Greetings from Anaheim, California, where Fuentek’s Danielle McCulloch, Julie Markoski, and I are attending the annual meeting of the Association of University Technology Managers®. The conference has barely started, and we’re already very busy at this great meeting! AUTM 2012 began yesterday with a joint session with the Licensing Executives Society, which had its Winter Meeting here in the first half of the week. (And, no, it’s not coincidence that the LES and AUTM meetings are aligned like this. This was just one of several efforts this year in AUTM’s Strategic Alliances.) The two associations hosted a pair of sessions together on Wednesday. The first was called… Continue reading →
As Nannette Stangle-Castor and I get ready for Fuentek’s new webinar on implementing open innovation best practices in technology transfer offices (TTOs), I am reminded of conversations I’ve had with a wide range of tech transfer professionals over the years. What has struck me time and again in these discussions is the broad applicability of open innovation concepts to tech transfer and the value of implementing these concepts in a proactive manner. Despite the fact that government, university, and corporate TTOs vary in their missions, perspectives on innovation, goals/metrics, and economic and entrepreneurial climates, they all have the potential to benefit from implementing sound principles related to open innovation. 
Last week, a tech transfer professional at a university asked me which patent analysis tools Fuentek uses in our market-based technology assessments. Our conversation then evolved into a discussion about how we use patent mapping as well as the value patent maps provide in evaluating a technology’s commercial potential. I’d like to share with you the perspective that I shared with him. Let me begin by being crystal clear: I firmly believe that analysis tools providing visual maps of the patent landscape play a useful role in… 
The urgency is growing surrounding a very important technology transfer issue: the free agency concept. This is the idea put forth by The Kauffman Foundation that university faculty should be able to shop their discoveries to any third party for licensing. A Quick Recap The free agency concept first gained attention in January 2010, when Harvard Business Review called it a breakthrough idea. I blogged at the time that it is, in fact, a naive idea. 
I’m interacting with lots of young people these days. Last week I went to Chewning Middle School in Durham, NC, to speak with students about my experiences growing up and working my way into a career in the science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) field. And later this week I’m returning once again to judge the NC Regional FIRST Robotics Competition at the Dorton Arena in Raleigh. 
Your Web site is the doorway through which licensees, collaborators, and innovators enter your office, so make sure it enhances the perception of your organization and aligns with your tech transfer goals. This was the message that came through loud and clear from panelists at a session of the recent Association of University Technology Managers® (AUTM®) annual meeting in Anaheim, California. 
I’ve recently connected with Springboard Enterprises, an innovative organization that showcases high-quality, women-led companies that are seeking investors. Springboard has a good track record for facilitating spin-out companies (success stories include Constant Contact, ZipCar, Tikatok, and many more) and is providing great opportunities for women entrepreneurs. 
Danielle, Julie, and I are settling back into the swing of things now that we’re back from the AUTM® annual meeting in Anaheim. We’ll blog about our panels (which we previewed earlier) in the days to come. But today I wanted to recap some of my favorite moments from the conference.
As VP for Strategic Alliances, I was pleased to host a special-interest group (SIG) discussion yesterday morning at the AUTM® annual meeting. It turned out to be a popular session, with more than 40 attendees split about evenly between university and industry tech transfer offices (TTOs). All of them offered great ideas about the various initiatives that Strategic Alliances is pursuing. 