Online legal marketing: How lawyers assist in commercialization of university research

Commercialization of university's inventions has become an important topic to Malaysian universities. Important outcomes from this commercialization are patent, spin off company and also how much profits generated from these mechanism. Most of academic writers always argue on the roles of the Technology Transfer Office (TTO), researchers and policy makers as main key players in commercialization process. However, there is still little research debating on the role of lawyers who have been involved as the agent for the university in the process of applying IP rights for researchers. Moreover, lawyers help the university to commercialize university's research more easily to the public because they are the one who involved in the commercialization process from the start. Another important element is that the nature of their profession which is closely connected to the professionalism, integrity and trust places them as the most relevant referral point to help university in the commercialization process. This paper will look at how lawyers may market the innovations of the university when they simultaneously market their legal skills online. The paper recommends that lawyers who have been appointed as legal advisors for universities may act as the online marketing agent for the university.