How Universities & Companies Can Partner to Lead Innovation
posted by Jon Glicksberg 30 September 2010
For a recent client presentation, we dove into the massive potential that exists for Universities and Corporations to foster and support the new technologies and businesses needed to drive the economic rebound.
Indeed, neither party was particularly fast out of the gate when the financial crisis arrived. And, both Universities and Corporations were, justifiably, blamed for much of the economic collapse and it’s impact on society. Universities, in particular MBA programs, were accused of embracing the culture of greed, and focussing on creating consultants and bankers with no real commitment to society. Likewise, many major corporations, over-leveraged themselves and faced massive drops in value, which in turn impacted the individual consumer with the resulting and continuing high unemployment levels.
Yet, many of the major corrections needed to spur the massive re-boot demanded for an economic rebound, such as new technologies, innovation and capital support can be most easily solved by bringing Universities and large corporations together. Universities, as traditional homes of research, youth-powered innovation, and forward-thinking, and corporations, who are motivated by the capital desire to grow and, hopefully, a sense of commitment to their communities.
The partnership between Universities and Corporations to drive innovation is a proven model. Consider the development of Google at Stanford (see Wired 13.08), or the entrepreneurial atmosphere at MIT.
Applying this spirit to meeting the economic, and environmental issues of today seems natural, responsible and a potentially very promising model.
We feel we are seeing the first moves of corporations stepping up to solve big issues such as the recent Ecomagination Challenge program from GE. That there is a marketing message here is clear, but bringing venture capital and the GE production engine behind the development of solutions to big problems seems tremendously promising.
On the University front, there are several Universities with programs to promote, “Entrepreneurship”. The most interesting we found was Columbia University in NYC, whose Technology Ventures seeks to make the most out of the relationship between the University and the access to venture capital in New York. Columbia has done a good job of making the transfer from the academic environment to real, viable business possible.
