Hartford Business Journal

www.HartfordBusiness.com • February 10, 2020 • Hartford Business Journal 19 Join us as the Hartford Symphony Orchestra IGNITES JOY at our 2020 Bravo! Gala on May 2, 2020. Benefiting HSO's community engagement and music education programs. Tickets are on sale now! • www.hartfordsymphony.org/BRAVO Sponsorship opportunities still available! For more information, contact Jen Galante at jgalante@hartfordsymphony.org or 860-760-7302 IGNITE HARTFORD SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA'S 2020 BRAVO! GALA Joy PRESENTING SPONSORS OVERTURE SPONSOR SONATA SPONSORS RHAPSODY SPONSORS MEDIA PARTNER RECEPTION SPONSOR SATURDAY, MAY 2, 2020 | 6–11 PM CONNECTICUT CONVENTION CENTER BALLROOM HARTFORD, CT PERFORMANCE SPONSOR Jeffrey & Nancy Hoffman and Jennifer DiBella Judie & Coleman Levy Judith & Brewster Perkins And UTC, which spends $4 billion annually on R&D, is putting that in- vestment to good use, Roelofs said. The company was awarded 9,000 patents in the U.S. over the past five years, the company said. In 2018 it received 459 patents in Connecticut. The Research Center employs about 400 people in highly skilled positions, Roelofs said. About 70% hold a Ph.D. and they all represent a mix of longtime Connecticut resi- dents and people who moved here from around the globe. UTC's main R&D focus lies, unsur- prisingly, in aerospace, Roelofs said. Research runs the gamut from minor improvements to existing products and technologies, to implementa- tions of new technology. Among its R&D activities, UTC researchers are currently trying to leverage quantum computing, which could create faster and more accu- rate simulations of real-world mate- rials, to design lighter and stronger aircraft metals, Roelofs said. Other innovation Stanley Black & Decker — which last year was granted 224 U.S. pat- ents, including 104 to Connecticut inventors — spent $275.8 million on R&D in 2018, a 35% increase from two years earlier. The company solidified its R&D operations in 2014 by creating a "special forces" unit that invented the successful FlexVolt cordless battery system that wire- lessly charges construction tools, Stanley Chief Technology Officer Mark Maybury said. Stanley last year opened its Manu- factory 4.0 facility in downtown Hartford, where part of its R&D strategy and work takes place. In addition to the in-house in- novation work, Stanley invests in startups through its Stanley Ven- tures arm, and even guides some companies to maturity through its Stanley+Techstars accelera- tor, which brings in startups from around the globe to Hartford for a three-month business development bootcamp, Maybury said. "Part of our strategy is to bring those startups in to brand them, and bring them right into the group," Maybury said. "We realized that we needed to also begin to better lever- age the external ecosystem." One company Stanley Ventures invested in, Boston-based Pillo Health, last October launched a robotic pill dispenser called the Pria by Black+Decker Home Care Com- panion. The product uses a built-in voice activated-assistance system to dispense pills, and communicates with patients' caregivers. Stanley last year led Pillo's $11-million fund- raising round. In Bloomfield, Kaman's approach to R&D focuses on customers' needs, said Mathew Mormino, Kaman's vice president of quality and engineering. Before choosing a project to work on, Kaman's R&D employees consult with customers on what problems they want new products to solve, and "then we'll develop our products based on what their wish list is," he said. Out in Stratford, Sikorsky, a sub- sidiary of Lockheed Martin Corp., is testing autonomous technology in its S-70 OPV Black Hawk helicopter, which recently flew for the first time, a company spokeswoman said. That brings Sikorsky closer to its goal of building a fully autonomous helicop- ter by the end of 2020. For Carstensen, the research and development these companies are doing in Connecticut only under- scores the need to unleash more stranded R&D tax credits. "Thinking small … is just not mean- ingful," Carstensen said. United Technologies Corp.'s Research Center in East Hartford. PHOTO | HBJ FILE

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