March 2011
1 post
The Passage Across the Valley of Death: The Gap...
At Johns Hopkins University, I teach students of entrepreneurship. These students vary across disciplines. They include biotechnology students who are studying how to manage innovation, engineers and computer scientists who learn to write business plans, and MBA students who are learning about venture capital. The model used for this process is to begin with an innovation that can be packaged...
January 2011
1 post
Technical Professionals Career Path,...
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I used to work for Westinghouse back in the day when it was a Fortune 500 company. I left to become a serial entrepreneur when I became convinced that there was no true technical career path and that most managers there, particularly my...
September 2010
1 post
Angel Investors - Smart Money or Dumb Money?
At a recent overview for entrepreneurs on angel investors, it was emphasized that there are “smart angels” and “dumb angels”. After listening to the angel groups talk about it, they seemed to classify angel groups as “smart angels” and individuals such as friends or colleagues as “dumb angels”. They claimed that the smart angels brought more than...
August 2010
1 post
Valley of Death? See: www.EdAddison.tv
A recently overused phrase connoting inability to raise money is the “valley of death”. It refers to the funding gap between research and revenue, that is product development funding.
There is plenty of funding for research from government agencies and nonprofit organizations. This money usually goes to universities. There is also some applied research money called SBIR (or...
April 2010
1 post
Maybe some investors appreciate an honest...
I have been reviewing a lot of business plans this Spring. It seems to be a combination of student projects, student competitions, early stage ventures looking for money and case studies up on a pedestal. No matter how much is written about or how much preaching is done, entrepreneurs (and students of entrepreneurship) all seem to forecast the ever elusive J curve for financial projections.
The...
February 2010
1 post
Are university tech transfer offices missing the...
In my conversations with entrepreneurs, stories abound about university technology transfer offices who just couldn’t get a deal done. Some universities are even dubbed as “closed for business”. It seems that their technology transfer offices are more interested in crafting the perfect license with large financial payoffs (in their minds) to the university and the investigator....
January 2010
2 posts
New Venture CEO and Team
In my venture management consulting work, I am often asked about the management team — what is needed to attract funding and what is needed to be successful. A founding CEO and management team is usually quite different than the management team that takes a company through its high growth phase after it goes public. This is because the required skill sets are different.
A founding team...
Can we solve medical safety problems with best...
It is well known that many new innovations occur by borrowing a concept from a different field and applying it to a current problem. Some authors call this “technology brokering”.
As an active pilot, I have always been impressed with the tremendous safety record of aviation. Commercial airlines are as much as 100 times safer than driving automobiles on a “fatalities per...
December 2009
5 posts
7 Technology Transfer Tips for Tough Economic... →
Interesting article on how technology transfer can prosper during hard times.
Why the VC Model is Dying
I posted this in response to an Innovation Daily article entitled “Is the Venture Capital model dying?”
Venture Capital is clearly not just in a cyclical downturn. But its problems are not about invention value and title. Venture Capital is using an old business model not fit for the current period. The 10 Year Fund that invests $5M per company and expects IPOs when investments reach $10M in...
Leverage, Creative Destruction, and Value Added
A view from a distance shows that our economy is undergoing creative destruction. New high paying jobs are rare, but hiring at the entry level is starting to pick up. High end real estate values have collapsed, but the market for starter homes is firming up. Exotic financial intruments, including derivatives, are out and good old fashion business is in. High multiple valuations based on...
New course on Managing Innovation at Johns Hopkins
This new course will be offered by Lawrence Husick and myself online at Johns Hopkins in 2010. You can take it from anywhere in the world. We offer an onsite version of the course for interested organizations.
Managing Innovation in the Life Sciences
Innovation is the creation of value from new ideas, concepts, methods, materials, and organizational structures. Life Sciences organizations...
New 2010 BLOG on Technology Commercialization
This BLOG begins on January 1, 2010. It’s purpose is to discuss the many aspects of commercializing technology from the research lab to productization and successful marketing. It will cover many aspects including technology transfer, product development, product management, business planning and execution.
Follow this BLOG to stay up on the latest thinking on technology commercialization...