Legal & Commercial Context
Legal & Commercial Context
The University of Western Sydney (UWS) is a statutory body established by an Act of the New South Wales Parliament which provides for the constitution and functions of the University including those guidelines that apply to the conduct of commercial activities. Governments in Australia require formal reporting on the governance and management of university commercial activities due to the high levels of federal government funding. They are particularly concerned to ensure that there is no taxpayer subsidisation of such activities and that they are consistent with the general principles of competitive neutrality required of all government-funded entities. Adherence with the guidelines is assured by formal auditing of the University annual financial statements by the Office of the State Auditor-General.
Like all universities, UWS engages in a variety of commercial activities. These include the management of a small number of not-for-profit enterprises which effectively provide the non-core functions of the University; the provision of diverse consulting services to business partners; commercial access to state of the art technology and facilities; research partnerships; and joint commercialisation of new technologies and research innovations, to name a few. In all these activities, the University is the legal entity for contractual purposes. University Schools and Research Centres, for example, have no status under Australian law and therefore cannot legally contract, purchase equipment in their own name, or independently engage staff.
In the case of joint commercialisation and other approaches to the exploitation of university-generated intellectual property, the University and research staff inventors may create spin off companies with variable shareholdings consistent with IP management policies and financial investment. The University cannot directly contract with its own employees, nor can it take a shareholding in a company whose prime purpose is to channel funding for IP development prior to commercialisation.
