Aspect-Oxentia
The SHAPE of things to come
In 2023, Divine Ox ran an eight-month project with an international network of over 40 universities (including the University of Oxford and the London School of Economics). The project set out to demonstrate the impact and potential impact of commercial spin outs based on IP created from the research undertaken in university social sciences, humanities and arts departments (SHAPE). The intended audience was funders and network members. We designed a theory of change model and an impact framework. We gathered data from sources within and outside the network through which we designed a predictive model which enabled us to:
- Track the progress of projects as they progressed through the commercialisation pathway
- Qualify and quantify the value of support that university acceleration activities were having
- Identify key issues and blockages at intermediate points along the pathway
- Show what worked best and what difference it made
- Make predictions about how long a project would take to progress along pathway
- Identify places in which resources could be targeted to best achieve impact goals
- Predict the attrition of projects as they moved through the system
- Make predictions about how likely it is that the intended impact will be eventually realised
This enabled Aspect and its constituent universities to draw conclusions around current and future impact and return on investment and to assist in decision making on where the project should go next.
Click here to read The SHAPE of things to come
