LONDON—A novel international data base compiled on floppy disks may soon help American scientists disseminate their ideas for commercial applications of their work.

This new venture in worldwide technology transfer is called Techstart International Inc. The New York company was founded by two entrepreneurs, Peter Ruof, formerly of the World Bank, and Paris del L'Etraz, a computer systems analyst with the Union Bank of Switzerland.

The company plans to develop a network of national boards to identify possible recipients of information supplied by American scientists and engineers in companies, universities and research establishments. The scientists provide Techstart with an IBM PC floppy disk containing a 100-word description of their concepts, plus their names and addresses. Once every three months, Techstart will collate, format and distribute copies of the disk to boards around the world for circulation to their target markets.

National boards already exist in London, Dusseldorf, Zurich, Madrid and...

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