Hartford Business Journal

August 10, 2015

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8 Hartford Business Journal • August 10, 2015 www.HartfordBusiness.com Q&A UConn launches new entrepreneurship program Q&A talks about Accelerate UConn, a new entrepreneurship pro- gram at the University of Connecticut, with Michelle Cote, manag- ing director of UConn's Connecticut Center for Entrepreneurship & Innovation, and UConn business professor Timothy B. Folta. Q: Accelerate UConn is a new program at the UConn School of Busi- ness. What is it, and what are some of its primary goals? A: Accelerate UConn (AU) is a university-wide program support- ed by the National Science Founda- tion (NSF), and is oper- ated as a partnership between the Office of the Vice President for Research (OVPR), Technology Commer- cialization Services and the Connecticut Center for Entrepre- neurship and Innova- tion (CCEI), which is housed in the school of business. NSF funds such programs to help spur the commercial- ization of scientific research. Our goal at UConn is to provide students and faculty from across the uni- versity with a new set of tools they can use to assess the market opportunity for a new technology, product or service. Our goal is to encourage faculty and researchers to reach out to students for support in the pro- cess of determining market viability. We also want students reaching out to fac- ulty for technical expertise, and other companies with deep ties to UConn, such as members of the Technology Incubation Program, to get involved by working with either faculty or students. We also want to encourage the busi- ness community to get involved. Each team is required to have an experienced mentor who can help the team get acquainted with the particular industry that they are hoping to enter. We hope that this role provides UConn alumni and other members of the local busi- ness community with an opportu- nity to get involved. Q: Accelerate UConn, as your website explains, helps faculty, students and researchers deter- mine the commercial potential for new ideas, technology and products and develop strate- gies for bringing their innova- tions to the marketplace. Is that too broad of an audience for what seems to be your limited funding of $100,000 from the National Science Foundation Innovation Corps? A: Accelerate UConn is cer- tainly an ambitious program. However, we're able to run the program extremely efficiently for a couple of reasons. Part of the award that comes from the I-Corps grant is access to the curricu- lum developed by the National Science Foun- dation specifically for this program. We have also been able to join a network of regional and national leaders who have adopted this approach to entrepre- neurial education and skill development, and many of them have assisted us in the pro- cess of getting the pro- gram up and running. We are also reaching out to UConn faculty with similar training to help lead modules of this program for us. Technology Com - mercialization Ser- vices and CCEI staff have also dedicated a significant amount of their time to help get the program's infra- structure in place. A broad audi- ence is expected and needed because the structure of the program encourages entrepreneurial team formation with varied roles for faculty, grad- uate and undergraduate students, and industry mentors. While the breadth of audiences may seem difficult to serve, each of them brings unique skill sets required by the program. Q: The program is going to focus on technology concepts that "are likely candidates for commercialization." What are the metrics for determining if concepts are candidates for commercialization? A: We want to focus our resourc- es on entrepreneurial teams that have already done some of the leg work needed to determine the mar- ket potential for their product or technology. We want to know that the products or technologies being supported by these efforts have a high potential to serve a real group FOCUS STARTUPS & ENTREPRENEURS MICHELLE COTE Managing director, Connecticut Center for Entrepreneurship & Innovation, UConn TIMOTHY B. FOLTA Business professor, UConn Continued CT's nascent entrepreneurial network slowly evolves By John Stearns jstearns@HartfordBusiness.com W ith three years under its belt, CTNext, the state- backed entrepreneurial network created to encourage more startup activity in Connecticut, has grown to nearly 750 members and doled out $5.1 mil- lion to widen small business access to talent, workspace, industry expertise, services, skill development and capital. A startup itself, CTNext continues to evolve but has made progress since its 2012 founding in generating a more cohesive network to help shepherd startups through various stages of development, said Glendow- lyn Thames, director of Small Business Innovation and CTNext at Connecticut Innovations, the state's quasi- public venture capital and lending arm. "We've been able to grow our network as far as the innovation ecosystem — and what that really means is the number of companies that are in our member- ship," Thames said of the organization's 749 members, more than 80 percent of which are startups, with the rest including service providers and mentors. "We've seen that growth over time, so we're really pleased with where we are." The state earmarked $25 million in funds for CTNext over five years. The network so far includes CTNext part- ners who receive funding to help startups, non-financially sponsored partners, service providers, entrepreneurs and six entrepreneurs-in-residence scattered throughout the state who are experienced in starting, running, owning and growing a business and who also receive funding for their assistance. CTNext also provides Entrepreneur Innovation Awards to promising compa- nies, which are $10,000 grants startups can use to propel their business. But direct funding is only one part of CTNext's mission, Thames said. "Entrepreneurs and small businesses need customers, they need connections, they need that whole networking aspect, they need mentors, they need advis- ers, they need rental space, so CTNext provides all those links and kind of the glue to that com- munity," Thames said. Early impact Many of the CTNext partners that help early stage companies are startups or small businesses as well, meaning each is helping the other grow, creating a mutu- ally beneficial relationship. Thames counts Voda among CTNext's success sto- ries. The company, founded at the University of Con- necticut, makes the SmartWell custom-beverage dis- penser, which offers hot, cold or carbonated water to which people can add zero-calorie flavors, a natural plant sweetener and electrolytes and vitamins. It cites an environmental element, too: no plastic bottles. Matt Cremins, Voda CEO, said CTNext helped his company, which won a $10,000 Entrepreneur Innovation Award in 2014 and another $2,000 as audience favorite in the award competition. Voda used the money to design and build a functional prototype of its SmartWell prod- uct that it could test with customers. "This was a huge turning point for us," Cremins said. "With real customer feedback on what they liked and did not like, we could intelligently improve the Smart- Well to find a product-market fit." Customer feedback also convinced private investors to invest in Voda, he said, adding that CTNext helped transform Voda from an idea to an investable company with a working product. Determining value Bruce Carlson, president and CEO of the Connecticut Technology Council, a new CTNext partner aiming to receive $90,000 this fiscal year for a program to help match college graduates strong in coding with growing companies needing that help, said he thinks CTNext is on the right path. Startups and entrepreneurism succeed when there's a robust network of people and services supporting them, where someone can "parachute in," make critical connections and be enveloped by the network, he said. "I would say we're well on our way to that being the case in Connecticut, and that's a good thing," Carlson said. More state funding for CTNext after five years would be great to allow it to continue to try new ideas and further develop the network, but devel- oping an innovation ecosystem can't just be a public effort; there needs to be private investment, too, he said. For example, if Con- necticut Technology Council's workforce program succeeds in helping companies identify and fulfill talent needs, he hopes com- panies help sustain it, thereby allowing his group's state funds to be reprogrammed for trial on another good idea. Mark Lassoff, founder and president of Vernon-based LearnToProgram Inc., a pub- lisher of web, mobile and game development courses used worldwide and an early innova- tion grant winner, said CTNext's approach of letting pri- vate companies develop the ecosystem is good. "It's been a reasonable effort," Lassoff said. "I'm a believer that government, even though a critical partner, is not the factor that can catalyze growth of entrepre- neurship; it's one of many partners in developing an eco- system. I think as much as CTNext has sponsored some good programs … I'd like still to see more people from the existing Connecticut business community step- ping up and participating and becoming leaders in the entrepreneurial community and sharing their wealth of experience that's here." Thames admits CTNext still has a lot more work to do building an innovation ecosystem, but she believes it is on the right path. "If you look at … where we were three years ago, there wasn't this connectivity, there wasn't this glue bringing everybody together and there weren't all these resources that existed," Thames said. "And now we have that and we have something and now it's a matter of, 'OK, how do we coalesce that and continue to move it to the next level and move the needle.' " n Glendowlyn Thames, director of Small Business Innovation and CTNext at Connecticut Innovations Voda CEO Matt Cremins stands next to the SmartWell custom-beverage dispenser. P H O T O | C O N T R I B U T E D P H O T O | C O N T R I B U T E D

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