Brief Project Overview:

1. Stevens Environmental Entrepreneurship Program Stevens Institute of Technology / Polytechnic Institute of NYU PI: Lex McCusker Co PI’s: Kurt Becker, Christos Christodoulatos, Thomas Lechler NSF Award #IIP- 0840623 3 Year Award Start Date: 16 March 2007 Key Attributes of our Innovation Ecosystem: Questioning & Curiosity: The main thrust of our project is bringing market intelligence to campus to guide and influence the research of faculty toward attacking problems of interest to industry and government. We have worked to expose faculty to a somewhat different set of questions than those that are being asked by colleagues in academia. E2 Lab Website – www.stevens.edu/entrepreneurship/e2lab Thomas Lechler, Lex McCusker, Christos Christodoulatos Brief Project Overview: Top Challenges: 1. Motivating faculty to participate in entrepreneurial activities. 2. Underestimated the effort to create networks that are able to give effective feedback to research faculty. 3. Workshops were spaced too closely to allow for sufficient progress between successive workshops. Risk Taking: Redirecting research towards applications is a huge risk for researchers. What if the application never comes to fruition? Working towards patenting and commercialization as opposed to publishing, is also a risk, especially for young faculty. We are working to modify our promotion and tenure policy and process to allow faculty who have created valuable intellectual property to get proper recognition for that accomplishment in their applications for promotion and tenure. The Environmental Entrepreneurship Lab (E2 Lab) is a project to transform the structure, policies, processes and culture of a research-intensive university to dramatically improve the rate of transfer of new technologies into marketplace ventures. The effort is focused on elevating business awareness among faculty and students and introducing entrepreneurial behavior by implementing several innovative educational initiatives aimed at enabling the integration of technological and market knowledge into the academic culture. ProgramActivities: Openness: We have been changing the internal processes for Intellectual Property at Stevens Institute of Technology. The faculty incentive system has financial incentives at every stage in the IP process. Incentives in the first phase, Pre-IP consist of funding for research assistants for up to 3 months, to investigate concepts and prepare prototypes. In the second phase, Secure IP, inventions disclosed to the patent committee, as well as received patents, are rewarded with a monetary sum as well as with recognition awards. To date over 80 people have received an incentive check for submitting disclosures and patent applications. • E2 Lab Events • Workshops • 05/20/2008 Drinking Water Quality Workshop • 09/23/2008 Stormwater Quality Management Workshop • 01/15/2009 Green Roof Design Workshop • 06/02/2009 Alternative Energy Workshop • 09/29/2009 Water Quality Workshop • Conferences • 12/07/2009 Energy Technology Conference • 03/22/2010 Sensing Technology Conference • Stevens Entrepreneurs Network Events • 04/01/2010 - The Role of Attorneys  • 05/06/2010 - Writing Effective Business Plans • Academics • Stevens Institute of Technology • Entrepreneurship Minor • Ph.D. Seminar, • Innovation & Entrepreneurship Doctoral Fellowship • NYU-Poly • Inno/Vention student idea competition • Office of Academic Entrepreneurship – Stevens • Research & Entrepreneurship Newsletter Jan 2010 • Internal Policies • Pre-IP Process • Case Study: X-Rid • Incentive Program for Generating IP • IP Training Seminars • AE Survey • Research & Entrepreneurship Day (Annually) • Student Elevator Pitch Competition • Start-up Company Presentations Collaboration Across Fields: SEED (Stevens Entrepreneur & Enterprise Development) Program.The Office of Enterprise Development and Licensing is having undergraduate students from both the Schaefer School of Engineering and Science and the Howe School of Technology Management cooperatively develop a new startup company over an 18-month period. The SEED program has established two new businesses where students, under the direction of a professional CEO and the Senior Design Advisor, are taking university-created technology through the startup phase and into commercialization. Students are responsible for everything from market research and business plan development to completing a commercializable product. In addition, they are directly involved in raising capital to fund the startup. Partners: Placing Partners in “New Environments” & “Playgrounds”: We ask our researchers to present their early stage research at our workshops and conferences. The researchers then receive feedback from industry and from investors that understand the market. We are creating opportunities for our research faculty to get out of the ivory tower and get direct exposure to the needs of the marketplace. • Top Contributions: • 1. The E2 Lab has organized several events to help educate and encourage market-focused research in both faculty and students. To date we have had 5 workshops and 2 conferences, with over 32 faculty members from 5 different universities presenting. These workshops are a key element of our new prototype for the Pre-IP Process. As a result of these workshops and our follow-up interviews with presenting faculty researchers, many new market focused research projects have been established with specific application areas. We typically follow up with all presenters from Stevens at the workshops, and approximately 1 per workshop goes on to establish a new research project based on feedback from the workshop and from meeting with the E2 Lab. • 2. A Case-Study: X-RID – treatment process to remove explosives (TNT, RDX, HMX, and other energetic materials) • May 20, 2008 - Broad research in bimetal nano-particles was presented at the workshop • Result: Stevens ARDEC/Picatinny Arsenal joint project enabled the researchers to focus the research to a specific technology with an application area. • October 2008 - a provisional patent application was filed (#61/106,641) • May 2009 Business case analysis performed by an undergraduate business student, Daniel Riggle. • Result: $20 million market for this project, and a recommendation that this technology should move to the next stage. • September 2009 a preliminary application to New Jersey Corporation for Advanced Technology (NJCAT) for independent technology verification was submitted • October 19, 2009 - A non-provisional joint patent application (No. 12/581,480) was filed on in conjunction with Picatinny Arsenal.   • 3. Establishment of the Office of Academic Entrepreneurship to foster and exploit technology-driven innovations that are either adopted by the industry or serve as basis for creating new ventures, using the E2 - Lab as a prototype. Dr. Christodoulatos (Co-PI) was recently named the Associate Provost for Academic Entrepreneurship (AE) in the new office, and Dr. Lechler (Co-PI) was named as the Director of AE Programs. Leading/Inspiring for Surprising or Unexpected Results: Dr. Henry Du was looking into sensor technologies and he presented his research at our Stormwater Management Workshop in Sept 2008. He found that he could measure parts per trillion with his new technique for detecting contaminates. In the breakout sessions at the workshop, the industry participants told the researcher that the problem is not the precision of measurement but how to detect something in real-time (as opposed to bringing it back to the lab for testing, etc.). In particular, on the NJ coast line, in the summer, a big problem is detecting the e.coli bacteria in the water to make sure the water is safe for swimmers. The E2 Lab project funded a research assistant to look into this specific application over the summer and fall of 2009. Professor Du has redirected his research into real-time sensor technologies with market applications. PFI . . National Science Foundation Partnerships For Innovation Grantee’s Meeting April 25-27, 2010 Arlington, VA