Ask HN: How does one form business partnerships with universities?

I'm the co-founder of a small US-based startup. As an applied research company, we'd like to form a partnership with my a certain laboratory in my alma mater that would involve the following:

- Joint research projects in fundamental and applied science. - Joint grant-writing for said projects - Our partial funding of the laboratory - Collaboration with other departments

Patent and publication ownership will have to be negotiated and is outside of the scope of this question.

Beyond piquing the interest of the lab's director, what is the usual process for formalizing such partnerships with the university?