The Catholic University of Louvain, or UCL, is internationally recognised for its expertise in the field of neurological disorders. It can now step up its research thanks to support from the Marshall programme for excellence, launched at the end of 2008 by Regional Minister for Research Marie-Dominique Simonet and the UCL authorities. This research programme, called DIANE (Désordres Inflammatoires dans les Affections NEurologiques, or Inflammatory Disorders in Neurological Diseases), is aimed at alleviating the suffering associated with neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s. The objective is to gain a better understanding of the factors that trigger these diseases and to investigate the ensuing deterioration of the nervous system.

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Universities, a key actor in innovation stimulation 

Universities are seen as key actors in stimulating innovation and therefore fostering economic growth of any society. During the recent years, government agencies encouraged universities to interact more with industries. Public research funding became increasingly dependent on how inventions are protected and how research done at university is fueling scientific innovation.

In the mind of many academics, thinking about patents and commercial use of them is considered as a threat for open dissemination of scientific knowledge (delay or prohibition of publications) and fear that efforts devoted to this activity will weaken the scientific focus of the research. Recent studies have shown that performing research with an entrepreneurial focus creates a virtuous circle and increases the number of publications without affecting the quality of the publication involved.

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At a press conference held on Monday 16 February at the Catholic University of Louvain (UCL) Faculty of Medicine in Woluwe, in the presence of University Chancellor Bernard Coulie and Brussels Minister Benoît Cerexhe, UCL, Sopartec and the Brussels-Capital region presented their new incubator for innovative companies, the Brussels Life Sciences Incubator, or BLSI, set in the heart of UCL’s Brussels campus. Professor Pierre Gianello, Dean for Research in the Faculty of Medicine, took advantage of the occasion to highlight the importance of this new incubator for the policy of further developing the research carried out at UCL.

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What do the following have in common: the entry control systems on the campus of the Free University of Brussels and at the central offices of ING in Amsterdam, the calculation of the time that SNCF trains spend stopped in RER stations, the counting in real time of customers of The Phone House stores and the security of a huge military-industrial complex in Kuwait? All of these customers use automatic image processing software (videosurveillance) designed and marketed by the company ACIC in Mons.

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E-Xstream engineering (www.e-xstream.com) is a UCL spin-off which came into being on 20 May 2003 as the result of a meeting between two men who have realised their dream: Issam Doghri, a professor at UCL since 1994, with many years’ experience in the domain of modelling and the digital simulation of nonlinear materials, and Roger Assaker, Doctor in Applied Sciences from UCL, the holder of an MBA who was a researcher at Goodyear Luxembourg for five years. Ever since its creation, the company has achieved constant growth of around 50 to 60% in its annual turnover, reaching the profitability threshold in 2007.

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SEMINAR - 12.05.2009 in Gembloux : tex incentives for R&D

Companies in many sectors of activity are often unaware of the tax incentives for R&D, and so these tend to be underused.

In addition, several new incentives are now available (exemption from prepayment of tax, patent income deduction etc.), while other incentives have recently been changed (tax credits for investment in R&D, exemption for regional subsidies).

These measures can offer significant benefits to many companies, and their field of application is much wider than might be thought.

Making use of the R&D tax credit allows companies to reduce R&D costs by 7%, and this tax credit is refundable if the company does not have a taxable base.

The exemption from statutory prepayment of tax for staff working in R&D, which now amounts to up to 75%, significantly reduces payroll costs for R&D staff.

The new tax deduction for patents reduces the effective tax rate for patent income to a maximum of 6.8%.

• Did you know that?
• Are you familiar with all these measures?
• Is your company taking all possible advantage of tax incentives?
• The aim of this training course is to draw up a list of the tax incentives available to companies carrying out research and/or development in order to assess their practical financial effects. The course is aimed at heads of companies, financial managers, tax managers, corporate lawyers and directors of research. 

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Registration: If you wish to register for the course, don’t forget to include the code SOPARTEC10P in the field ‘remarques’ (comments). You will then be given a 10% discount on the cost of the training course.

The "Little Breakfast Meetings" of Sopartec were born in December 2007. The purpose of these meetings is to promote reconciliation between the people involved in the process of upgrading academic research and create synergies within the project spin-off from the UCL by the establishment of a platform for informal contacts. The success of "Little Breakfast Meetings" shows a need to exchange ideas and experiences to build on them.

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