwards Delve >