The governance and commitment document co-signed by a BioHub’s founding cohort. Produced by Prompt 3 of the BioHub Identity Template. Establishes the BioHub as a coordination body worthy of commitment, articulates what each founding cohort member contributes and receives, sets out the entity form and patronage architecture, and specifies provisions for cohort expansion, revision, dissent, and dissolution.
Extended definition
Every coordination body has a founding moment. The Founding Compact makes that moment legible. It is the BioHub’s constitutional document, but written as a commitment register rather than a legal charter. What binds the founding cohort is not the entity form’s legal weight; it is what each person has committed to in writing, co-signed with the others.
The Compact is a +E coordination instrument. Its authority is voluntary, commitment-based, transparent, and revisable by the cohort through the decision-making forms it itself establishes. It does not derive authority from the state, the market, or any prior institution. Where the BioHub subsequently registers as a legal entity, the Compact remains the governing document of the coordination work; the entity form serves the Compact, not the reverse.
Length is five to ten pages. Any longer and it stops being a co-signable commitment register. Any shorter and it fails to specify what needs specifying.
Contrast with adjacent instruments
A memorandum of understanding records that parties have agreed to work together. A Founding Compact records what each party is accountable for and how the collective decides. The MOU is descriptive; the Compact is constitutive.
A partnership agreement or company constitution establishes the legal form of an entity. The Founding Compact establishes the coordination form of a cohort. The two may coexist, but they answer different questions. Where a legal entity is registered, its constitutional documents serve the Compact’s coordination purposes.
Structural elements
The Compact’s structure follows the Identity Template’s Prompt 3 specification:
- Preamble stating why the BioHub exists as a coordination body.
- Founding cohort commitments (what each contributes, what each receives, what each is accountable for).
- Entity form and its implications.
- Patronage architecture and how capital is held.
- Decision-making forms.
- Multi-BioHub coordination protocols (working protocols anticipating that other BioHubs may operate in the same BioRegion).
- Custodial and consent principles for cultural, indigenous, and heritage knowledge.
- Provisions for cohort expansion.
- Provisions for revision.
- Provisions for dissent.
- Provisions for dissolution.
- Co-signatures section.
Related terms
- Identity Statement
- Tender Compact
- Alignment Compact
- Commitment Pool
- +E Coordination Form
- Mycelial Patronage
Sources
- Ruddick, W. (2023). Commitment Pooling
- Burgess, M. (2015). Thinking in Promises
Provenance
Extracted from the BioHub Identity Template v0.2 in the VoG as Patron Project Prototype knowledge base, where the Founding Compact is specified as the third of the template’s three Prompt 3 outputs. Cross-referenced with the BioConomy Value Proposition Template and the Bankable Service Alignment Template, which inherit the cohort structure, decision-making forms, and patronage architecture the Founding Compact establishes.