Confidential Disclosure Agreement (CDA) are used to protect proprietary or non-public information that is disclosed in the course of evaluating a possible business relationship. These are also referred to as Non-Disclosure Agreements (NDAs) or as Secrecy Agreements.

CDAs protect UCSF and UCSF scientists in several ways:

• They allow UCSF researchers to discuss interesting new findings without compromising their future patentability.
• They memorialize what was discussed between the scientist and the company, so that if later there are questions about who originally developed an idea, we have a record of when the discussion took place.
• A CDA allows UCSF researchers to review and share company data or protocols with other UCSF employees to better evaluate opportunities for collaboration.

Industry sponsors will often ask UCSF to sign a CDA as a precursor to a sponsor-initiated clinical trial or sponsored research project. If you think you may need a CDA or if you have received a CDA from a company, email us for help.