Wildcatalyst Seminar Series

Speaker: Beth Kahn, Associate Director, New England Regional Innovation Node at MIT (NE I-Corps™)
Date: Thursday, February 27, 2020
Location:  UNHI Training Room, 21 Madbury Road, Suite 101
Time: 4:30 PM- 5:30 PM

Our speaker this month was Beth Kahn, Associate Director at the New England Regional Innovation Node at MIT (a part of the NSF-funded I-Corps™ program). The NSF I-Corps program was established to help researchers translate their promising innovations to market by teaching them how to be entrepreneurs. Beth is a nationally certified NSF I-Corps Instructor and a mentor with the MIT Venture Mentoring Service and she works with innovators to explore commercialization of their research. 

Customer discovery is essential to evolving your ideas, innovations, products, and services to fit the actual needs and wants of your customers (or your audience, clients, users, etc.). 

In this seminar, Beth discussed:

• How to effectively articulate the value of your ideas
• The benefits of customer discovery
• Best practices for testing basic assumptions with your potential customers
• How to get feedback about the pain points, or problems, that your customers face
• How to get deeper engagement with existing customers to find new ways to evolve your current offerings to meet unexpected needs
   

Speaker: 
Tonya M. Evans, Esquire
Associate Dean of Academic Affairs and Professor of Law at the UNH,
Franklin Pierce School of Law

Date: Thursday, November, 2019
Location: UNHI Training Room, 21 Madbury Road, Suite 101
Time: 4:30 PM - 5:30 PM

For November's seminar, we invited Tonya Evans, Associate Dean of Academic Affairs and Professor of Law at the UNH Franklin Pierce School of Law to share her extensive expertise on the topic of blockchain and IP. Tonya directs UNH Law's Blockchain, Cryptocurrency & Law online professional certificate program. She speaks and consults regularly in the US and abroad about the legal implications of new technologies like blockchain and innovation for startups, entrepreneurs, and creatives.

The last decade has seen blockchain technology grow from a financial experiment to a revolutionary technology that has the potential to fundamentally change many industries. In this seminar, Tonya will discuss the basics of blockchain and how it relates to IP. She  shared her thoughts on how blockchain technology might be an important tool for transforming scholarly communication and research.

Speakers: Jen Goodrich
Director of Product Management and Publisher Solutions,
Copyright Clearance Center
Chris Harris, J.D.
Legal Counsel, Copyright Clearance Center
Shannon Reville
UNH Alumni

Date:Thursday, October 24, 2019Location: UNHI Training Room, 21 Madbury Road, Suite 101 
Time: 4:30 PM - 5:30 PM

For October’s seminar, we invited Chris Harris and Jen Goodrich from Copyright Clearance Center (CCC) to share their expertise and experience in Open Access (OA) – freely available, digital, online information. Jen is Director of Product Management and Publisher Solutions at CCC and Chris serves as Legal Counsel. CCC provides collective copyright licensing services for corporate and academic users of copyrighted materials.

OA is a newer form of scholarly publishing that is of interest to many in academia, but researchers often struggle with the decision of whether to publish in OA journals versus traditional journals. In this seminar, Chris and Jen  provided a general overview of OA, including the benefits and challenges of publishing in the OA space, and discussed recent trends. They also took a  deeper dive into the subject to compare OA publishing in humanities and social sciences versus STEM research, and how it might affect funding.

Speakers:
Mary Lou Wakimura, J.D.
Principal, Hamilton, Brooks, Smith, Reynolds
Matt Jacobs, J.D.
Former Vice President & General Counsel at Black Duck Software, Inc. (Recently acquired by Synopsys, Inc.)
Director with Synopsys legal group

Date: Thursday, September 26, 2019
Location: UNHI Training Room, 21 Madbury Road, Suite 101
Time: 4:30 PM - 5:30 PM

For September's seminar, we invited Mary Lou Wakimura, J.D. and Matt Jacobs, J.D. to share their expertise on Open Source Software (OSS). Mary Lou is a Principal at Hamilton, Smith, Brooks, Reynolds with years of experience advising on OSS licenses and other software licensing agreements. Matt was the VP and General Counsel at Black Duck Software (recently aquired by Synopsys, Inc.), a company whose products automate the process of securing and managing OSS. 

Use of OSS is on the rise as software developers seek new ways to reduce costs and get products to market fast. Mary Lou and Matt  shared their expertise and discuss the legal basics around using OSS, as well as the benefits, risks, and pitfalls of using OSS in your own software.

Our final Wildcatalyst Seminar speaker of the academic year was Julie Lenzer. Julie is Chief Innovation Officer and Director of UM Ventures at the University of Maryland, where she is charged with fostering and deploying innovation to drive economic and social impact from the University.

Julie has had a long career in innovation and entrepreneurship. Before starting at the University of Maryland, she was appointed to lead the Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship (OIE) within the U.S. Department of Commerce and drove programs and policies that supported innovative economic development across the country. 

Before her appointment within the Department of Commerce, Julie spent time as a serial entrepreneur. In 1995, she founded her first company called Applied Creative Technologies, an IT solutions firm focusing on manufacturing operations and inventory control. She grew the company to multi-millions in revenue and won several national awards for workplace excellence. Julie was also the co-founder and former CEO of the Path Forward Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship, a nonprofit that helped women expand economic opportunity by starting and building growth-oriented businesses using technology transfer and spent time as the Executive Director of the Maryland Center for Entrepreneurship.  

In this seminar, Julie discussed her journey through her impressive career, particularly as a female innovator in a male dominated field. She shared her unique experience as an entrepreneur and innovation advocate in both the industry and academic setting along with her thoughts on what resources are needed for the next generation of female innovators.

Our speaker for March’s Wildcatalyst Seminar was Dr. Kim L. R. Brouwer, associate dean for research and graduate education and professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s Eshelman School of Pharmacy. She joined the school in 1986 and is currently the William R. Kenan Jr. Distinguished Professor in the Division of Pharmacotherapy and Experimental Therapeutics.

While at UNC Chapel Hill, Dr. Brouwer co-invented B-CLEAR^®--a drug discovery tool based on her international expertise in the field of drug transporters—which enables researchers to predict new drug candidates' impact on the liver, including the modeling of drug-drug interactions (DDI) and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NASH). In 2002, Dr. Brouwer co-founded Qualyst Transporter Solutions with three other UNC faculty members and licensed the technology from the university in order to commercialize the work. After raising over $12MM in private capital, Qualyst was acquired by BioIVT in 2017.

In this seminar, Dr. Brouwer shared her experiences and advice for founding and growing a research and innovation-based start-up. She also shared her thoughts about the unique challenges that women scientists and founders face and discuss her opinions on what resources are needed for the next generation of female innovators.

Our speakers for February’s Wildcatalyst seminar were Sharyn Potter and Jane Stapleton, co-founders of Soteria Solutions, UNH’s first women-run spin out. Soteria Solutions is a non-profit that offers proven solutions to reduce sexual and interpersonal violence and harassment.

Soteria Solutions is a spin out of UNH’s Prevention Innovation Research Center (PIRC), which is internationally recognized for its collaborative research and community engagement focusing on sexual and relationship violence and stalking prevention and response. Sharyn, who is a Professor of Sociology at UNH, serves as Soteria’s co-founder and VP of research, and Jane serves as Soteria’s co-founder and president. They both still hold leadership positions within PIRC. Over the past year, they’ve been working hard with their team to launch Soteria Solutions and expand upon PIRC’s academic work solving one of society’s biggest challenges: building safe, respectful environments within workplaces and schools.

In this seminar, Sharyn and Jane shared their advice for running and growing a research and innovation-based start-up, and talked about how they balance and separate their commercial and academic work. They also shared their thoughts about the unique challenges that women founders face, and discussed their thoughts on what resources are needed for the next generation of female innovators.

Our speaker for November’s Wildcatalyst Seminar was Erica Johnson, Chief Operating Officer at QA Cafe & Cloudshark and former director of the InterOperability Lab (UNH-IOL). Erica is widely recognized as an industry leader with her abilities to drive technical innovation. Under her leadership over the last decade, the UNH-IOL enjoyed tremendous revenue growth and industry partnership opportunities due to her business acumen and in-depth understanding of complex networking technology. In her new role as COO for QA Café, she is responsible for oversight of business operations and delivery of continued growth strategies for the company. 

Erica has always been a proponent for the advancement of women in STEM and was deliberate in ensuring that women were equally represented and elevated at the UNH-IOL. In 2010, she was awarded the UNH Women’s Commission’s Stephanie Thomas Staff Award in honor of her achievements in promoting and embodying the advancement of women in the sciences. She has also been recognized by the NH Business Review with its Outstanding Women in Business award, and was honored in Fierce Telecom’s list of “Women in Wireline.” 

In this seminar, Erica shared her advice for running and growing a research and innovation-based small business/start-up. She also opened up a dialogue about the unique challenges she has faced as a woman in a leadership role in a technology-based venture and discussed her thoughts on what resources are needed for the next generation of female innovators.

Our speaker for October’s Seminar was Karil Reibold, President of Reibold Consulting and an adjunct professor in the Peter T. Paul College of Business and Economics. Karil has a passion for innovation and entrepreneurship. Through her consulting business, she works with companies to define organizational strategy and offers executive coaching across diverse industries. She also co-teaches courses at UNH on the topics of private equity, venture capital finance, and the meaning of entrepreneurship. Throughout her over 25 years of experience, Karil has helped companies raise in excess of $300 million in venture capital, worked on staff or as a consultant to venture funds in Silicon Valley and Boston, held various CFO/COO roles with venture backed companies, and served for several years as President and CEO of a telecommunications start-up. 

During the seminar, Karil  provided insight on finding the value and market potential of an idea, and shared her advice for creating a vision, strategy, clear objectives, and the right culture for a success venture. We enjoyed learning from her extensive experience and hearing her unique perspective as a woman in a male dominated field.

In September, our speaker was Karleen Seybold, co-founder and CEO of Digital Skin Imaging, a six-year-old digital medical imaging company modernizing the way physicians visually capture and compare skin changes. Karleen currently holds five patents for image sequencing, alignment, and a skin cancer detection display module. Before co-founding Digital Skin Imaging, Karleen was a Senior Program Manager at Raytheon Company in Tucson, AZ for 17 years, where she led new business development efforts through innovative technology applications and directed an international new business program in missile defense.

In this seminar, Karleen shared her experiences and lessons learned while starting and growing a company from the ground up. She discussed the successes and pitfalls she has encountered along the way and provided her perspective on the unique challenges that female innovators and entrepreneurs can face.

Our final speaker in this year’s Wildcatalyst Seminar Series was Rana Gupta, CEO of the UMass Amherst spin-out Felsuma LLC, which is commercializing a new adhesive technology called Geckskin®. Geckskin was developed by two UMass Amherst researchers, Dr. Al Crosby and Dr. Duncan Irschick, who were studying geckos' ability to climb and cling to different surfaces. Their collaboration led to the development of a novel adhesive so powerful that an index card-sized piece can hold 700 pounds on a smooth surface, yet it can be easily released and leaves no residue. Rana was introduced to Dr. Crosby and Dr. Irschick and their work and six months later he launched Felsuma LLC to commercialize the technology.

On top of running his business, Rana is also a teacher in BU’s entrepreneurship program in the areas of entrepreneurial finance, innovation, and technology development.

Felsuma is growing and exploring Geckskin's potential in many different applications. We learned more about the technology and Rana's experience translating university research into real and useful commercial products.

Our guest speaker for March's Wildcatalyst Seminar was UNH's own Dr. Glenn Shwaery, Assistant Dean of Research at the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences (CEPS). In addition to his role at UNH, Glenn is an experienced entrepreneur. He helped to start and grow the Newmarket, NH-based company ArgenTech Solutions, which started out selling handy wipes for cleaning the skin of toxic metals. Over the last 10 years, the company has successfully pivoted and innovated to become a world-wide provider of complex technical services in support of unmanned aircraft systems (i.e. drones) for both the government and commercial clients. ArgenTech's team of four founding members were broadly trained and possessed complementary skills that allowed them to pivot and take advantage of opportunities as they were presented. They used Glenn’s contacts at UNH to advance their portfolio of capabilities while providing funding for UNH faculty, students, and staff. From SBIRs to NHIRC awards, the relationship persists to their mutual benefit.

Glenn's newest venture, IdeaShare, is developing a redesigned manual wheelchair and just won the Social Venture Innovation Challenge (SVIC) community track here at UNH. Glenn has a lot of experience successfully leveraging university resources like research, equipment, and expertise to develop and expand his commercial ventures. We heard about the challenges he's faced and the lessons he's learned throughout his career.

We were very excited to have Dr. Debarshi Nandy, Associate Professor of Finance at Brandeis University and Co-Founder of Cleanfield Capital as our guest speaker in February. Dr. Nandy's research interests include everything from entrepreneurial finance and financing of innovation to hedge Funds and corporate restructuring. His start-up, Cleanfield Capital, was founded in 2016 and uses a proprietary, innovative financial model to optimize the environmental benefits and commercial value of redeveloping abandoned and potentially contaminated land known as “brownfields”. The company seeks to restore neglected areas and repurpose brownfields into sustainable and productive residential and commercial real estate developments using renewable energy sources.
 
Dr. Nandy has significant experience with mentoring and advising entrepreneurial firms and both an academic and practical perspective of entrepreneurship and corporate finance. In his seminar, he shared about his experiences and the lessons he’s learned translating his research and innovation into a successful business.

For the first Wildcatalyst Seminar of 2018, we invited Dr. Edgar Goluch, Associate Professor of Chemical Engineering at Northeastern University and Founder of QSM Diagnostics as our guest speaker. Formed in 2014, QSM Diagnostics is a Northeastern medical device spin-out based on Dr. Goluch's research. The start-up is developing wearable sensors for infection monitoring in humans and animals that allow for quick detection and treatment of specific types of infections.

When launching QSM Diagnostics, Dr. Goluch took advantage of every start-up and mentorship resource he could find at Northeastern and the surrounding community, such as the NSF I-Corps program and business competitions. He also pursued several funding avenues such as angel investors and SBIR grants. He is currently on sabbatical from Northeastern working hard to get QSM Diagnostics off the ground.

In this seminar, Dr. Goluch discussed his innovative research and provided the unique perspective of a founder in the early stages of a start-up.

We were very excited to have Dr. Eric Fossum, Professor and Associate Provost for Entrepreneurship and Technology Transfer at Dartmouth College as our guest speaker for November’s Wildcatalyst Seminar. Dr. Fossum is a serial entrepreneur, a U.S. National Inventors Hall of Fame inductee, and holds over 160 US patents.

While working for NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in the 1990’s, he invented the CMOS image sensor which is used today in billions of cameras around the world, including smart phones, webcams, and medical devices. Dr. Fossum co-founded Photobit Corporation in 1995 to commercialize the technology and served in several top management roles including Chairman and CEO. The company was acquired by Micron Technology in the early 2000s. More recently, he and his students formed Gigajot Technology to commercialize photon-counting image-sensor technology invented at Dartmouth.

Dr. Fossum discussed his successful career in academic and government research and entrepreneurial leadership and shared his experience and expertise in translating ideas and innovation into real and usable products.

For October's Wildcatalyst Seminar, we invited Dr. Kevin Short, Professor of Mathematics at UNH, to share his experience and expertise in research commercialization and entrepreneurship. In 1999, Dr. Short licensed patented intellectual property developed through his research activity at UNH and started Chaoticom, the university's first ever spin-off company. Chaoticom was acquired in 2008 and in 2012, Dr. Short launched yet another spin-off company called Kaonyx Labs, followed by its affiliate Setem Technologies. Dr. Short's research from UNH is a foundation for products that enhance voice clarity and audio signals in today's voice and speech recognition products (i.e.-cell phones, headsets, hearing aids, voice-activated electronics). Setem was acquired earlier this year by XMOS.

Dr. Short is a research commercialization trailblazer at UNH. It was great to learn more about how his business ventures took shape and about the challenges he faced/lessons he learned while launching and selling successful businesses, specifically ones based on university research-born intellectual property.

We could think of no one better to kick off the first seminar in our series "Launching (Research-Based) Start-Ups" than UNH's own Dr. Wayne Jones, Jr., Dean of the UNH College of Engineering and Physical Sciences. In 2015, Dr. Jones co-founded ChromaNanoTech, LLC, a start-up company producing optical nanomaterials patented from his university research lab for use in energy, biomedical, and defense related applications. Dr. Jones was joined by his co-founder Dr. William Bernier, ChromaNanoTech's CEO and a 35-year industry veteran. Together they talked about how their business venture took shape, and discussed the challenges they faced/lessons they learned while launching a successful business, specifically one based on university research-born intellectual property.

Topics include:

• Venture and grant funding
• Customer research
• Faculty founder lessons learned
• Finding the right co-founder/business partner
• Commercializing university IP (from the perspective of both the licensee and the licensor)
• And more!

UNH is at the forefront of climate change studies and renewable energy research. For April's seminar, we invited UNH's Martin Wosnik to discuss university/industry collaboration in renewable energy.
 
Martin is an associate professor of mechanical engineering whose research interests span fluid and thermal sciences with an emphasis on renewable energy, including ocean renewable energy, turbulent flows, high-speed hydrodynamics, and more. Martin has worked with several industry partners on renewable energy research projects throughout his career. He shared his insights on the benefits and challenges for both parties when pursuing such partnerships, and discussed the importance of industry/academic collaborations in developing sustainable energy sources that will protect our planet for future generations. Martin’s discussion highlighted his efforts on the NSF-funded Living Bridge Project on the Memorial Bridge in Portsmouth, NH, and the UNH Flow Physics Facility, the world’s largest scientific quality boundary-layer wind tunnel facility.

For March’s Wildcatalyst Seminar, we discussed the development of effective and valuable university/industry strategic partnerships.

University/industry partnerships have a host of mutual benefits like increased student involvement, new educational opportunities, product development, industry growth, and economic development. We asked Marc Sedam, UNHInnovation managing director, and Peter Egelston, owner of Smuttynose Brewing Company to lead the conversation and share their recent experiences working together to brew and launch a beer in celebration of UNH’s 150th anniversary and talk about their collaborative efforts to build and strengthen UNH’s capacity to support NH's fast-growing craft beer industry.

We'll also celebrated the release of the 150th anniversary beer that has been named "1866" in honor of the year of UNH's founding. We had plenty at the seminar for attendees to try as well as a selection of Smuttynose's other delicious brews.

For January’s seminar (part of our newly renamed Wildcatalyst Seminar Series), Dave Arnold, serial entrepreneur and Retrieve Technologies founder, shared his experiences thinking outside the box and seeking novel opportunities to spur growth and innovation. We also heard from Erik Swartz, professor and chair of the UNH Kinesiology department and developer of Hutt^®, a helmetless tackling program developed at UNH. Together, Dave and Erik lead a discussion about what happens when traditional academic research collides with a game-changing technology.

For November’s Catalyst Seminar, we strayed from our theme slightly to open up a broader discussion of trademark fundamentals and how to apply them when starting a business. We invited Craig Morris, Managing Attorney for Trademark Educational Outreach at the USPTO (US Patent and Trademark Office) to share his expertise on this topic with us. The discussion included his insights on:

• How trademarks, copyrights, patents, domain names, and business name registrations all differ
• Determining when trademark protection is appropriate
• The importance of selecting a strong mark that is both federally registrable and legally protectable
• Potential grounds for the USPTO to refuse registration
• When an attorney should be used and how to find one
• What might happen if another trademark owner believes it has stronger rights in a mark and issues a "cease-and-desist" letter
• The distinction between what the USPTO does in the federal registration process and what a private attorney could do
• How to avoid "scams" perpetrated by companies that request fees for services not required by the USPTO

For October’s Catalyst Seminar, we highlighted the mutual benefits of university/industry engagement and collaboration. The rewards of these strategic partnerships can go beyond the obvious business and financial incentives; effective university/industry relationships can lead to learning, innovation, and growth for all parties.

We asked Shawn Banker, director of UNH’s University Instrumentation Center (UIC) to join us to talk about his experience working with outside companies and how those relationships have not only offset costs and increased instrument utilization for the UIC, but have helped UNH develop techniques and training for scientists and inspired new research opportunities for faculty and students.

We also invited Jared Kelly, laboratory manager at EMSL Analytical in Nashua, NH, to join in the conversation. EMSL is a provider of environmental, indoor air quality, and materials testing services and products. As a physicist/microscopist/scientist, Jared has spent his career engaging and collaborating with universities, including MIT, Harvard, UMass Amherst, and UNH. Jared has been able to significantly broaden EMSL’s testing capabilities and increase the company’s product and service offerings by working with specialized instrumentation only available at institutions like UNH.

We hope that bringing these thought leaders together for a candid discussion highlights the technical challenges and solutions they are facing, and provides insight and inspiration to those interested in industry/university partnerships.

We've asked Charlie French, Project Team Leader, Community and Economic Development, at UNH Cooperative Extension to join us this month to talk about a collaborative effort between UNH Cooperative Extension and the city of Franklin, NH.  Like many other New England cities built on a mill economy, many of which face challenges with a changing economy, Franklin identified a number of priorities to improve the city. Using funding from the highly-competitive National Endowment for the Arts (NEA)-funded Citizens’ Institute on Rural Design (CIRD) grant, UNH Cooperative Extension facilitated a unique community process to engage multiple voices around economic improvement opportunities for Franklin. Out of this process arose a number of ideas that were rapidly put in motion, as well as the establishment of new businesses in the area. 

George Dzujna is a Franklin City Council member and a member of the Steering Committee that worked with Cooperative Extension on the “Franklin for Lifetime” project. He will be joining Charlie for the presentation and discussing Franklin’s story and outcomes resulting from the project. This presentation should be of interest to anyone who wants to find out more about creative ways of revitalizing a downtown which entails an entrepreneurial voice in economic development opportunities, creating a welcoming and supporting environment for new endeavors, and leading change around a unifying idea.

For April’s Catalyst Seminar, we highlighted the emerging (and sometimes disruptive) phenomenon of crowdsourcing and how it is impacting new product development (NPD) practices around the globe.

We asked Matt O’Hern, Assistant Professor at the Peter T. Paul College of Business and Economics to join us this to talk about his research on crowdsourcing and digital maker communities and the different ways that crowdsourcing may compliment (or threaten) firms’ traditional business models. Matt also discussed different types of crowdsourcing initiatives that exist and the various roles that users play within a crowdsourcing community.

We also invited Gavin Bauman to join in the conversation. Gavin is a Technical Evangelist at Microsoft, working with developers, students, and start-ups to help them build innovative applications using Microsoft's leading edge technology. Gavin talked about The Garage, the makerspace community at Microsoft where small teams across the company can work on their big ideas, and shared his experience working with students during hackathons.

For February's Catalyst Seminar, we highlighted the exciting entrepreneurial ecosystem that is emerging at UNH.

We asked Ian Grant, director of the new Peter T. Paul Entrepreneurship Center (ECenter), to join us this month to talk about his vision and the exciting goals he has developed for the ECenter. He discussed the opportunities and resources that will be available for students, faculty/researchers, alumni, and parents, and shared his thoughts on the impact that the ECenter will have on campus and in the state of New Hampshire.

We also invited Andrew Earle, assistant professor of strategic management and entrepreneurship at the Paul College, to join in the conversation. Andrew gave us some insights into his innovative research on how technology moves from concept to commercialization, and talked about his experiences with student energy and engagement in all things entrepreneurship on campus.

Leadership seminars. Management classes. Panel discussions. Classroom exercises. Many of us have used these tools to learn more about business and technical skills to improve success in our companies, research programs, and professional aspirations. But as we all know, there can be a gap between receiving information and experiencing the real thing.   

We asked David Kaye, Chair of the UNH Theatre and Dance Department to tell us about his professional theatre company, Power Play, which bridges this gap. Power Play specializes in interactive performances for individual, group, or institutional development. Power Play has created performance models for a range of issues including sexual harassment prevention, leadership training for police, fire, and school administrators, and facilitation training for municipal officials.   

We also asked Elaine St. Jean, education & training program coordinator at Primex3 in Concord, NH, to join us. Primex3 is a public entity risk pool and committed to assisting its members in developing knowledge, skills, abilities, and capabilities through various training programs. Recognizing the limitations of instructors using a PPT to induce behavior changes, Elaine was interested in an experiential learning program for Primex3 and its clients. Elaine’s work with David and Power Play has resulted in simulation-based and interactive learning opportunities that provide authentic practice in skills that individuals need for a successful career.   

We hope that bringing these thought leaders together for a candid discussion will foster a conversation that highlights the technical challenges and solutions in both industry and academia and uncovers new opportunities for innovation in leadership and management development. 

In November, our theme was A Conversation About...Data Analytics. We invited Bob McGrath, an Everett B. Sackett Associate Professor in the College of Health and Human Services and Director for Graduate Programs in Analytics at UNH (a new and quickly growing program) to provide a high-level overview of data analytics and talk about how data analytics can provide the insight a business needs to solve current problems and function as efficiently and possible.

We also asked Peter Mueller, Head of Business Analytics at Lonza PharmaBiotech, to join us to talk about the processes, methods, training, and tools he is deploying to help manage the data generated by the global firm’s different business systems and software platforms so that business decisions are made upon accurate information and insights.

October's Catalyst Seminar was A Conversation About...Innovations in Wireless Connectivity. For this year's theme, we are inviting NH businesses to come and share the innovations, challenges, and pressing issues from within their industry in a conversation with UNH faculty researching in that field. In October, we asked Steve Perlberg from Verizon Wireless to talk about the next generation of wireless connectivity advancements being developed at the Verizon Innovation Center in Boston.

We also invited Dr. Nick Kirsch, director of the UNH Connectivity Research Center (CRC), to join in the conversation. He provided a researcher's perspective and shared a little bit about the CRC's initiatives related to wireless connectivity and the Internet of Things.

Bringing these thought leaders together for a candid discussion fostered a conversation that highlighted the technical challenges and solutions in both industry and academia and uncovered new opportunities for innovation.

To kick off our series, we began with a broader discussion as we welcomed an official from the USPTO (US Patent and Trademark Office) to share her thoughts on and experience with intellectual property and innovation.

 Finding a way to fund your innovation can be a real challenge. For this seminar, we invited Tom "TK" Kuegler, Co-Founder and General Partner of Wasabi Ventures to share his expertise and advice for entrepreneurs who are thinking about different funding options and discuss what entrepreneurs should consider and prepare before approaching a venture capital firm. We also be heard from Cory von Wallenstein, CEO of Adored, a customer-centric mobile app start-up. Cory shared his start-up experiences and funding journey as well as his advice and tips for fellow entrepreneurs.

For many years, innovation and start-up activity in New Hampshire have been under the radar. Now, with increased support from the highest levels of state government, the state's entrepreneurial ecosystem is finally in the spotlight.

in this seminar, we discuss the state's initiatives to address concerns raised by NH’s high-tech business and entrepreneurial communities, and market NH as a place where start-ups can grow and thrive. Our speaker Liz Gray, is the director of entrepreneurship for the NH Business Finance Authority, and the state's Live Free and Start initiative. Live Free and Start is a joint initiative between the Governor’s Office, Business Finance Authority and Department of Resources and Economic Development aimed at creating jobs and making it easier for technology companies to start, grow, and succeed in New Hampshire. Liz is joined by Allison Grappone, who is the Founder and CEO of NEARBY, a successful NH start-up. Allison shares her firsthand experiences and advice for growing a business in NH, as well as her perspective on the state of innovation in NH as a start-up business founder.

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For many entrepreneurs and business owners, the act of negotiation can be uncomfortable, but the ability to negotiate effectively in a wide range of business contexts, including licensing agreements, deal-making, employment discussions, contracts, and handling disputes is an integral part of any business or start-up. Our speaker, Marc Sedam, is the Managing Director of UNHInnovation and has an extensive background in intellectual asset management, licensing, and start-up formation. In this seminar, he shares the key negotiating skills and strategies he has learned throughout his career. These tactics will help you come to the table prepared to get the best deal possible and avoid common negotiation pitfalls.

Mike Alberts is the Director of Global Organizational Development for the Lisbon, NH-based company New England Wire Technologies; he has worked for them for almost 20 years.

In this seminar, Mike outlines the important considerations for businesses planning their workforce development strategies. He shares his extensive knowledge of available state resources for workforce development, as well as his experience partnering with colleges and universities to develop custom professional and executive development training, and implementing successful student internship programs.

Mike is an active participant in the movement to keep NH workers in the state. He is currently a member of four local and NH state boards, including two governor-appointed positions with the State Workforce Development Board and the NH Job Training Fund, as well as an active Board member for Grafton County Economic Development (GCEDC) and North Country School to Work advisory.

Mike is joined by Michael Power, Community Outreach Administrator for the Office of Workforce Opportunity (OWO) (NH Department of Resources and Economic Development) who adds his own expertise on the subject of state workforce development resources.

Joe McEachern is a UNH alumnus with a Bachelor's Degree in Electrical Engineering and a Master's Degree in Computer Science. During his master's program, Joe was employed at the UNH InterOperability Lab where he developed his skills and interest in testing and networking technologies. After graduating and working in the booming tech industry of the '90s, he founded QA Cafe in 2001 and the company has been growing ever since.

In this seminar, Joe shares his experiences with starting and growing a small business in New Hampshire, developing new innovations and products, overcoming challenges, and details how he used his background and connections at UNH and the IOL to build the foundation for QA Cafe's success.

Companies often need to innovate in order to expand and grow, but finding the resources to innovate can be a challenge. Hiring additional personnel, outsourcing, or using work-for-hire services may allow the company to retain significant ownership over intellectual property, but the cost of these avenues can be prohibitive.

Pursuing an innovative partnership, whether with another industrial partner or with an entity such as a university, could be a good alternative. Chris Dundorf, Founder and President of 2KR Systems, Chris shares his experiences with starting a company in New Hampshire and the benefits and tradeoffs of using strategic partnerships to fund and advance innovations in 2KR's product offerings. The seminar is moderated by Scott Valcourt, the Director of Strategic Technology for UNH IT.

In just a few short years, Itaconix has grown from an innovative idea into a successful, expanding start-up. Yvon Durant, Co-Founder and CTO, explains how he successfully navigated an innovation in polymer production from initial concept to commercialization. His story describes critical steps along the way, including:

• The origins of his innovation and how it became the key technology in a successful start-up.
• Critical resources.
• Establishing strategic partnerships.
• Using research grants to develop new technology.
• Lessons learned for businesses and individuals interested in innovating or starting a business in New Hampshire.

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Inevitably, you will need the services and/or skill sets of other people to get your business running.  When you begin to add people to your lean start-up, the initial question will be whether or not each person will be an employee or independent contractor.  This seminar will help you understand the pros and cons of each type of relationship, and the legal risks in one vs. the other. 

If you hire even one employee, there are HR legal compliance issues you will need to address.  This seminar will also discuss the HR issues that are most important as you begin to add employees, such as:

• Your obligations under wage laws and employment verification laws
• Approaching incentive compensation
• Protecting your confidential information and trade secrets

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Everyone talks about starting a company. Some focus on the idea, others focus on finding customers, and still others on how the world will change when their idea hits the market. But what happens when you start operating your company and need to do everything but don’t have the money?  March's Seminar was given by our own Marc Sedam, Executive Director of UNHInnovation and former biotech start-up COO. Marc reviewed his most popular and practical tips for keeping costs low without negatively affecting productivity.

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Are you a founder? Do you know how much of your startup you own? What are the ways founders divide up equity? How much ownership do investors usually take? In this seminar we will explore these topics, including tips on bootstrapping, fundraising, and the like, all from the point of view of an evidence-based entrepreneur.

The key to a successful business does not depend on the size of your marketing budget. The Lean Startup model relies on interacting with potential customers early and often so you can incorporate feedback during the product development process. Marketing is good. Finding the right market to serve with quality marketing is better.

Customer development begins with creating a clear roadmap to discover who your customers are and validating that those people are willing to buy into a product that meets their needs. You can then use that knowledge to create a solid product or service demand and build the infrastructure, relationships, services and processes necessary to grow into a world class company.  This seminar helps entrepreneurs understand and implement the key principles of customer development in their business.

The minimum viable product (MVP) is that version of a product which allows a team to collect the maximum amount of validating insight about customers' needs with the least amount of product building—in other words, it's the least developed product that customers are willing to pay for. It's one of the most important principles of a lean start-up.

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Join us for a special visit from Sanjeev Thohan, Senior Research Fellow in Preclinical Sciences/Translational Sciences at the Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research in Cambridge, MA. 

In a special visit to the UNH campus, Joe Emling, Director, Specialty Agriculture & Science, Ingredion Incorporated (Indianapolis, IN), will speak on "Successful Commercialization of Agricultural Innovation: Opportunities and Challenges in the Global Food Economy."  

From the first domestication of crops and livestock to today's use of modern biotechnology, agricultural innovation has impacted human health, environmental quality, and economic prosperity. In our globalized economy, advances are influenced by consumer attitudes, government regulation, investor expectations, sustainability, and other factors. The successful innovator balances these influences to create lasting value from breakthrough advances in agricultural technologies and processes. 

Slides/Presentation not available.

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Continuing our seminar series theme, "Innovations in...", will be Brian Coffenberry, SVP of Strategic Planning & Business Development for Albany Engineered Composites, to speak on Innovations in Materials Science. Brian will speak about how Albany Engineered Composites brings their products to market, the challenges and successes the company has faced as they've grown, the current focus of Albany Engineered Composites as they look to the future of materials science, and the most pressing market needs for innovative solutions in materials science.

Suzanne Foster, Vice President and General Manager of the Advanced Energy Division at Medtronic Advanced Energy, kicked off our seminar series with a presentation on Innovations in Medical Devices.