Lab2Market Symposium helps UC grad students turn projects into products

This daylong event gave attendees a chance to learn how to transform their pioneering research from ideas into commercial products.

UC is known as a nationwide leader in innovation and entrepreneurialism, so Lab2Market received a strong turnout from the Bearcat community. As one of Cincinnati’s prime startup incubators and accelerators, the 1819 Innovation Hub was an ideal home for Lab2Market.

Researchers at UC and other elite institutions perform brilliant lab work, but many never send their groundbreaking ideas to the commercial space. This leads to potential market gaps where innovative products could otherwise have solved consumers’ problems.

The UC Center for Entrepreneurship and the school’s Technology Transfer team are determined to change that. As UC encourages faculty, staff and student researchers to submit commercialization ideas, more intellectual property is being transformed into real-world products.

Kate Harmon, assistant vice president of UC’s Office of Innovation, understands the value of tech commercialization — that’s why she helped to organize Lab2Market and lead it.

“Lab2Market exposes our graduate students to the importance of understanding the market landscape of their research area,” she said, “and how to leverage that knowledge into creating greater societal impact through their research.”

The Lab2Market 2024 Symposium engaged UC graduate students who focus their research on the science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) fields. The top 100 applicants who registered for Lab2Market could attend in person and received $100 scholarships courtesy of UC’s College of Engineering and Applied Science (CEAS).

Attendees heard from a diverse range of experts across the entrepreneurial and tech commercialization spaces. Below are a few of Lab2Market’s prominent speakers:

• Madison Bourbon: senior licensing associate on UC’s Tech Transfer team
• Patrick Brown: commercialization navigator on UC’s Tech Transfer team
• Christin Godale: executive director of Covington Life Sciences Partners
• Jason Heikenfeld: biomedical engineering professor at UC
• Joe Maruschak: managing director of Aventurine Capital Group
• Molly Rizkallah: co-founder and chief operating officer of Cincy Carbon

Sessions at Lab2Market covered topics including the tech commercialization process, examining research through a market lens and exploring UC’s commercialization pathway. Additionally, students enjoyed a startup founder panel and breakout sessions headed by mentors, entrepreneurs and investors.

Speakers consistently encouraged Bearcat researchers to embrace the world of startups.

“The entrepreneurial mindset,” Heikenfeld said, “changes the way you think about how to solve problems, how you actually solve the problem and how you include value inside a large company.”

Other researchers may be interested in becoming startup founders themselves, which is where UC’s Tech Transfer team and the Venture Lab come into play. These assets, strategically located inside the 1819 Innovation Hub in the heart of the Cincinnati Innovation District, allow Bearcat students, faculty and researchers to take on a new title: entrepreneurs.

Featured image at top: Panel members speak at UC's Lab2Market Symposium. Photo/Gregory Glevicky