UTEN@Austin Hosts August Training for Portuguese TTO Managers and Staff

Portuguese TTOs and staff from UTEN@Austin and the UT Austin Office of Technology Commercialization

From August 9 to 21, 2009 UTEN@Austin, IC² Institute, UT Austin, offered the second phase of the FCT supported Technology Transfer Training (T3) Program for competitively selected Portuguese TT Managers and staff. As noted elsewhere in this newsletter several of these workshop participants are also engaged in one-to-two month internships with UTEN’s Texas partner institutions. The following eleven Portuguese TT professionals participated in the workshop:

UATEC, University of Aveiro: José Paulo Rainho, Technology Transfer Director; Ana Rita Remígio, Technology Transfer and Licensing Officer; David Resende, Researcher in GOVCOPP Research Unit; and Marlos Silva, Technology Transfer Officer and Entrepreneurship Coordinator

TecMinho, University of Minho: Marta Catarino, Technology Transfer Director and Pedro Silva, Technology Transfer and Industry Liaison Officer

INPI: Dina Chaves, Senior Officer and Miguel Moura, Patent Examiner

Instituto Superior Técnico: Maria José Francisco, Entrepreneurship Program Executive Director

INOVISA: Isabel Alte da Veiga, Technology Transfer and IP Manager,

Universidade de Trás-os-Montes e Alto Douro: Carla Mascarenhas, Technology Entrepreneurship Management and IP Consultant

The intensive two-week training program focused on “thinking and doing” concerning business development in US markets, technology valorization, licensing and negotiations, developing university spin-offs, managing a TT office, fostering entrepreneurship, technology marketing, project management, and systems of innovation (download the full program, 135KB PDF). The participating Texas-based experts and partner institutions included offices of technology commercialization from UT Austin, UT-Dallas, Texas A&M University, and South Texas Technology Management (STTM) as well as additional content experts as follows:

Kate Mackie, Senior Lecturer, Graduate School of Business, UT Austin, lead exercises on developing internal and external marketing strategies for Portuguese TT Offices that are associated with different university technology sectors and regional environments.

Brett Cornwell, Director of Commercialization Services at the Texas A&M Texas A&M Office of Technology Commercialization, focused his comments on the creation and management of university-based start-ups and spin-offs.

John Fritz and Sean Thompson, both Technology Licensing Associates from South Texas Technology Management (STTM), spoke on technology transfer processes and how to approach and work with inventors and researchers for best results, choosing a path to market, and “closing the deal.”

Robert Robb, Associate VP for Technology Commercialization at the UT Dallas Office of Technology Commercialization, and Joseph Picken, Executive Director of the Institute for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (IIE) also at UT Dallas, discussed how The University of Texas at Dallas launched and built its technology transfer operations, cross-disciplinary and community-based entrepreneurship initiatives, and new venture creation programs.

Rick Friedman, Associate Director of Licensing at the UT Austin Office of Technology Commercialization, focused his comments on techniques and processes for licensing and negotiations. His presentation was followed by an afternoon of Portuguese teams competing on how best to negotiate a license while being mentored and critiqued by senior UT Austin OTC staff.

Laura Kilcrease, Founding Director, Triton Ventures hosted the interns for a discussion on lessons learned from “The Austin Model” of technology-based growth as well as how to develop a robust home grown VC community to accelerate the development of a globally competitive technology commercialization regional infrastructure.

Jamie Rhodes, Founder of the Central Texas Angel Network spoke on the important role of angel investment in economic and community development and how he and his colleagues successfully organized and launched angel networks in Austin and throughout Texas.

During the two-week workshop Portuguese participants took part in a range of hands-on exercises that included “cold-calling” and interviewing US technology and business experts to obtain first-hand information on their Portuguese technologies as well as workshops on conducting licensing negotiations, crafting a marketing plan for their TT Offices, and managing TT offices and processes. On the last day of the workshop each Portuguese workshop participant and team presented, to a panel of experts, their emerging strategies and tasks for their TT Offices in the near and longer term as well as identifying key take-aways from their two weeks of training.