Entrepreneurship Experts Gather in Lisbon to Discuss Technology Transfer, Commercialization, and Academia-Industry Partnerships Workshop Focuses on Success of MIT’s “Entrepreneurship Ecosystem” Leaders of MIT’s “entrepreneurship ecosystem”—the programs, policies and social networks that foster successful relationships between MIT researchers and companies that convert academic research into marketable products—played a key role in a Lisbon workshop held March 29-31, 2009, aimed at homing in on the factors that help academia and industry to develop fruitful partnerships.  Left to right: Prof. Carlos Matos Ferreira (President, IST), Tony Knopp (MIT/ILP), Prof. Manuel Heitor (Secretary of State for Science, Technology and Education), Dan Roos (Director of MIT Portugal at MIT), Charles Buchanan (Board Member, FLAD), and Prof. José Manuel Mendonça (Director, UTEN). The workshop, “Experiencing Technology Transfer & Commercialization: Fostering a New Dialogue with MIT,” was organized by the University Technology Enterprise Network (UTEN) with the support of the Luso-American Development Foundation (FLAD) and the cooperation of the MIT Portugal Program. The event was held at the Instituto Superior Técnico (IST) in Lisbon. UTEN, which was founded as part of the University of Texas-Austin–Portugal program, connects technology transfer offices at 18 Portuguese higher educationand research institutions. The MIT workshop was the second in a year-long series of events that includes an extended international internship for technology transfer officers. From Knowledge Creation to Market The first group of panels looked at ways of stimulating knowledge creation and entrepreneurial activities on campus: encouraging faculty to think about technology transfer, setting up policies to facilitate spin-offs (using the Instituto de Engenharia de Sistemas e Computadores do Porto (INESC-Porto) as a case study), and critical success factors in high-tech entrepreneurship. Giving a first-hand account of technology transfer in the software industry, Paulo Rosado, CEO of OutSystems, a Portuguese software company, suggested that the Portuguese government could help facilitate the entry of executive talent to Portugal. An example of this strategy, discussant Ken Morse, Managing Director of the MIT Entrepreneurship Center, cited Ireland’s decision to allow approximately 1,000 sales people from abroad to work in their country. The second group of discussions looked at building and supporting entrepreneurial activity, including moving knowledge out of academia for commercialization, the ups and downs of creating spin-offs from academic research, and insights into what companies really value in their relationships with universities. The workshop ended with a lookat several MIT–industry success stories. Lessons Learned The seminar included the participation of Manuel Heitor, Portugal’s Secretary of State for Science, Technology and Higher Education, whose address outlined the “raison d’être” of the event. Secretary Heitor noted the importance of building capacity in Portugal to “select [promising technologies], direct [their development in avenues likelyto be favorable in the market] and connect [the creators of these technologies with needed legal, funding, and management resources].”This framework of “select/direct/connect” echoes the methodology of the MIT Deshpande Center for Technological Innovation.The Faculty Director of the Deshpande Center, Prof. Charles Cooney, followed the Secretary of State’s introduction with a charge to the audience to identify clear goals for entrepreneurship within their institutions and stay focused on these goals. Central to the workshop was the sharing of lessons learned—among them, the need to focus on building talent within academic institutions capable of supporting technology-driven entrepreneurship, and to establish strong relationships among academics, technology transfer professionals, venture capital firms, business angels, and companies.The Boston clusters in biotech and energy were cited as good examples of how proximity can help fuel these relationships. MIT’s presenters emphasized that all of the Institute’s research projects are competitive—that there are no block grants for basic research. This initial peer review and selection for all programs ensures that MIT research is always conducted in a national and global context. Portuguese technology licensing professionals were urged to help their faculty and researchers place themselves among their global peers by establishing local and national networks. Alumni Relationships Are Critical The MIT group also noted that maintaining relationships with MITalumni/ae—and ensuring alumni/ae involvement with MIT students—hasplayed a crucial role in the Institute’s technology transfer successes.They cited this as one of the conclusions of a recent study issued by the Kauffman Foundation, “ Entrepreneurial Impact: The Role of MIT,” which details not only the way in which MIT fosters innovation and entrepreneurial growth, but also how it stimulates the local, national and global economies. The Kauffman study looks at companies founded by MIT alumni/ae, which generate hundreds of billions of dollars and hundreds of thousands of jobs regionally. It notes that if the active companies founded by graduates of the Institute were considered a country, its revenues would make it at least the 17th-largest economy in the world.The added value to Massachusetts and the United States of thesecompanies is significant, given the tendency of students arriving to MIT from outside the state or country to stay and create their businesses. A High-Level Gathering Among the participants in the workshop’s discussions were leading Portuguese entrepreneurs and representatives of UTEN and the MIT Portugal Program, including UTEN Director José Manuel Mendonça; DanRoos, Director of MIT Portugal at MIT; and António Cunha, Director of the University of Minho’s School of Engineering and a lead of MIT Portugal’s Engineering Design and Advanced Manufacturing focus area. Also taking part were Carlos Costa, Director of the Faculdade de Engenharia da Universidade do Porto (FEUP); Carlos Matos Ferreira, President of IST; and José Carlos Caldeira, Executive Director of the Instituto de Engenharia de Sistemase Computadores do Porto (INESC Porto). The MIT participants who provided a behind-the-scenes perspective on the Institute’s “entrepreneurship ecosystem” were Prof. Cooney, a member of the MIT Portugal faculty and Haslam Professor of Chemical and Biochemical Engineering at MIT (as well as Faculty Director of MIT’sDeshpande Center); Jack Oldham, Director of Foundation Relations at MIT; Karl Koster, Executive Director of MIT’s Office of Corporate Relations/Industrial Liaison Program; Tony Knopp, Senior IndustrialLiaison Officer at MIT’s Industrial Liaison Program; Ken Morse, Senior Lecturer and Managing Director at MIT’s Entrepreneurship Center; and Lita Nelsen, Director of MIT’s Technology Licensing Office.
Read more about the Kauffman Foundation study. | 
