Contract Review and Approval Process for Research Agreements

To ensure your research agreement is reviewed promptly, refer to the Research Agreement Responsibility Matrix which can be found here. This guide is intended to assist you in determining the appropriate parties responsible for processing your research agreement. The primary agreements handled by the OTCBD are included below:

• Confidential Disclosure Agreements (CDAs, NDAs)
• Material Transfer Agreements (MTAs)
• Corporate Sponsored Research Agreements (SRAs)
• Clinical Trial Agreements (CTAs)
• Data Use Agreements
• Option and License Agreements for Technology Transfer

Each contract is reviewed to ensure the terms and conditions are appropriate for the university, including publication rights and intellectual property ownership, and complies with existing contractual obligations of the university.  The standard process for submitting a contract to OTCBD is as follows:

Processing Time:

• CDAs:  Processing time for standard CDAs is approximately 2-3 weeks.  Major items that are reviewed include ensuring invention disclosure forms have been submitted internally for potential Temple intellectual property (IP) as applicable, reviewing for any existing license agreements which may restrict the exchange of information, and determining the scope of the exchange. 
• MTAs:  Where appropriate, the University Biological Material Transfer Agreement (UBMTA) should be used for transferring materials between research institutions since Temple has agreed to the UBMTA terms and the implementation agreement can be processed in about 2 weeks.  MTAs may take an additional 1-2 weeks depending on the issues since each request is reviewed to determine the original source of the material and for any restrictions on sharing the material with collaborators or other institutions to obtain permission to share and flow down the appropriate terms. Other items may include demands for data or IP rights from the material provider.  These terms may also need to be negotiated to comply with Temple standards.  If a foreign entity is involved, export control review will also be required. 
• Data Use:  Standard data use agreements are processed in 3-4 weeks
• Corporate SRA:  Using Temple’s SRA form, industry funded research agreements can be finalized in approximately 30 days.
• Clinical Trials, Options/Licenses:  Due to the complexity of these agreements, they require the most extensive review and negotiation.  Processing time varies greatly for each agreement. Your contracts or licensing representative can provide expected processing time for each agreement.

Signature Process: 

Temple uses a contract approval system that ensures the necessary approvals are granted prior to obtaining signatures by the university’s authorized representative. The signature process for research agreements is as follows: 

• If Temple is initiating signatures, the university provides digital signatures using its contract approval system or through AdobeSign.  
• If the other party is initiating signatures, please send electronic or scanned signatures directly to the administrative office managing the contract.  Submission to Temple’s contract approval and signature system will be handled by that office.
• IMPORTANT NOTE: Agreements sent directly to authorized signature representatives of Temple will not be signed since they have not been reviewed and approved for signature. Therefore, please do not route agreements to Temple using DocuSign, AdobeSign or any other signature system without obtaining prior approval and instructions.  Where approval is granted, the agreement must be sent to the administrative official managing the contract with the ability to delegate the signature step to the university’s authorized signature representative. 

Only designated signatories of Temple University can sign contracts that involve the university.  OTCBD submits all contracts to University Counsel for approval and requests signatures using TUmarketplace.  Signatures are electronic unless a wet ink signature is requested.

Agreement Templates: Standard forms are available upon request for the agreements listed above.  Please email contracts@temple.edu to make a request.

Contact us with any questions:

Stephen Nappi
Associate Vice President of Technology Commercialization & Business Development

Tel: (215) 204-5293
Fax: (215) 204-4609
Email: stephen.nappi@temple.edu 

Go to top