Evaluation and institutional decision
How the TTO checks a submitted disclosure, requests assessments from internal or external experts, takes it to committee and records the institutional decision.
- EnaTTO app
This article was verified with an older release. Screen names or steps may differ in the current version.
After an inventor submits a disclosure, the TTO takes it through the completeness check, evaluation, committee and institutional decision. Each stage creates tasks for the people in its pool, has a deadline with reminders and is written to the record's history.
Required role
- Manage intellectual property (TTO staff, Owner), or being the disclosure's responsible specialist.
- Assessors only need to be organization users; they see the disclosure and their own assessment.
- The approval levels of the institutional decision are given to the people in the TTO director pool (and, if switched on, Vice rector for research).
Completeness check
People in the IP specialists pool get a task when a disclosure arrives. They either Accept for evaluation or Request changes with an explanation. A disclosure waiting for changes does not close by itself: when the stage deadline passes, the IP managers pool is notified and a person decides what happens next.
Evaluation
In the Evaluation stage the TTO chooses which assessments the disclosure needs. Go to Assessments → Request assessment:
- Choose the Assessment type: Technical, Commercial, Patentability, Prior art or Ownership and rights.
- Choose the Assessor. Turn on External expert for someone from outside the institution; they do not see notes, planned disclosures or the institutional decision, and their access ends 30 days after the due date.
- Set the Due date and an optional Note to the assessor. The assessor gets a task.
The assessor opens the disclosure and clicks Submit assessment: a Result (Favourable, Unfavourable or Inconclusive), an optional score from 1 to 5, the assessment text and, optionally, the code of a report in Documents. A submitted assessment cannot be changed unless it is reopened.
The TTO can Share with inventors an assessment, Stop sharing it, or Cancel a pending one. When every requested assessment is complete, Send to committee becomes available. Ask inventors for changes sends the disclosure back to the draft with an explanation.
Assessments are records of expert opinion
A patentability or ownership assessment in EnaTTO is the text an expert enters. EnaTTO does not judge patentability, freedom to operate or ownership itself, and never fills these in for you.
Committee
The disclosure waits in the Committee stage until the deciding committee records a decision on it in a meeting. The committee is chosen in the workflow settings; without one, the stage creates no tasks. The outcomes are Protect, Do not protect, Release to inventors or Defer. Defer returns the disclosure to evaluation; the other outcomes move it to the institutional decision. See Committees.
Institutional decision
Open Institutional decision → Record decision and enter:
- Decision: Protect, Do not protect, Release to inventors, Defer or Protect as trade secret.
- Ownership: Institution, Inventors, Institution and inventors jointly or Other (explained in the note), with an Ownership note.
- Rationale and Decision date. Turn on Share the rationale with inventors if they should see it; otherwise only the TTO and the committee do.
The institution sets the decision and ownership; EnaTTO makes no suggestion. The decision is final once the TTO director approves it (Approve decision). If your organization switched on the second level, the vice rector approves next. Send back to evaluation returns it with an explanation.
When a protection decision is approved, a portfolio record opens automatically and the disclosure reaches Decided.
Default deadlines
| Stage | Deadline | Reminders | Notified when overdue |
|---|---|---|---|
| Completeness check | 5 days | 2 days before | IP managers |
| Evaluation | 30 days | 7 and 1 days before | IP managers |
| Institutional decision | 10 days | 3 days before | IP managers |
Your organization can change these in workflow settings. A passed deadline never moves the stage by itself.
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