ICO's Process Flow
Step 1: Intake
All new agreements (or formal amendments to existing agreements) should be submitted through ICO's Intake Form. The intake team will create a record in the ICO database and assign a Contracts Officer to review the agreement. For questions about ICO's Intake Form, please contact ico@stanford.edu
Step 2: Compliance
The intake team initiates research compliance checks based on the information in ICO's Intake Form. Compliance may include IRB, IACUC, Export Control, Conflict of Interest and other matters that require approval by another Stanford department. ICO will copy the Investigator on all relevant emails regarding compliance.
Step 3: Review
The Contracts Officer assigned to the agreement reviews all applicable documents, including the proposal, budget, statement of work, contract/redlines, any prior related agreements and correspondence before contacting the other party.
This step often occurs concurrently with the research compliance checks.
Step 4: Negotiation
The Contracts Officer will discuss issues with PI, engage and discuss the agreement with the sponsor and consult other Stanford offices as needed.
Negotiation is usually the longest step depending on the specifics of the project. Common negotiation points with industry sponsors are: intellectual property, indemnity, confidentiality, and publication.
Step 5: Signature
Once all parties to the agreement have agreed on the terms and all compliance issues have been resolved, the Contracts Officer will coordinate signatures on the agreement.
The PI will receive a digital copy of the fully executed agreement.
Step 6: Finalize
After final execution of the agreement, the Contracts Officer will mark the agreement as completed in the ICO database. For SRAs, the Contracts Officer will award the agreement in SeRA to enable OSR Post-Award to set up the project account.
Once the agreement is executed, the researchers can move forward with the project.