In This Issue LES Winter Meeting: President's Message: Sector Spotlight Chemicals, Energy and Materials Sector: Healthcare Sector: Foundation Focus: Activities of the Licensing Foundation,
USA & Canada, Inc.: Chapter Launch: A Traveler's Guide To LES Local Chapters: LES Spring Meeting: Revolutionize Your Thinking In Atlanta 2007 Rings In With Advanced PDS Courses LES Annual Meeting: Local Chapters Celebrate The Holidays |
Activities of the Licensing Foundation, USA & Canada, Inc. The Licensing Foundation’s 2007 Graduate Student Business
Competition Heats Up, Winning Team To Receive $10,000 The Licensing Foundation’s 2007 Graduate Student Business Competition is well underway with entries continuing to arrive from U.S. and Canadian student teams.
In keeping with its mission, each year, the Licensing Foundation sponsors this competition, as well as a variety of other outreach programs aimed at creating a broader awareness and understanding of licensing. “Students are often not taught about the opportunity and value that can be gained through the licensing of patents and other forms of intellectual property,” said Richard Razgaitis, President of the Licensing Foundation. “Our competition is unique in that it promotes an awareness and demonstrates how things like patents, copyrights, know how, and trademarks can bring tremendous benefits in both time-to-market and sustainable competitive advantage. It’s how many companies, small and large, succeed, and it is often a critical step for commercializing the inventions of individual inventors.” To compete, participants must submit comprehensive business plans that contain core intellectual property (IP) licensing components by January 31, 2007. Entries receive world-class review and evaluation from LES members, who provide valuable feedback to each team. In addition to the licensing element, the mentoring between participants and LES members also sets the Foundation’s competition apart from others. “These partnerships offer students an excellent advantage while allowing licensing professionals a chance to give back to the community and to help groom a new generation of leaders in the field,” says Art Rose, Secretary of the Licensing Foundation Board and responsible for the competition. In April, three teams will advance to the finals. These teams will present their plans at the 2007 LES Spring Meeting in Atlanta, Georgia, May 16-18. The final round of the competition simulates a venture capital scenario in which students gain topnotch real-world experience. The competition will then conclude with the selection of a winning team by a panel of LES (member) judges. The winning team will receive a $10,000 grand prize and each of the runner-up teams will receive $1,000. The finalists will also assist in presenting a meeting workshop on preparing successful business plans. Now in its fourth year, the competition’s previous winners are working to turn their “virtual” business into real world successes. Last year’s winning team from the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) took first prize for their plan to develop groundbreaking cancer therapies based on a new technology. Caralynn Nowinski, MD, and Chirag Patel, an MBA/MS candidate, plan to make their company, SanoGene Therapeutics Inc., the first to introduce therapeutic siRNAs (interfering pieces of RNA) that prevent tumor growth and invasion and induce cancer cell death. In 2004, the Canadian-based Tangam Gaming, Inc. won the competition after introducing a unique automated system for monitoring casino gaming tables. The team calculated that their system could save casino operators millions of dollars in decreased operating expenses and reduced fraud. “Things are going quite well for us,” said Prem Gururajan, founder and president of Tangam. “Winning the LES competition raised our visibility and lent a lot of credibility to our business, which brought investors to the table and accelerated the development and commercialization of the company. Most start-up companies are lucky to emerge from R&D with one customer. In our case, we have several who are very excited about the product.” Gururajan and his team at Tangam are still the only game in town with several patents pending on their technology. The competition, which honors Edwin A. Shalloway, continues to grow in size and popularity. Nevertheless, the Foundation is always looking for new ways to broaden its reach. If there are business schools, engineering schools, graduate entrepreneurship programs or others who you feel might be interested in participating, please have them visit www.licensingfoundation.org where they can find more information and a re-printable flyer for use on campus. And, if you are interested in judging, mentoring or participating in competition-related activities, opportunities both big and small are available for your consideration. Please contact Art Rose at arose@kmob.com. The Licensing Foundation has also developed a general information Web site about the importance of respecting IP rights: www.respectrights.org.
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Executives Society (U.S.A. and Canada), Inc. |
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