The Communications Research Centre is the Canadian government's leading communications research facility responsible for conducting leading-edge R&D to develop the Canadian communications infrastructure and to support Canadian telecommunications firms in their efforts to remain globally competitive.

Over the years, CRC has been instrumental in helping small Canadian high tech companies by licensing technologies, passing on knowledge or providing access to specialized laboratory facilities. CRC boasts a wide range of intellectual property of potential commercial value and has a diverse list of technologies available for licence. Each year, new inventions or improvements to existing patents are added to the portfolio.

There are three formal ways in which business transactions can be enacted:

• Licence Agreements - A negotiated licence agreement is usually the preferred approach when a company identifies a CRC-held technology which could be developed into a product for the commercial market.
• Contracting-in - If a company has a clear research objective or well-defined project, but lacks the in-house capability to perform the work, contracting-in may be the preferred approach.
• Collaborative Agreements - Where CRC wishes to pursue joint research in support of the institute's objectives and that of its partner, a collaborative agreement is usually the mechanism for defining what the parties will undertake and how each will benefit from the intellectual property stemming from the project.

On a less formal basis, CRC will provide advice and know-how to smallfirms that only need to be shown a particular technical solution to a productdevelopment question or problem.