The article below appeared in the June 2008 issue of Technology Transfer Tactics.

“Most other workshops focusing on commercialization or technology transfer are designed as lectures,” he says. “I don’t know of any others that are as focused on making definitive progress. We’re not teaching scientists how to be Larry Page and Sergey Brin or Woz Wozniak and Steve Jobs. We’re teaching them how to do the critical things they can do in the first six months of commercializing an innovation to determine if it’s a viable commercial idea or not.”

The Academy, he adds, “combines understanding with very clear initial steps that researchers can take and, over the course of the week, participants do indeed take those first steps, and at the end of the week leave with significant progress.” Participating researchers are taught by venture capitalists, entrepreneurs, angel investors, lawyers, and others involved in the entrepreneurial community. “That means our participants learn directly from those who are doing the work,” Hargadon comments. “People from the technology transfer offices of universities teach about how to navigate university IP processes, but this workshop provides an opportunity for participants to learn what happens outside of that process — which is where most of the activity takes place.”

The program is “very focused on making progress towards commercialization, or at least towards learning whether the commercial potential is there to pursue,” Hargadon continues. For example, attendees don’t just talk about marketing, they talk about how to determine if there’s a market at all — and then they do it. “Our focus is on the most important steps in the first six months of starting a company,” Hargadon explains. “And one of those is making sure there’s a market. So we ask students to identify five potential customers: A doctor? An insurance company? A utility? Then we ask them to generate 10 questions to ask one of those potential customers in 20 minutes to determine the product’s viability. We walk them though coming up with those 10 questions, and then they go off and make the call.”

Here’s another example: “We might spend an hour one day talking about the role of networks [of outside experts] in building successful ventures,” Hargadon tells TTT. “We explain the need for access to expertise in investing, research and development, marketing and other key areas. Then we have the students run through a network audit, asking who they know who can help them fulfill those expertise requirements.” Students come up with five names they could e-mail right away to ask for help with specific skill sets. “Then we have them send those e-mails,” Hargadon says.

Another exercise has the students identify the first partners they’d need and the first individual hires they’d make. “We have them write a job description for the first partner, using a template that we provide,” Hargadon explains. “The process of writing that out is instructive in that it forces them to say, ‘I need someone to handle marketing and sales. I want that person to have five years’ experience.’ Or, ‘I need someone with experience in getting first-round funding.’ So now the first hire they make won’t be their college roommate.”

Overcoming the intimidation factor

The whole point, he emphasizes, is teaching innovators how to navigate the first steps of a commercialization maze that might otherwise seem just too far outside their comfort zone. One of the lessons, in fact, is that many of the functions researchers already tackle to get grant money and achieve scientific breakthroughs are similar to some of the key early steps in the commercialization process. “Most of us are intimidated by activities we’ve never done and expertise we don’t have,” Hargadon comments. “But that doesn’t mean those skills are difficult to achieve. It’s just that we haven’t learned them yet. Once people are introduced to the basic pathways of commercialization, shown the clear steps that they can take to move down that path effectively, and introduced to people who can help them, much of the uncertainty surrounding the commercialization process goes away.”

The mix of students varies program to program, but is approximately in thirds — faculty, post-doctoral fellows, and PhD students, Hargadon reports. All of the participants work together in the same classroom or studio for the entire week. There were 44 attendees last year, from 23 schools and 13 states. “It was a big success because of the quality of the students, and the progress they made. A number have gone on to win venture competitions and continue building their companies,” Hargadon adds.

One of those success stories is Peter Tittman, a UC Davis doctoral student and Academy alumnus who recently placed second in the Cleantech Venture Challenge at the University of Colorado, Boulder. His venture, Forest Eye, helps forest managers meet financial and environmental goals by conducting carbon, timber, and biomass inventory using an aerial laser scanning technology. His Academy experience “reinforced the value of having a sound financial model and a solid understanding of what a potential investor is interested in,” he says. “As the technologist, it was great to have my MBA colleague who could level with the VCs and address their questions. We are carrying the business forward, finalizing the proof of concept, and are in discussions with potential clients.”

MIT doctoral candidate Jon Mapel, another alum, came to the Academy because of his “long-time interest in energy and a desire to use science that pushes the envelope to help solve one of society’s major issues,” he reports. His venture: a high-efficiency, low-cost solar electrical concentrator that uses emissive dyes to redirect light into simple slab waveguides. Mapel and his two partners are finalizing their business strategy and plan to seek funding soon. “I met a number of venture capitalists and angel investors at [the Academy],” he adds.

And Hsin-Ling Yiu, a PhD student at UC Davis, has already seen a financial boon since attending. She’s conducting research focused on developing a technology to produce biodegradable plastic out of wastewater. Her team — also Academy alums — was one of six winners of the Environmental Protection Agency’s P3 competition, a $75,000 award.

Participants pay only $150 for the week of instruction, and Academy sponsors often cover not only the registration fee but the room and board as well. Travel is usually handled by the students’ home institutions, but even travel stipends are occasionally granted, Hargadon notes. The Greentech version of the Academy is held once a year — typically in late June — and the program is also being offered to researchers from all UC campuses in a separate session September 15-19, 2008. The same concept will be applied next in the preventive health, wellness, and nutrition space with the Health and Wellness Entrepreneurship Academy, scheduled for November 3-7, 2008.

Contact Hargadon at abhargadon@ucdavis.edu or 530-400-6529.