The Center for Technology Licensing (CTL) recently launched the Cornell Innovation & Venture Advisors (CIVA) group. CIVA is a new and exclusive community of industry experts who are provided a first look at emerging technologies and venture opportunities from Cornell innovations. The group, which advisors may join by invitation only, aims to connect Cornell inventors from the Ithaca, Geneva, Cornell Tech, and Weill Cornell Medicine (WCM) campuses with potential entrepreneurs and corporate partners with the goal of leveraging advisor feedback to best advance technology toward commercialization and venture.
A total of 80 participants attended the first virtual meeting, which took place in the last week of October 2022. “Every quarter, CIVA members will be invited to an hour-long virtual meeting to attend presentations from Cornell’s most promising inventors,” said Alice Li, executive director at CTL. “It’s not a pitch event for fundraising. The technologies presented are in the early development stage. The main goal of CIVA and the event series is to connect Cornell inventors and prominent corporate investors and entrepreneurs who are ardent supporters of Cornell’s innovation ecosystem, figure out suitable commercialization strategies for different technologies, and build pipelines for partnerships and ventures.”
The roundtable will feature three pre-selected Cornell innovators who describe their technologies in separate breakout rooms during the event. The advisors may choose the breakout room of most significant interest to them, including innovations in life sciences, physical sciences, and medical advancements. Following the inventors’ presentations, the advisors, inventors, and hosts participate in an open roundtable discussion that provides feedback, explores strategy, discusses the next development steps to add value, and more.
“While we will continue to improve the CIVA platform, we are delighted with the results and feedback we received during the first CIVA event,” said Lisa Placanica, senior managing director at CTL@WCM. “By providing this unique access to early-stage opportunities in venture and commercialization, we are opening the doors of CTL’s up-and-coming portfolio of technologies that have the potential to disrupt and transform their markets.”
In 2021, Cornell was granted 105 U.S. utility patents[1], ranking in the top 20 internationally and first in the State of New York. The establishment of CIVA and the roundtable series will help catalyze the adoption of these inventions into the marketplace and increase the potential impact of Cornell research and innovation.
[1] Top 100 Worldwide Universities Granted U.S. Utility Patents 2021. National Academy of Inventors. https://academyofinventors.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/8.17.2022-Top-100.pdf
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