On the glut of patenting, BASF's rising research budget, football fever in the Commons, and other insights into R&D management

Some strange new ways of raising money are starting to emerge - but would-be borrowers and lenders are still making sense of them.

The Cambridge-based company a.gain medical says it has invented the world's first urethral sensor for women – and is looking for further investment.

The universities of Cambridge and Manchester, Imperial College London and the SETsquared Partnership, a joint venture among four universities in southern England, have won funding to collaborate with peers in the US and with companies such as Airbus and Boeing.