VCU technology entrepreneurs invited to TechStart BootCamp at Biotech Park

By Lorraine Cichowski
VCU News Services

Registration is open for the next session of TechStart BootCamp, a comprehensive, one-day course on business basics for university researchers, start-ups and small, established technology companies.

The course, sponsored by the state's Center for Innovative Technology, is scheduled for Jan. 30, 8 a.m. - 5 p.m., at the Virginia Biotechnology Research Park, adjacent to the MCV Campus.

Topics covered will include financing a technology business, the federal grant process, university technology transfer, licensing, intellectual property protection and developing a business plan.

Online registration is available at www.cit.org, or call Robert Brooke at the CIT at 703-689-3080. The cost is $50.

"It's our goal to get as many discoveries as possible out of VCU's world-class research labs and into the commercial marketplace,'' says Richard C. Franson, Ph.D., director of VCU's Office of Technology Transfer. "Any programs that can help our researchers and faculty members with the tough business issues involved with starting and running a life sciences company furthers the university's mission."

More than 550 faculty researchers and entrepreneurs registered last fall for a two-day workshop hosted by VCU's Office of Research to help small companies get seed funding from the federal government through special programs designed to encourage high-tech innovation and commercialization of research. In his welcoming remarks at the September conference, VCU President Eugene P. Trani underscored the importance of linking small business development and VCU research and said VCU would continue to encourage entrepreneurship among its researchers.