Project aims at biotech growth Partnership will focus on alleviating time and knowledge barriers keeping researchers from becoming entrepreneurs.

A new partnership to bolster commercialization of academic research demonstrates Missouri's biotech industry needs more than money to grow. It needs ideas.

A group of academic and industry leaders last month won a $600,000 federal grant to create the Innovation Acceleration Partnership. The project will pair researchers at Washington University and the University of Missouri-Columbia with postdoctoral fellows trained in commercialization, who can act as their business partners.

The goal: to alleviate time and knowledge barriers that have kept researchers from becoming entrepreneurs, and ultimately to translate their ideas into companies and products.

"It's (another) piece of the puzzle" needed to create a vibrant biotech industry, said Marcia Mellitz, president of the Center for Emerging Technologies incubator, a partner in the program.

"It's going to be the first step, the walking-the-halls step of identifying those technologies and researchers that have ... potential and then giving some guidance," she said.

The St. Louis community has created a network of angel and venture capital investors, mentors and incubators to nurture startups. But in recent years, local universities have been criticized for having millions of dollars in funding and few new ventures to show for it.

The crown jewel, Washington University, ranked fifth in the nation with $395 million for research from the federal National Institutes of Health in fiscal 2005, the most recent year for which data is available. The university spent additional cash on research that year, for a total of $1.4 billion - but spawned only three startups and executed 50 technology licenses and options, according to the Association of University Technology Managers.

The University of Missouri system in fiscal 2006 had a research budget of $332 million, created two startups, and closed 16 technology licensing or option deals, according to AUTM. It was not listed in the 2005 AUTM study.

Initiatives for building biotech firms offer funding for university researchers. But not enough is being done to reach into laboratories where ideas originate, say industry supporters.

"St. Louis has done a good job in the venture capital space, in the early-stage seed funding," but it needs more research support, said Lesa Mitchell, vice president for advancing innovation at the Kansas City-based Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation.

That's where the five-year partnership steps in.

"One of the things that's missing now is, how do people connect?" said Ken Harrington, head of the partnership and managing director of Washington University's Skandalaris Center for Entrepreneurial Studies. "What we're intending ... is to catch people at the idea phase and keep them moving."

Four fellows, with research experience, will be selected each year for 13-month rotations, in which they will learn about technology transfer, funding resources, patents and other steps for business innovation. They will help scientist partners create business models and study market opportunities. Once ideas are cultivated, they can be pitched to BioGenerator - a St. Louis organization that provides seed funding and startup resources - or other investors, Harrington said.

That way, scientists can focus on completing and publishing their research, which they see as more important than becoming entrepreneurs, Mitchell said.

Dr. William Peck, a partner in the project, hopes the new program will drum up business for the mentoring arm of Innovate St. Louis, a civic group he heads that is aimed at business creation.

"What is the ultimate success of these fledgling commercial ventures? We don't know that. But ... the more entrants, the more successes" the community will have, he said.

The $600,000 grant from the National Science Foundation's Partnerships for Innovation will cover most costs for two years with the Skandalaris Center filling in gaps. He hopes local companies will fund the next three years.

Leaders in the partnership also need to sharpen their focus, Harrington said. Possible areas ripe for commercialization include: nanotechnology, medical instruments and surgical technology, and biomedical engineering devices.

Before spring, Harrington hopes to hire a director, someone who "knows the science but knows the business side" and can work with fellows and the universities' technology transfer offices, which are responsible for securing patents and licensing discoveries to business partners. Plans are to select fellows by summer. The project later could reach beyond Washington University and University of Missouri-Columbia to include other Missouri universities.

The project should generate nearly 30 startups and 400 ideas to evaluate within five years, according to the grant proposal. Harrington said those targets aren't easy, but he's hopeful about the outcome.

"Every idea that doesn't come to fruition, you leave the knowledge with the researcher about the process," he said. "I'm pretty bullish on what happens in the community when you support early-stage ideas."

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THE GROUP

Goal: To support researchers by having postdoctoral fellows act as their business staff, and ultimately, to bring ideas to market.

Staff: Four fellows every 13-month period with one-month overlaps as groups switch, for a total of 20; a director and a clerical support person.

Estimated cost: $2 million, with $600,000 already received from a federal grant.