Cal Company Connector

When startups connect with well-established companies it can facilitate strategic partnerships that accelerate R&D, manufacturing, sales, investments, and acquisitions. However, it's often challenging for startups to get the attention of large companies - especially via cold calls and email.

UC Berkeley has hundreds of active collaborations with well-established corporations and startups. Each collaboration is built and maintained via an agreement and corresponding relationships between employees on campus and at those companies.

The Cal Company Connector program leverages those relationships by making trusted introductions between the campus’s corporate collaborators and Berkeley-affiliated startups - for qualified partnership opportunities.

Berkeley-affiliated startups include those that have an IP rights agreement with Berkeley, or have been accepted into a UC Berkeley startup accelerator program - such as SkyDeck, Foundry and Cyclotron Road.

Here’s how the Connector program works. 

Startups affiliated with UC Berkeley can request the list of companies that have active collaborations with UC Berkeley via IPIRA. To make that request send an email to mike.c@berkeley.edu. The list is confidential and not distributable.

When a startup finds a company on that list with which the startup would like an introduction in order to explore a strategic partnership, the startup submits this simple form to Berkeley’s Office of IP & Industry Research Alliances (IPIRA).

IPIRA then: (1) qualifies the partnership opportunity; (2) notifies the UC Berkeley unit that's affiliated with the startup; and (3) confers with the campus person who is the lead on the relationship with the corporation. If all three of the above steps are affirmative, then we move forward on the corresponding introduction via email. 

Please note that IPIRA can’t guarantee that an introduction will result in a partnership; nor can IPIRA take an active direct role in establishing these partnerships. 

Want more information? Contact IPIRA by submitting a concierge request.