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The Development Of A Technology Entrepreneurship Culture And Lessons Learned

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Conference

2004 Annual Conference

Location

Salt Lake City, Utah

Publication Date

June 20, 2004

Start Date

June 20, 2004

End Date

June 23, 2004

ISSN

2153-5965

Conference Session

Collaborative Programs and Courses

Page Count

23

Page Numbers

9.1249.1 - 9.1249.23

DOI

10.18260/1-2--13841

Permanent URL

https://peer.asee.org/13841

Download Count

481

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Paper Authors

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Scogtt Magids

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Sarah Djamshidi

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Karen Thornton

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David Barbe

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Abstract
NOTE: The first page of text has been automatically extracted and included below in lieu of an abstract

Session 3454

The Development of a Technology Entrepreneurship Culture And Lessons Learned

David Barbe, Karen Thornton

Maryland Technology Enterprise Institute University of Maryland

1. Introduction

This paper discusses activities of the Maryland Technology Enterprise Institute (MTECH) of the Clark School of Engineering at the University of Maryland to foster mutually beneficial interactions with technology companies and an entrepreneurship culture. MTECH started operations in 1984 as an initiative by the college’s board of visitors with the purpose of increasing mutually productive interactions between faculty and students of the Clark School and companies in Maryland. The first programs that began operations were: a consulting service to strengthen Maryland manufacturers, an on-campus incubator for technically-oriented start-up companies, and a biotechnology program to help biotech companies through training and productivity enhancement and to scale up processes from research lab levels to commercial scales. In 1987 a technology transfer program was started which facilitates faculty and graduate students performing commercially-oriented R&D for Maryland companies. While these programs are not purely entrepreneurship, the experience gained from interacting with small and startup companies laid the foundation for a new three-phase entrepreneurship initiative which was begun in 2000 to create a robust technology entrepreneurship culture for students and faculty. The purpose of this paper is to describe the development and operation of the entrepreneurship initiatives and to discuss the lessons that were learned.

1.1. Holistic View of Programs

As we have gained experience over the years, we have identified barriers that students and faculty must overcome to build successful technology ventures, and we have realized that to have a truly effective impact, it is necessary to have a continuum of programs and activities that provide education and assistance to help faculty and students transform ideas, concepts and technology into sustainable ventures through education, acceleration, and incubation as well as to have programs that assist companies after they mature.

Each program and activity will be discussed in detail later in this paper; however; we first provide an overall view. Table 1 provides a listing of whom each program is designed to serve. Figure 1 illustrates the way these programs fit together to form a holistic culture to assist faculty/students, young and mature firms. It is expected that the reader will refer to the table and figure as details are provided.

Proceedings of the 2004 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright © 2004, American Society for Engineering

Magids, S., & Djamshidi, S., & Thornton, K., & Barbe, D. (2004, June), The Development Of A Technology Entrepreneurship Culture And Lessons Learned Paper presented at 2004 Annual Conference, Salt Lake City, Utah. 10.18260/1-2--13841

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