Research Commercialization Academy (BETA 0.01)

Author: Cromwell Schubarth

Source: Silicon Valley Business Journal

Interest: A study released Monday provides more evidence that there are a lot more startups finding a harder time getting Series A funds than they did in finding seed money. The seed financing survey by the law firm of Fenwick & West said only 27 percent of startups hatched in 2011 landed first round venture money in 2012, compared to 45 percent who launched in 2010 and got later stage funds in 2011.

Link: http://www.bizjournals.com/sanjose/news/2013/03/26/new-study-finds-series-a-startup.html

Author: Jessica Holzer

Source: The Wall Street Journal

Interest: WASHINGTON—The so-called JOBS Act is yet to deliver a big boost to initial public offerings. The one-year-old law, officially the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act, was aimed at helping companies with less than $1 billion in sales go public. But IPOs of such companies in the year since the law was enacted are on track to fall 21%, to 63 from 80 in the year prior, according to Jay Ritter, a University of Florida professor who tracks IPOs.

Link: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323361804578386833083221620.html

Author: Paul Spinrad

Source: O'Reilly Radar

Interest: New crowdfunding moves from the White House and Congress are positive signals. In May, I wrote here about efforts I’ve been involved with advocating a “crowdfunding exemption.” As part of the American Jobs Act introduced by President Obama last night, the White House announced that it will work with the SEC on implementing something along these lines.

Link: http://radar.oreilly.com/2011/09/crowdfunding-white-house-congress.html

Author: Fred Trotter

Source: O'Reilly Radar

Interest: New regulations could mark the end of proprietary finance. Currently, anyone can crowdfund products, projects, causes, and sometimes debt. Current U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) regulations make crowdfunding companies (i.e. selling stocks rather than products on crowdfund platforms) illegal. The only way to sell stocks to the public at large under the current law is through the heavily regulated Initial Public Offering (IPO) process.

Link: http://radar.oreilly.com/2013/03/how-crowdfunding-and-the-jobs-act-will-shape-open-source-companies.html

Author: Deanna Pogorelc

Source: MedCity News

Interest: A piece in Forbes this week calls attention to a recent trend in technology commercialization at universities: the use of crowdfunding. The article focused on a collaboration between the University of Utah’s Technology Commercialization Office and the crowdfunding site RocketHub, which resulted in the University Tech Vault, a portal specifically for projects that come out of the university.

Link: http://medcitynews.com/2013/02/crowdfunding-university-research-tech-commercialization-6-sites-that-are-doing-it/

Author: Kevin Lawton

Source: VentureBeat

Interest: Now here is the one percent you do want to hear about! The world is on the precipice of creating a trillion-dollar crowdfunding market. In Australia, the ASSOB has offered a crowdfunding investment portal since 2005. In the UK, equity crowdfunding is already in progress, with investment platforms such as Crowdcube andSeedups. And in the Netherlands, crowdfunding is ramping up with Symbid. The crowdfunding components of the American JOBS Act and the Italian Decreto Crescita are now in the pro

Link: http://venturebeat.com/2012/12/24/crowdfunding-market/

Author: ERIN GRIFFITH

Source: PandoDaily

Interest: First Round Capital, a seed-stage venture firm, has launched an experimental new fund focused entirely on college campuses. Based in Philadelphia but slated to expand to other states if successful, the $500,000 Dorm Room Fund is unique because once it is set up, the students themselves will choose which start-ups get funded.

Link: http://www.technologytransfertactics.com/content/2012/10/03/500000-dorm-room-fund-lets-students-pick-which-start-ups-to-back/

Author: Christina Williams

Source: Sustainable Business Oregon

Interest: Oregon State University, ZeaChem Inc. and other partners this week landed just over $7 million in research grants from the U.S. Department of Energy and U.S. Department of Agriculture as part of a federal push for innovation in biomass, bioenergy and other plant-based products. A total $41 million was awarded 13 projects trained on more efficient biofuels production and ways to improve the feedstocks that alternative fuels are made from.

Link: http://www.sustainablebusinessoregon.com/articles/2012/07/osu-zeachem-land-federal-funds-for.html

Author: Sarah Thompson

Source: Cornell University Chronicle Online

Interest: The commercialization of shrub willow as a bioenergy crop could be years closer, thanks to a $1.37 million grant that will allow Cornell researchers to take advantage of the newly mapped shrub willow genome to study hybrid vigor and yield. Larry Smart, associate professor of horticulture, has partnered with Christopher D. Town, professor at the J. Craig Venter Institute (JCVI) in Rockville, Md., to study the genetics of superior growth in hybrids of shrub willow

Link: http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/July12/WillowGrant.html

Author: BUSINESS WIRE

Source: BUSINESS WIRE

Interest: Founded at the University of Utah’s David Eccles School of Business, the UIF is the nation’s first private student-run social venture and impact investing capital fund focusing on for-profit analysis in startup companies designed to solve problems associated with social issues such as poverty and pollution while generating a profit for investors.

Link: http://eon.businesswire.com/news/eon/20120731005226/en

Author: Sarah N. Lynch

Source: Reuters

Interest: WASHINGTON, July 31 (Reuters) - Advocates for investors will meet with U.S. Treasury Department officials and others on Wednesday to express concerns about a new law that makes it easier for smaller companies to raise capital, people familiar with the matter said. The Jumpstart Our Business Startups law, or JOBS Act, won overwhelming bipartisan support from Congress in March. But critics of the legislation have said it goes too far in scaling back important protections for investors.

Link: http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/07/31/jobs-act-treasury-idUSL2E8IVBGX20120731

Author: Lauren Landry

Source: BostInno

Interest: Thanks to popular sites like Kickstarter and Indiegogo, crowdfunding is now commonplace. They’re the platforms musicians turn to, to release their first CD, or where local alumni pray to break their initial $18,000 fundraising goal in just 25 hours. Although started for today’s creatives, however, crowdfunding’s begun to to take a turn for the educational. Because if you can crowdfund art, why not crowdfund academic research?

Link: http://bostinno.com/2012/07/31/moving-academic-research-out-of-the-ivory-tower-into-the-crowd/

Author: DAILY PROGRESS STAFF REPORTS

Source: Daily Progress

Interest: State funding will support efforts to commercialize research discoveries by three biotechnology firms affiliated with the University of Virginia, along with a UVa professor, the school announced this week. HemoSonics, PocketSonics, Tau Therapeutics and UVa engineering professor Eric Loth were awarded funding totaling more than $500,000 from the Commonwealth Research Commercialization Fund.

Link: http://www2.dailyprogress.com/news/2012/jul/26/uva-affiliated-biotech-ventures-professor-awarded--ar-2086951/

Author: Davis Wright Tremaine LLP

Source: JDSUPRA.com

Interest: Congress passed a federal crowdfunding law. This was really exciting, but the federal law is problematic for many, many reasons. As you are probably well aware by now, Congress passed a federal crowdfunding law. This was really exciting, but the federal law is problematic for many, many reasons. What are the problems with the federal crowdfunding law?

Link: http://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/washington-state-needs-its-own-crowdfund-08303/

Author: Chance Barnett

Source: Forbes

Interest: A revolution in early stage finance is about to take place. But will the revolution succeed? Thanks to the passage of the JOBS Act, a new market is being born that will revolutionize how early stage investing and fundraising works. It’s called equity-based crowdfunding.

Link: http://www.forbes.com/sites/chancebarnett/2012/07/26/will-crowdfunding-for-businesses-succeed-or-fail/

Author: NIKKITA COLLINS, SHELLI GIMELSTEIN

Source: The Daily Pennsylvanian

Interest: Winning Stanford & Penn competitions, Invisergy has built network of support In the cutthroat world of startups, aspiring Penn entrepreneurs are finding unexpected support — both from prestigious competitions and their own peers. For rising Wharton and Engineering junior Ryan Marschang — whose solar technology startup Invisergy took top prize at a business plan competition at Stanford University last month — the victory provided both funding and connections.

Link: http://www.thedp.com/article/2012/07/business-competitions-give-startups-a-boost

Author: LINDA BAKER

Source: Oregon Business

Interest: Suddenly, online higher education startups are all the rage. In the past six months, at least seven such startups have launched or announced funding. And these aren’t just any startups—the majority are spinoffs created by professors or administrators affiliated with some of the nation’s most prestigious universities.

Link: http://www.oregonbusiness.com/linda/7830-online-higher-education-startups-boom

Author: Josh O’Leary

Source: Iowa City Press-Citizen

Interest: The University of Iowa brought in $438 million in external funding for research during the fiscal year that ended June 30, UI announced Wednesday, down $18.6 million from the previous year because of the expiration of federal stimulus dollars. Taking that stimulus money out of the equation, however, the university increased its external research funding by 3.2 percent year over year and garnered a record number of grant and contract awards in fiscal 2012

Link: http://www.press-citizen.com/article/20120726/NEWS01/307260031/UI-research-funding-dips-stimulus-money-expires

Author: Kevin E. Noonan

Source: Patent Docs - Biotech & Pharma Patent Law & News Blog

Interest: Companion bills were introduced in Congress on April 25th of this year with little fanfare (particularly in comparison to the Leahy-Smith American Invents Act) but they have the potential to provide significant funding for university-related start-up companies. The bills, H.R. 4720 and S. 2369, are entitled the "America Innovates Act of 2012"

Link: http://www.patentdocs.org/2012/07/grants-for-funding-university-technology-transfer-introduced-in-congress.html

Author: Gerry Smith

Source: Huffington Post

Interest: By appearances alone, this startup looks and feels like a movie set version of Silicon Valley. The co-founder is a 22-year-old college dropout who wears flip-flops, drinks Red Bull and gives exuberant high-fives to his staff. The office has a pool table, a foosball table and growlers of beer in the corner. Young engineers in t-shirts write thousands of lines of computer code, sometimes past midnight.

Link: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/16/new-york-startups_n_1671160.html