Pre-Seed Workshop to connect area innovators with business community expertise

Pre-Seed Workshop to connect area innovators with business community expertiseAugust 18, 2006SU News ServicesSUnews@syr.edu

The Syracuse Technology Garden, the CASE Center at Syracuse University and MedTech are sponsoring a Pre-Seed Workshop, a two-day intensive investigation and evaluation of early-stage technology ideas to assess the potential of each to become the foundation of a start-up business. The workshop will be held Aug. 18 and Aug. 25 and kicked off with an orientation and networking dinner session Aug. 17 at the Syracuse Technology Garden.

The workshop brings together eight teams, each headed by an idea champion, to spend two days and the intervening week to determine-through a systematic evaluation process-the commercial potential of each team’s concept. In addition to the idea champions, volunteer entrepreneurs, business people, educators, researchers and various professional leaders from throughout Central New York will participate in the workshop.

Eight idea teams will be drawn from SU, the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry, SUNY Upstate Medical University and Sensis Corp. Two idea champions form the nucleus of each team, supported by expert volunteers from the region. An innovation-driven economy is the focus of all the participants who believe that, through collaboration, emerging technologies will be identified and start-up businesses organized and nurtured in Central New York.

“This Pre-Seed Workshop is part of an ongoing effort to bring new technology ideas to the forefront in the Central New York community,” says Nasir Ali, vice president of new venture development for the Greater Syracuse Chamber of Commerce. “It is our belief that converting bright ideas from researchers and scientists into fast-growing businesses will be the basis for future economic growth in our area. The fact that so many leading business people have volunteered to participate as coaches, technology and legal advisors, and sponsors demonstrates that this belief is widely shared and supported in our community.”

The workshop is jointly sponsored by the CASE Center, Hiscock and Barclay, MedTech and the Syracuse Technology Garden.

Idea team volunteer participants will come from Bond, Schoeneck and King; the CNY Business Journal; Communigration; Heslin Rothenberg Farley & Mesiti; Hiscock & Barclay; Jaeckle Fleishmann & Mugel; the Johnson School at Cornell University; Kensa Group; NASA; the Onondaga Venture Fund, Phillips Lytle, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute; the Research Foundation of SUNY; Summit Software; Technology Innovations; Terakeet; Unicorn Technologies; USA DataNet; Wall Marjama & Bilinski; and Welch Allyn, among others.

By involving all levels of participants from business students to technologists to successful entrepreneurs an opportunity is provided for each participant to receive additional insight into the business development process.

“Given my years of experience working with individuals looking to start technology businesses, I know there is often a major gulf between an innovative idea and a marketable business,” says Roger Trabucco, associate director of the CASE Center. “Many bright folks with technology backgrounds don’t have the right tools to help them to determine whether their idea can bridge that gulf and be turned into a viable business. Anything CASE can do to help give regional innovators these tools is right in line with our economic development mission.”