2011 has been a record year of activity for Cambridge Enterprise (CE), the University´s commercialization group. Its year-end results report more than £10.2 income from licensing, consultancy and equity transactions, £8.3 m of which were returned to the University, departments and researches.

For the first time since foundation in 2006 CE is writing black numbers, exceeding last year´s overall revenues by 22 percent. Income from licensing increased 24% from 2009/10, and income from consultancy increased by 37% year over year.

The rise of income went hand-in-hand with a rise in the number of intellectual property, consultancy and equity agreements signed on behalf of the University and its researchers.

In the past year 116 licenses and 183 consultancy contracts were completed and more than £468,000 returned to the company´s evergreen seed funds through equity transactions.

‘The growth enjoyed by Cambridge Enterprise this year demonstrates the value that industry attaches to Cambridge research, and the contribution the University is making to our national economic recovery.’ said Dr Tony Raven, Chief Executive of Cambridge Enterprise.

Currently, Cambridge Enterprise supports more than 1,000 University researchers at all stages of the commercialization process. ‘Universities such as Cambridge have an important role to play in supporting an innovation-led economic recovery, through collaborative research, technology licensing, consultancy projects and new company formation,’ stated Dr Raven.

At present, CE holds equity in 68 companies and manages ‘evergreen’ seed funds on the University’s behalf. In 2011, the companies in the Cambridge Enterprise portfolio raised more than £189 million in funding, around £130m of which came from Plastic Logic´s $200 million fundraising.

One of the 68 companies funded with intellectual property and cash by Cambridge Enterprise is Eight19, spun-out from the Cavendish Laboratory in 2010.

 This year, the company completed trials of IndiGo, a personal pay-as-you-go solar electricity system in Zambia, Kenya, Malawi and India, based on organic photovoltaics, a method of generating electrical power by converting solar radiation. The system could provide safe, sustainable and affordable power for some of the 1.6 billion people without electricity worldwide.

Pneuma Care, another highly successful Cambridge company this year, was named a winner at the prestigious Medical Futures Innovation Awards for its development of a non-contact method of measuring lung function for the one third of patients who are unable to use current methods.

Its product is now in use in hospitals across the UK, with expansion to Southeast Asia and North America planned for 2012.