Organisation

The universities organised within the patent marketing association of North Rhine-Westphalia have been shareholders of PROvendis GmbH since September 2008. PROvendis GmbH was originally established as a fully-owned subsidiary of ZENIT GmbH on 24.10.2001 within the framework of the federal government’s exploitation initiative.

PROvendis, a service provider of the patent marketing association of the universities of North Rhine-Westphalia, has also acted successfully for other public research institutes and is supported by:

the SIGNO Universities (SIGNO-Hochschulen) initiative. SIGNO is a program of the Federal Department of Economics and Technology (BMWi) that aims at supporting universities, companies and freelance inventors in securing protection rights and the commercial utilisation of innovative ideas.

the Department of Innovation, Science and Research of the federal state of North Rhine-Westphalia (MIWF).