Contract Negotiation

We specialize exclusively in negotiating contracts within the research and procurement sectors. Our team of experts offers a fixed price per contract based on the complexity of the agreement. This allows institutions to keep us on retainer with no upfront cost and leverage our services when needed. You only pay for the work completed, giving you predictable costs without the burden of underutilized full-time employees.

Our Approach

Whether your organization struggling to hire, train, and retain staff with the specialized skill set necessary for complex contract negotiations, or your institution facing challenges in securing research contracts with universities, hospitals, or nonprofits, Attain Partners is here to help.

Instead of relying on expensive outside counsel with uncertain timelines and high hourly rates, you can partner with our experts for a more predictable and efficient solution. Offering a fixed price per contract—tailored to the unique complexities of each agreement—we share our experts with you so that you can leverage our services as needed.

The Attain Partners Guarantee

At Attain Partners, our contract negotiation services come with three guarantees—timeframes for getting initial drafts/redlines to the counterparty; a proven, systematic follow-up process; and complete negotiations on any contract on which you engage us. Our guaranteed service levels for initial review and responding to responses and follow-ups is a system that has proven to reduce turnaround times.

Contract Negotiation Services

Full Contracts Team – Let us serve as your dedicated contracts team. We will work seamlessly with departmental and central leadership, administrators, and researchers—just like your in-house staff. We’ll update your system of record, use your email, and manage the contracting process with your ancillary departments (e.g., legal, tech transfer, IT) to ensure smooth operations.
Short-term Supplemental Support – Facing staffing turnover, upcoming leaves, or unexpected growth in a particular area? Our team can step in to provide short-term support, preventing backlogs and ensuring that critical contract work continues without disruption.

Contract Redlining – Let us handle the initial redlines of your contracts providing your internal team with a solid foundation to kick off negotiations quickly and efficiently.
Full Negotiations – Have our experts negotiate the agreement and take it through the signature process using mutually agreed upon contractual guidelines.
Corporate Affiliation Agreements – Allow us to help you properly structure agreements with corporate partners with which you are looking to form deep and complex relationships. This is especially important in an environment in which federal funding is at risk.

Types of Contracts

Federal Grants and Contracts

Corporate Sponsored Research

Clinical Trial Agreements

Service Agreements

Contracts with City, County, and State Governments

Fixed Price, Cost-Reimbursable, and Time and Materials Procurement Contracts

Subawards

Nonprofit Grants

Cooperative Agreements

Memorandums of Understanding

Confidential and Non-Disclosure Agreements (NDAs)

Data Use Agreements

Material Transfer Agreements

Facility Use Agreements

Data Aggregation Agreements

Consortium Membership Agreements

Contract Consulting Services

Attain Partners brings incredible depth of experience to our contracting work. Our leadership teams have negotiated contracts for more than 50 organizations across the country and have run contract offices at colleges and universities. We have encountered every level of risk tolerance, contractual guidelines, business processes, and technological solutions.

Training – We offer contract type-specific training, workload management strategies, and negotiation tactics tailored to your team’s needs
Quality Assurance – We help train your staff by reviewing their initial redlines and providing feedback on adherence to guidelines, important contractual concepts, and strategy suggestions.
Staffing Assessments – We provide detailed assessments that go beyond basic benchmarking. Using industry data, we analyze how long different types of contracts take and evaluate the specific responsibilities of your contract officers, considering the unique aspects of your organization.
Business Process Redesign (BPR) – We assess interactions with ancillary departments (e.g., IRB, IACUC, IBC, Data Security, IT, Legal, Tech Transfer, Export Control, Marketing, and Clinical Operations). We help you optimize the signature process and escalation pathways for contractual impasses. We also evaluate how technology is being used to create an efficient contracting process.

Template Review – We review your contract templates to ensure they align with industry best practices and don’t hinder the collaborations you wish to pursue.
Guideline Creation/Review – We develop contractual playbooks based on industry best practices. This can be general or tailored to specific contract types.
Policy Drafting and Review – We assist clients with drafting policies related to contracts, connections between contracts and operations, intellectual property, data transfer risk tolerance matrixes, and other regulatory compliance.
Software Selection and Implementation – We assist in selecting the appropriate Contract Life Cycle Management (CLM) and Artificial Intelligence (AI) solutions for your organization’s contracting needs. Once a solution is chosen, we can help design and implement it to ensure maximum effectiveness. We can also lead the implementation if no internal resources are available.

Talk to an Expert

Ready to Attain more? Contact our team to find out how we can support your unique objectives.