An introduction to showcasing spinouts

Spinouts (or spinoffs) are startup companies formed to commercialize academic research, typically founded by faculty, researchers, or students, with the institution often retaining a minority stake. Supporting spinouts isn’t just good practice, it’s good business. From providing lab space and mentorship to marketing and investor networking, universities play a key role in setting these ventures up for success. In 2024, UK university spinouts secured £2.6 billion in funding—a significant increase, even as investment in other high-growth companies declined by 19%.

These numbers reflect a growing recognition of spinouts as powerful drivers of innovation and commercial impact in the academic sector.

What makes spinouts appealing to industry partners?

Clearly, spinouts are an attractive investment option, but why?

For one, spinouts may be seen as a more secure investment. One expert from within our Connect network explained the benefit of the focus and shared goals that come with working with a spinout:

"Usually when they bring in a management team and investors [...] the goals are much more aligned and you're less likely to get these rogue tangents."

With focused objectives and external accountability, spinouts are often perceived as lower-risk, execution-ready partners. Funding constraints also encourage strategic prioritization:

"However, much funding they have, they have to use it judiciously. So they better understand the real value drivers and the importance of doing the killer experiments."

And, perhaps most importantly:

"When you work with a spin out […] there is way more accountability."

Why is it important for universities to promote their spinouts?

For universities, the benefits of generating a spinout from IP can be diverse. Commercializing spinout technology aids in bridging the gap between academic innovation and industry applications. With universities increasingly wanting to demonstrate the positive impact their research has in the real world, spinouts hold an attractive opportunity to present this first hand. It also offers a great opportunity to showcase the institutions’ wider expertise and capabilities surrounding the development of a technology beyond the initial invention and surrounding IP.

Then, there are the economic benefits. Spinouts generate jobs and stimulate local and international economies. Not only that, but the direct financial benefits for the university can also be significant as successful spinouts generate revenue, which can be reinvested into research and development (R&D), creating a cycle that promotes continuous technological progress.

For companies, the promise of commercial success draws in capital from venture capitalists and corporations, which is crucial for scaling operations and refining the technology. As mentioned previously, the focus of the spinout means that development is often rapid if the right partner is found and scientific breakthroughs are aligned with market needs, enabling solutions that can be widely adopted and scaled.

It is important to note that spinouts look to collaborate in a variety of different ways, their relative independence from the university and focus means that once an aligned company is identified, future partnerships can take many different forms, such as funding, co-development, licensing, acquisition and potential customers.

Using Inpart to promote spinouts

With all of the above in mind, it is unsurprising that more universities are adding spinout profiles to their Inpart Connect portfolios.

With a growing number of venture capital, biotech, and private equity users on the platform, Inpart is a natural fit for promoting spinouts to a targeted audience of industry stakeholders.

  • Our network includes companies actively seeking to:
  • Co-develop with research-driven startups
  • Acquire or license IP from spinouts
  • Fund translational R&D through early partnerships

In short, if your university is backing spinouts, Inpart can help amplify their visibility.

Step-by-step guide for spinout profiles

Crafting an engaging profile for your spinout is vital for encouraging interest from potential industry stakeholders and collaborators. To ensure spinouts are promoted in the best way on Inpart’s Connect platform, we have reviewed engagement across the site to identify the do’s and don’ts for encouraging industry interest.

To make the process of creating a summary easier, here is a step-by-step guide on how to effectively promote your spinout on Inpart Connect, with handy tips and tricks to boost industry engagement based on what we have seen to be most effective. Please bear in mind that all information provided should be non-confidential.

Title

Short and snappy! Ideally between 4 to 10 words, which includes the name of the spinout but also a brief tagline of what the company does. There should be enough detail to catch the attention of interested parties.

For example, ‘NeuroTherapia: Treating Neural Inflammation with Small Molecules’ from a Cleveland Clinic spinout.

Precis

A 140-character summary, which should be a clear and concise description immediately orienting the reader to the nature of your spinout. If space, highlighting the opportunity is a spinout here would also be beneficial.

For example, this precis from Northeastern University: “Northeastern spinout develops novel modulators of neuronal KIR channels that have efficiency for both rare and common epilepsies.”

Background

Similar to a licensing opportunity, this section should provide context explaining what unmet need is being fulfilled.

Technology overview

As the core of the summary the technology overview should provide the bulk of the information on the spinout, including relevant, non-confidential technical details.

A potential structure could be:

  1. Confirm it’s a spinout and summarize what it does: Specify that this opportunity is from a university spinout and explain what the main focus is.
  2. Explain the technical approach in plain language: Get into the specifics of the project, including technical information where possible, described at a level that a non-expert can still understand.
  3. State the development stage (TRL, studies completed, etc.): What stage of development is the project in? Provide a TRL number if possible or describe what tests have been done so far to validate the technology your spinout has spun from.

Extra information in the form of links to journal articles, websites, or videos can provide additional context and allow potential investors to investigate further, which may encourage them to initiate contact.

Benefits

Provide bullet points outlining the unique features of the spinout. Although these should be focused on benefits specific to the underlying technology, it may also be relevant to include some benefits of the company, such as the experience of the researchers involved.

Applications

Who is the target market for your spinout? Who will your customer base be? Lay out a few points, preferably in a bullet point format, to explain these plans for your spinout.

Opportunity

Make sure to specify what kind of partnership you are looking for (Funding, licensing, co-development, strategic partnership, etc.), remembering that transparency in this aspect lets potential partners know, off the bat, how they can engage.