Executive director of Md. Technology Development Corp. finally loses 'interim' title

BYLINE: Karen Buckelew

On her second day on the job, the new executive director of the Maryland Technology Development Corp. is undertaking one of the most critical tasks of the position - defending the agency's proposed budget before state lawmakers. But Renee M. Winsky has served as interim executive director of the quasi-public agency known as TEDCO for the past 14 months. By the time the board named her to the job on a permanent basis Monday, she already was prepared for Tuesday's budget hearing in the Senate.

Her task before lawmakers this year includes defending a proposed $10 million increase for the second year of the state's stem cell research fund, which TEDCO administers. "It's a relief," Winsky said of being named officially to the position. "It's nice to go in [to budget hearings] with a level of authority I didn't have as interim executive director. " TEDCO, funded by the state, works to help commercialize technologies developed at the state's universities and federal laboratories, a process known as technology transfer. Winsky is a seven-year veteran of the agency, the first employee hired under its founding director, Phillip A. Singerman. She was appointed interim executive director upon Singerman's resignation in December 2005. Until that time, she served as deputy director of the agency. She already has made a name for herself among legislators in Annapolis, said board vice chair Theodore O. Poehler, vice provost for research at the Johns Hopkins University. "She already was becoming, in a sense, the leadership figure associated with TEDCO in Annapolis," Poehler said. Of the agency's $20.86 million budget this fiscal year, $15 million is allocated to the stem cell fund, which TEDCO administers. Since it began last year, the fund has earned the organization increased attention from lawmakers and the public. Gov. Martin O'Malley's budget proposal suggests $25 million for the fund for 2008. Winsky "is extremely well-regarded by the General Assembly," said Singerman, now a managing director at Bethesda-based venture capital firm Toucan Capital Corp. "She's done a terrific job. She is ready to take this program to the next level. " As new director, she will oversee a staff of 10, plus two newly created positions for a director and administrator for the stem cell fund. Winsky's plans for the agency, she said, include expanding its tech transfer initiatives with federal laboratories including those at Fort Detrick, Aberdeen Proving Ground and Patuxent Naval Air Station. Those programs have totaled $12.8 million in funding since 2001, about half from the Department of Defense and the remainder from other federal sources. "I want to take them to a new level," she said of the initiatives. "We're crafting an approach" to be presented to the board at its meeting next month. Beginning last summer, TEDCO's board reviewed at least 100 candidates after a nationwide search for the position, led by Heidrick & Struggles, according to board chair Frank Adams of Timonium-based Grotech Capital Group. The board chose to hold off on making a final decision pending the results of the gubernatorial election, according to Adams and Poehler. Once O'Malley was elected, there was the matter of his choice for secretary of the Department of Business and Economic Development - recently announced as David Edgerley - with which TEDCO works closely. "We felt it was important to make sure that the leadership in state government would be happy and supportive of this [choice]," Poehler said. "They are very much so. " Said Adams: "At the end of the day, none of [the applicants] were as qualified as Renee is. We are gratified we had somebody on the scene, and we didn't have to take a risk. "