Many thanks to John Sechrest, Terri Fiez and Josefine Fleetwood for their work in putting together the event that was on the front page of the Corvallis Gazette Times today.

Instead of trying to force our researchers to become entreprenuers, we'll work to connect them with people whose passion is entreprenuership and allow our researchers to keep doing what they love, research.

I attended the "matchmaking" meeting that Bennett Hall wrote about today and am excited about what I saw happening. Researchers, sharing a snipit about their research and small business owners seeing the unique commercialization opportunities. I hung around to watch some of these bright entreprenuers connect directly with the researchers to explore the opportunity for unique new products that will change our future.

This was an important first step in delivering on our vision of becoming a place to come if you want to change the world. If you would like more information about how to get involved in this incredibly unique circle, please contact John Sechrest with Alpha Omega at sechrest@ao.com.

The following article can be found online at: http://www.gazettetimes.com/articles/2005/04/07/news/community/thuloc01.txt

OSU faculty meets with high-tech entrepreneurs to network ideas

By BENNETT HALL Gazette-Times business editor

First, there was a quick trip through the buffet line and perhaps a short, nerve-calming visit to the bar. Then came the hard part. One by one, the participants had to stand up and introduce themselves to a roomful of strangers.

Just the basics: Name, place of work and a brief list of personal interests — things like pattern recognition, 3-D modeling and computer visualization.

Call it speed dating for techies.

The setting was a GE Security conference room in the Sunset Research Park, and the participants were local high-technology entrepreneurs and faculty members from Oregon State University's School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.

With the Software Association of Oregon playing matchmaker, more than 50 people turned out for last Thursday's event, the first in a planned series of four networking sessions intended to pair up OSU researchers with Corvallis-area tech companies.

"I think it went extremely well," said Terri Fiez, director of the School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science and one of the organizers of the event.

"We have several faculty that are following up with visits with companies to understand more about what they're doing and ways that they collaborate. What we see as the next step is to bring a similar group back together and spend more time."

The next session will be in May or June, with two more to follow in the fall. The idea is to speed development of commercial products based on academic research, giving the local economy a boost in the process by helping local companies grow and fueling job creation.

Frank Hall, past president of the local SAO chapter and principal of Entredigm Consulting, which works with area tech companies, has been a longtime advocate of closer cooperation between campus and commerce. He rated Thursday's introductory session a successful ice-breaker.

"I thought it was good chemistry," he said.

"It's been very difficult to get relationships between the research community and the business community," Hall added. "Each of them is plenty busy in their own world, and events like this that draw them out to mix are key."

Aside from any long-term returns on collaborative projects, both Hall and Fiez noted that academic-industry partnerships can open doors to new sources of federal research money. Small business innovation research grants, for instance, were a hot topic at the mixer.

"All told, you can get about $1.2 million" to commercialize a new product, Hall said. "Granting agencies look much more favorably on proposals that have some bona fide researcher, at least as an adviser or as a participant in the project."

On an institutional level, OSU also has much to gain from collaboration.

After hovering at around $500,000 a year in the mid-90s, OSU's income from licensing university research has risen steadily, topping $1 million in 2000 and climbing above $1.5 million in 2003, according to the university's Technology Transfer Office. According to the University of Oregon's Office of Technology Transfer, UO brought in about $1.8 million that year.

And while OSU takes about a third of that licensing income off the top, the remainder is shared by the inventor and the department, providing a powerful incentive to collaborate with the private sector.

But academic researchers also have another motivation, Fiez said, one that is perhaps even more powerful.

"What we want to do as faculty is have impact," she said. "The way we have impact with our research is if it gets adopted and becomes part of a new product, a new company."