The final session is this week. This spring the office launched a new educational program called the “Innovator Series.” in order to help educate our faculty about how they can better position their research for commercial success. “Historically, scientists pursue knowledge for the sake of knowledge.” says Philip Semprevio, OTT licensing associate. “We are aiming to get researchers to think ahead about not just knowledge and science itself, but its relevance and commercial application.” With focus shifting towards inventions and innovation as well as their translation into commercial products, it’s important for faculty to understand how to take advantage of the increasingly available funds for translational and applied research. “The current funding environment is tough, and if you want to commercialize technology you need to consider research topics that will be relevant to industry professionals and unmet needs in the industry” says Panya Taysavang, OTT licensing associate. “It is more than possible to conduct research that is both commercially relevant and beneficial from a basic research standpoint.” The series consists of four sessions with three of those comprised of panel discussions over the course of three months. Identify industry needs that align with your interests Merrick Furst, PhD, Founder, Flashpoint
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Rallying Around Medtech: SEMDA’s Eighth Annual Conference Highlights the Role of Tech Transfer
The Southeast Medical Device Association (SEMDA) held their annual conference earlier this month. The conference was filled with thought-provoking seminars, fledgling company presentations, cutting-edge innovations, and great conversations. A highlight for us was the impressive showing of technology transfer professionals from throughout the southeast, an example of the increasing role technology transfer plays in the development of our regional industries. Emory OTT participated as an exhibitor; our booth provided a place for our team to interface with companies, entrepreneurs, and investors alike. In addition, during the first day of the seminar, there was a university technology panel with tech transfer professionals from University of Florida, Vanderbilt, Clemson, University of Alabama at Birmingham, and Emory. Our office’s Director Todd Sherer participated on the panel. The panel discussed hot topics such as training, support of inventors and entrepreneurs, and venture funding of medical device companies. It was no surprise to us, but perhaps a surprise to some in the audience, that the ultimate goal of tech transfer is not necessarily to make money. Although finances are of course a concern, our overarching goal is to promote the utilization of new innovations and get them into the marketplace while simultaneously supporting technologies and
Continue readingWhat a Year it Has Been: Celebrating the 1st Anniversary of Our Blog!
Just about 12 months ago, our office launched this blog as a new initiative with the goal of sharing hot topics in tech transfer, opinion pieces, educational items, events, Emory initiatives, and intern experiences in an effort to promote Emory technologies and working with our office. Given that our industry has been under increasing scrutiny due to economic and political pressures, we viewed telling these stories as an increasingly important component to our overall success and the well-being of our industry. Our initial goal was to post once or twice a month, but we quickly found that there were so many things going on, so many great topics, that we could post weekly. It has been a great problem to have! We hope that you, our readers, have found our blog valuable as well, and we have appreciated all the kind words, constructive feedback, and sharing on social media. Over the next year we hope to maintain our weekly sharing, bring in more guest blogs/content, expand our range of topics, and punch up the visual appeal of the site. We will keep on sharing, if you keep reading! Looking back, we have published 45 posts, almost 40% of site traffic
Continue readingFrom the Director: Kauffman FastTrac Program
For two years now Emory has helped bring the Kauffman FastTrac® TechVenture™ program to Atlanta. During this 7 week program aspiring and current entrepreneurs learn about the nuts and bolts of running a business from other successful entrepreneurs. In this blog post we pick the brain of our Executive Director, Todd Sherer, on the importance of entrepreneurship, training our faculty, and why the program has been so successful. What was behind bringing this curriculum to Emory? There has been a lot of pressure during the global financial crisis for universities to do a better job of spinning out technology and creating not just companies, but jobs. We knew that in order to do this we would have to provide more formal training for faculty who are typically and traditionally trained to be research scientists, but don’t receive training to be an entrepreneur. We knew it was going to be critical to our success if we wanted to improve impact in the technology transfer space by providing more focused training around becoming a successful entrepreneur. What is your thought on the role of entrepreneurial training? I think the role of entrepreneurial training is critically important. Again, in a peer reviewed
Continue readingENTICe Moves Forward
Last year we announced the start of Emory’s ENTICe (Emory Neuromodulation and Technology Innovation Center) program in a blog with the goal to advance the understanding and effectiveness of neuromodulation therapies in order improve treatment of neurological and psychiatric disorders. Over the past few months, ENTICe has been moving forward with their program at a rapid clip and laying a solid foundation for innovation in the area of Parkinson’s disease treatments. In December of last year, ENTICe held their first Innovation Forum with both scientists and engineers from Emory and Georgia Tech in attendance. During the first forum, Drs. Mahlon Delong, Robert Gross, and Thomas Wichmann provided a general overview of Parkinson’s Disease pathology, symptoms, and current treatment options, including L-DOPA, anticholinergics, thalamotomy, and palidotomy. Two months later, in February of this year, ENTICe held its next Innovation Forum in conjunction with Georgia Tech’s sister program. At this forum, Dr. Robert Gross spoke more about strength and weakness in current therapeutic approaches as well as how deep brain stimulation (DBS) is currently used to treat Parkinson’s, neurostimulatory devices are implanted, and stimulation for those devices is programmed. The session was followed by an open discussion full of thought-provoking questions raised
Continue reading8th Annual Celebration of Technology & Innovation
Each year the Office of Technology Transfer (OTT) hosts a celebration to highlight the technology and innovation of Emory’s faculty. Last Thursday, March 6th was our 8th annual celebration and it was another successful event even with the rainy weather. After opening remarks from David Wynes, Vice President for Research Administration and David Stephens, Vice President for Research in the Health Sciences Center, the keynote speaker Christopher Yochim, Director, External Relations, Global Product and Portfolio Strategy, AstraZeneca, gave an interesting talk highlighting how industry can work with academia. Chris spoke in-depth about partnerships between pharma and academia. With declining revenue and R&D productivity, pharmaceutical companies need to add to their pipelines and increase awareness of innovative science. In addressing these needs they are increasingly turning to universities and academic medical centers to build strategic alliances and partnerships. Due to decreases in support from the federal government for research, these partnerships present new and interesting opportunities for academia. Chris talked about how aligning the interests of all parties involved had many challenges, but that they could be overcome. He emphasized that it often comes down to relationships and visibility from both scientists and the technology transfer office of the university. Pharma
Continue readingWrapping up Emory’s Experience at AUTM’s 2014 Annual Meeting
We just flew in from the West coast, and boy are our brains tired! It’s a play on an old joke we know, but after the whirlwind of non-stop education, networking, and partnering at AUTM’s (the Association of University Technology Managers) Annual meeting in San Francisco, it pretty accurately describes our energy level. AUTM 2014 was a busy meeting for the OTT team as members volunteered, attended sessions, spoke, and participated in partnering sessions over the four day event. While recapping the entire experience is too much for a blog post, here is a rundown of the highlights and takeaways. Partnering: For the third year in a row, OTT made extensive use of the corporate partnering sessions offered by AUTM. Scheduled beforehand, these 30 minute one-on-one meetings with company representatives gave the OTT team members a chance to discuss particular Emory technologies, gather feedback and learn about each company’s areas of interest. As a whole the team participated in 23 partnering sessions, and the feedback gathered will be used to guide future marketing efforts. Sessions: OTT members had the opportunity to attend many educational sessions during AUTM 2014, covering a range of topics impacting our industry from funding to patent
Continue readingEmory OTT Attends the Annual JP Morgan Healthcare Conference
Last month from January 13-16, 2014, the JP Morgan 32nd Annual Healthcare Conference was held in San Francisco, California. For many years, Emory’s Office of Technology has attended; represented this year by Executive Director, Todd Sherer and Director, Kevin Lei. With approximately 300 companies presenting and over 4,000 investors present, the conference is one of the largest healthcare investment symposia in the industry. It brings together global industry leaders, emerging companies, innovators, technology transfer offices, and members of the investment community all in one place. “JP Morgan is an important meeting in our strategy to build relationships with the business community and showcase the University’s innovations,” said Sherer. Over the course of four days Sherer and Lei met with over a dozen venture firms to discuss some of Emory’s most exciting opportunities, which were AbbyMed, LLC: a company focused on a class of small molecules aimed at treating certain types of intractable cancers such as brain, liver, and melanoma. The company’s initial clinical target is glioblastoma multiforme (GBM). Accuitis, Inc.: a company focused on dermatological and ophthalmic pharmaceuticals targeting underserved indications. The company’s initial clinical target is rosacea. Cambium Medical Technologies, LLC: a company focused on the development of a
Continue readingAn ENTICeing Proposition: Neuromodulation Innovation Center
The advent of neuromodulation, the therapeutic alteration of neural activity via an implanted device, has revolutionized the treatment of neurological and neuropsychiatric disorders. Emory has long been at the forefront of this revolution with pioneering research on the pathophysiology of Parkinson’s disease and the identification of novel brain targets for ablation. At the same time, Emory has also been a leader in the development of innovative deep brain stimulation (DBS) techniques for psychiatric disorders (e.g., major depression), and the use of DBS for epilepsy and dystonia. The success of these programs has propelled the expansion of neuromodulation-related research at Emory, which now spans the Departments of Neurosurgery, Neurology, Psychiatry, Rehabilitation, Biomedical Engineering, Neuroscience, and Psychology as well as the Yerkes Primate Center and collaborations with our colleagues at Georgia Tech. Emory is now prepared to take the next step. By bringing together these clinicians, researchers, and engineers into a single center, Emory hopes to further develop these discoveries into practical solutions and products. This new center is called the Emory Neuromodulation and Technology Innovation Center (ENTICe). The goal of ENTICe is to advance the understanding and effectiveness of neuromodulation in order to reduce the burden of neurological and psychiatric disorders. The
Continue readingNew DRIVE for Drug Development & Innovation
An innovative new commercialization partner has arrived at Emory University; DRIVE (Drug Innovation Ventures at Emory, LLC). DRIVE is a new public-private drug development enterprise and not-for-profit entity separate from, but wholly owned by Emory, that will expand the capabilities of traditional academic drug research, combining the expertise of Emory scientists with a proven business and management team. DRIVE will provide the financial, business, project management, and regulatory expertise to move drugs through lead optimization and pre-clinical testing and into proof-of-concept clinical trials. Its ultimate goal is to transition scientific discoveries more rapidly, effectively, and efficiently. Emory OTT is excited to have this new avenue available to move discoveries forward from the lab to the market. Universities have typically had difficulty moving promising projects through this stage of development often referred to as the “Valley of Death.” Technologies with proof-of-concept clinical data will have significantly more value and less risk and can then be out-licensed to pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, partnered with foundations or government entities, or spun-out into newly formed companies financed by venture capital firms. DRIVE will finance its initial efforts with $10 million in funding received from the monetization of royalties associated with the HIV drug emtricitabine
Continue readingAnother Successful FastTrac Closes – Congrats & Thanks!
After two months and six full days of course work another FastTrac® TechVenture™ course concluded. There were 36 budding entrepreneurs from Emory, Georgia Tech, Morehouse School of Medicine, and University of Georgia who participated. The course taught researchers and aspiring entrepreneurs about the nuts and bolts of running a new business, familiarizing them with start-ups and preparing them to work with business leaders and investors. The group heard from five presidents/CEOs, three VPs/COOs, an executive recruiter, a patent attorney, and a venture capitalist. Donovan Moxey, a 3D animation software company co-founder led weekly class discussions. Congratulations to our Graduates: Heather Bara, Gregory Berns, Beau Bruce, Austin Cape, Amanda Caster, Ping Chen, Sharath Cholleti, Felmont Eaves, Ernesto Escobar, Baowei Fei, Douglas Friedman, Christopher Gillig, Cengiz Gunay, Michael Hellerstein, Brantley Herrin, R. Chris Hopkins, Erin Keller, David LaBorde, Renhao Li, Brandon Miller, Jonathan Neff, Susan Nicholas, Chantel Nicolas, Modele Ogunniyi, Omotunde Olubi, Muralidhar Padala, Amir Rezvan, Felipe Sarmiento, Jennifer Sherer, Mark Spivak, Kelvin Suggs, Srini Tridandapani, Erika Tyburski, Lawrence Wilson, Daqing Wu, and Kevin Woods. Thank you to our speakers and mentors for volunteering your time! Speakers: Barry Brager, Tom Callaway, Robert Crutchfield, Charlie Deignan, Richard diMonda, Sherry Knowles, Vince La Terza,
Continue readingOTT Launches New Website
Emory’s Office of Technology Transfer is proud to announce the launch of an all NEW website www.ott.emory.edu! This large scale redesign and update is a key part of our larger comprehensive “Reinventing Technology Transfer” Project (ReTechTran) focused on improving and upgrading Emory’s technology transfer program, ensuring that we remain at the forefront of our industry. Serving as a digital gateway to our office, our upgraded and redesigned site offers many features and content not previously available to our faculty and industry partners. Highlights of the new site include new educational materials, facts & figures, success stories, additional videos, social media integration, and an OTT blog. We hope you take a few minutes to explore!
Continue readingMixing Opportunities, Entrepreneurs, and Eggs
On May 21st, Emory OTT held the latest installment of our biannual Breakfast Club meeting. Started in 2010, the office hosts an invite-only event during which our licensing associates briefly pitch a new innovation with especially great potential. Each 10-minute pitch is focused less on the technical merits of the particular technology, and more on the commercial opportunity enabled by that innovation. Attendees include venture capitalists, service providers, and entrepreneurs from the greater Atlanta area. “We consider our Breakfast Club one of OTT’s signature and most successful programs” says Executive Director Todd Sherer. “It’s like a dating service for feature technologies. Our office is the one matchmaking Emory’s innovations with venture capitalists. Over the last three years, the feedback and connections made have been invaluable in advancing our technologies.” The event is a great time to learn about the new technologies coming from Emory research labs, network, catch-up with the local biotech community, and grab some breakfast. Yesterday, four members of our team presented four very different technologies – “Sugar Assassin” – An encapsulated dietary enzyme that reduces the dietary glucose absorbed by the GI tract during a meal. Ideal for weight loss. Click here for yesterday’s PowerPoint presentation and
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