(176i) Engineered Systems for Entrepreneurs in Academia and Industry

The
Engineering Research Centers (ERC) Program has fostered entrepreneurial
translation of scientific and engineering discovery to innovation since its
establishment in 1985.  The National Science Foundation initiated its flagship
ERC program at the request of the White House and National Academy of
Engineering to develop an interdisciplinary culture of innovation by partnering
academia and industry.  Innovation ecosystems cultivated in sixty-one
multi-institutional ERC partnerships between universities, industries, and
federal agencies in the past 30 years have bridged the ?valley of death'
between discovery and marketing (see Fig. 1).  ERCs have been awarded 382
patents, issued 669 licenses, and spun out over 171 companies with more than
1500 total employees.  

A number of innovative
best practices have emerged from the ERC program that provide comprehensive
support for entrepreneurship.  Among these best practices are novel curricula, interdisciplinary
team-based project development, comprehensive strategic planning, vertical and
horizontal mentoring by academic and industrial collaborators, experiential
learning activities, and rigorous formative and summative assessment.  As a
result, students who graduate from ERC program are ranked significantly higher
than their peers in a number of relevant categories (see Fig. 2).  Included
among over twelve thousand participants in ERCs in the past thirty years are founders
of Google. 

Among federally
supported programs that foster innovation, the ERC program is unique in its focus
on translation of discovery to marketable innovation within the context of an
engineered system. Test-beds in each ERC guide foundational research and
integration of technology into proof-of-principle demonstrations of an
engineered system.  Test-bed evolution is accelerated by benchmarking against
state of the art, roadmapping using quantitative metrics and milestones, input
from industrial and scientific advisory boards, annual evaluation by site
visitors, and regular assessment of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and
threats.  Faculty, students, and industry researchers who partner in ERC
activities engage in ?T-shaped' acquisition and development of innovative
capacity (see Fig. 3).   

Products and processes commercialized from ERC-developed
technology are estimated at >$50B, a ~50-fold return on a roughly ~$1B
federal investment in ERCs. The Food and Drug Administration recently
licensed the Argus II retinal prosthesis which was developed by collaborating academic
and industry entrepreneurs in an ERC at University of Southern California. ERC
programs and participants are encouraged to develop a personalized roadmap for
entrepreneurial development that adapts to the unique needs, challenges, and
opportunities in their area of science and engineering, technology sector, and
market segment (see Fig. 4.) 

This
presentation will review the structure and design principles of the ERC program
and experiences of its participants that highlight key aspects of
entrepreneurship at the intersection of academia, industry, and government.