Kent spin-out achieves further success

UltraSoC Technologies Ltd, a spin-out from the University of Kent, has been awarded second place in the prestigious 2006 Research Councils’ Business Plan Competition. The company received a trophy and a cheque for £10,000 during a presentation at the Royal Society. Malcolm Wicks, Minister of State for Energy, Department of Trade and Industry, commended UltraSoC and the other finalists for their excellent business propositions, adding that ‘science and entrepreneurship are so crucial to the health of the UK economy.’

Carole Barron, Director of Enterprise, said: ‘We are delighted that UltraSoC’s success has been recognised by such a prestigious business competition. This is not the first time one of the University’s spin-outs has received this award – EigenFIT Ltd also achieved this accolade in 2004. Innovation depends on taking research through to completely developed marketable products and we actively encourage and support our academics to commercialise their research.’

UltraSoC is developing leading-edge technology making it easier to find and mend faults, or ‘bugs’, in embedded computer systems which is a huge challenge to manufacturers of electronic products. The technology has important commercial benefits for developers and manufacturers, as well as increased end-customer satisfaction. The intellectual property underpinning the technology was originally developed by Dr McDonald-Maier at the University of Kent. Dr McDonald-Maier said: ‘We believe our debug support strategy for next-generation system-on-chip technology will have enormous benefits in lowering manufacturing costs and improving safety in a wide range of computer and semiconductor applications. Being so highly placed in this extremely competitive event demonstrates that others share that vision.’

Dr Gary Robinson, Technology Transfer Manager at the University added: ‘We believe that UltraSoC’s success in the Business Plan Competition is testament to the strength not only of the world-leading research that underpins the company but also the depth and viability of the business.’

The Research Councils’ Business Plan Competition provides support, mentoring and training to develop high quality business plans to commercialise research carried out in UK universities and research institutions. Participants in the competition submitted business propositions from across the arts, biosciences, the environment, science and technology.