In collaboration with the Cornell Energy Systems Institute (CESI), the Center for Regional Economic Advancement offered an Entrepreneurial Foundations and Skill Building Sprint for postdocs and graduate students. The mission of the sprint was to educate a diverse group of clean energy and ClimateTech researchers and innovators on how to commercialize their technology and take it from lab to market.

The four-week program, which took place this spring, instructed participants on everything from completing a business model canvas to seed grant funding sources. Throughout the course, the four teams of researchers did independent pre-course work and participated in three virtual training sessions, including a meeting where they heard from peers who are on the path to commercialization. Other sessions focused on customer discovery and creating societal value with their technology.

“There is definitely a lack of diversity in the entrepreneurship space, especially in ClimateTech. We wanted an early-stage introduction that was engaging and welcoming for a highly diverse group of researchers in these fields,” said Lindsay Anderson, interim director of CESI and Associate Professor of Biological and Environmental Engineering at Cornell. “The program culminated with the opportunity for the teams to “dry run” some of their ideas with a group of experienced and enthusiastic investors, and many participants were excited to explore next steps.”

For the diverse group of 14 participants, this was a unique and exciting opportunity to focus on the next steps to take once they conclude their innovation research. For many academics, the barriers between concluding a project in the lab and developing a marketable product often feel insurmountable. Each team tackled a case study of a Cornell research project — everything from zinc batteries to OptimizEV’s work reducing stress on the electrical grid — to follow throughout the course. Armed with their new entrepreneurial knowledge, the clean energy innovators are prepared to pave the way forward and make these solutions available to the public.

“The impact of academic work is sometimes limited by its inaccessibility to policy-makers, industry leaders, and the broader public,” said Polina Alexeenko, a Cornell PhD candidate who participated in the sprint. “This program is exciting because it outlines the process by which that gap can be bridged, potentially significantly increasing the impact of academic work.”

For additional individualized support, the research teams were each paired with a mentor to work with throughout the sprint. Mentors in the sprint included Lindsay Anderson, interim director of CESI, as well as Brian Bauer, Elisa Miller-Out, and Gregory Ray, Entrepreneurs-in-Residence at Rev: Ithaca Startup Works. The mentors used their clean energy knowledge and entrepreneurial experience to provide guidance and mentorship to the teams.

At the end of the spring, the teams had the chance to present their work to a guest panel of Cornell alumni and investors, including Jennifer Tegan, Bob Shaw ‘63, MS ‘64, Bennett Thomas MBA ‘03, and Elisa Miller-Out.

“The course introduced an incredible cohort of diverse ClimateTech researchers to the possibilities of entrepreneurship by working with basic principles of entrepreneurship applied to leading edge Cornell technologies, then exposing the participants to peers that have ‘been there and done it’, and to investors and mentors that can connect them to resources should they choose to move forward,” said Bauer.