COOPERATIVE RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT AGREEMENT
BETWEEN
LAS AND CERL FOR THE PURPOSE OF
GRASS TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER


CERL's EN Commander, Colonel James T. Scott and LAS's President Gilles Clement the day of the signature of the CRADA.
In the back, Robert Carl Lozar, Principal Investigator at COE Lab, Ms. Bea Saenz-Shahin,ORTA Program Coordinator and William D. Goran, Chief of Land Managment Laboratory.

The U.S. Army Construction Engineering Research Laboratories (CERL), Champaign Ill., Announced in February 1996 that it will no longer develop public-domain software related to Geographic Resources Analysis Support System (GRASS).

CERL has signed on June 7th 1996 with LAS Inc a CRADA (Cooperative Research And Development Agreement) for the transfer of GRASS technology. The future development of GRASS, its distribution in a commercial environment is now LAS responsibility.


BACKGROUND

CERL intents to no longer develop, support or distribute the public
domain version of the GRASS GIS.  At the same time LAS has released a
commercial, value-added versions of GRASS (known as GRASSLAND) on widely
used hardware configurations. 

Therefore, so that:

1)	The research, time and money invested into GRASS in the past is not
lost and so that

2) 	A Commercial Off The Shelf (COTS) alternative source for the GRASS
capabilities is available for military installations (and general
public) and

3)  	Growth of spatial analysis R&D may continue outside of CERL itself,

It is proposed that LAS and CERL enter into a mutually beneficial
Cooperative Research And Development Agreement (CRADA).

This agreement is mutually beneficial because:

1)	CERL must ensure that there will a COTS GRASS alternative for their
military installations which have invested considerable money and labor
resources into GRASS implementation.

2)	LAS is interested in seeing GRASS survive since it is the basis of
its new package GRASSLAND.

3)	Though the current version of GRASS (4.1) is a very good and very
stable software package for the market place, and before the decision to
do no more development and distribution was made, CERL performed a good
deal of R&D which has resulted in significant GRASS enhancements since
version 4.1.  To ensure this investment of government moneys is not lost
to the public when CERL supported GRASS ends, LAS will integrate some of
these into their COTS GRASSLAND product.

4)	GRASSLAND is a logic continuity to GRASS for military installations
since it solves some of the most important problems remaining in
GRASS4.1 and since LAS will fully support the GRASSLAND software
package.

5)  CERL is continuing to invest in advanced environmental modeling based
on our GIS technology needs.  Those which have potential interest to the 
general GIS market place could be made available to LAS for integration 
into future releases of GRASSLAND.

LAS therefore proposes to implement a technology transfer agreement that
will help CERL to transion out of GRASS development and support without
putting the GRASS based R&D investment of several military installations
in jeopardy.  Because GRASS has a public domain history, and there
are other individuals and groups who may wish to continue to be active
in GRASS development, LAS is free to make additional arrangements with
those additionally interested parties.


RESPONSABILITIES OF THE PARTIES TO THIS AGREEMENT:

Each parties will have the following enumerated responsibilities within
the scope of this agreement:

LAS Responsibilities

Take over most activities previously performed by the Office of GRASS
Integration (OGI) within the scope of this CRADA:

  1)	Provision of a full technical support plan for both users and
developers,

  2)	Enhancement, maintenance and progressive development of GRASS
user's and programmer's documentation within GRASSLAND's documentation,

  3)	Progressive integration of existing code developed by CERL and
other interested parties into GRASSLAND,

  4)	Distribution of GRASSLAND for Windows/95 and Windows/NT (as a
commercial product) and distribution of GRASSLAND for SOLARIS and a few
other undefined UNIX workstations platforms (as a freeware product),

  5)	Maintenance of all GRASS source code (after and including
GRASS4.1), and make it available to the user's community through an ftp
site 

  6)	Progressive take over and maintenance of the GRASS web and ftp
sites and link to the GRASSLAND web site, (ftp site to be transitioned
from CERL to LAS within 30 months after this CRADA becomes effective),

  7)	Assistance and technical support in transfering CERL's GRASS based
application into GRASSLAND,

  8)	Provide a continuing vehicle for CERL spatial research into a COTS
environment.


CERL Responsabilities

Provide LAS with the tools necessary so this techology transfer
agreement is fully successful including:

1)	Provide an Internet WWW and ftp facility for exchange of code and
information between CERL, LAS and other interested parties,

2)	Provide all current documentation in digital format (programmer's
manual, user's manual, man pages, tutorial and others),

3) 	Provide all source code of GRASS enhancements developed since
version 4.1 so LAS can intergrate these into its COTS environment
product, GRASSLAND. (This of course does not cover proprietary source
code that is owned or co-owned by third parties).

4)	Inform all military installations of the existence of GRASSLAND as a
logic continuity to GRASS,

5)	Give to LAS information about the military installations where GRASS
has been/is currently used,

6)	Transfer at least one GRASS based application such as PRISM or other,
into GRASSLAND.

7)	Distribute a press release through its regular channels about the
existence and benefits of the agreement to historic CERL customers.

8) CERL will act as a beta-site for GRASSLAND's releases which LAS will
make available to CERL at no cost.  If CERL fields GRASSLAND to other
sites (e.g. installations), normal commercial charges for the GRASSLAND
product will apply.

9) LAS will have access to new software developed by CERL in its spatial
research program to provide a COTS vehicle for technology transfer to
CERL users.  The question of royalties will be considered in the future.
For any code/module for which LAS pays royalties, LAS will exclusively own the
rights to that code/module.


DURATION

This agreement will be in effect for three years or until the goals and
responsabilites of both parties are achieved.


PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATORS FOR LAS

Mr.Gilles Clement, CEO and Mr.Christian Larouche, PhD, Geomatics.

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