<p>From May 13 to June 6, 16 university and lab-based startups from 蜜桃传媒破解版下载 and Colorado State University (CSU) dove into the world of customer discovery, participating in classroom lectures and workshops, networking with entrepreneurial mentors and conducting industry interviews.</p>
<p>The inaugural <a href="/venturepartners/innovators/commercialization-ac... (R2M) program</a>鈥攈osted by聽<a href="/venturepartners/">Venture Partners at 蜜桃传媒破解版下载</a> in partnership with聽CSU and the Colorado Cleantech Industry Association (CCIA)鈥攇uided researchers-turned-startup founders through the iterative process of finding a product-market fit and refining a value proposition for their respective technologies.</p>
<p>Sally Hatcher, <a href="/venturepartners/innovators/commercialization-ac... Academy</a> director, says the R2M program involves more than just classroom learning. For inventors, it offers the opportunity to 鈥済et out of the building,鈥� engage with industry, and learn about potential customers, partners and competitors.</p>
<p>鈥淲e have technologists creating great innovations in the lab, but they don鈥檛 know how to interact with industry,鈥� said Hatcher. 鈥淲e want CU鈥檚 innovators to figure out what problems industry professionals have and then solve those problems. It鈥檚 important to not invent in a vacuum. If you can solve a real problem, people will support your work and buy your solution.鈥�</p>
<p>Over the course of three weeks, participants attended three in-person sessions while simultaneously meeting with 18 mentors and scheduling interviews with 30 potential customers. The goal? To gain insight into industry needs and map out a commercialization strategy.</p>
<p>[box title="Research-to-Market 2019聽Cohort:" color="darkgray" style="filled" float="right"]</p>
<ol>
<li>Arpeggio Biosciences 鈥� 蜜桃传媒破解版下载</li>
<li>Artimus Robotics 鈥� 蜜桃传媒破解版下载</li>
<li>Boulder Wavefront Shaping 鈥� 蜜桃传媒破解版下载</li>
<li>Catamaran Labs 鈥� 蜜桃传媒破解版下载</li>
<li>CitSci.org 鈥� Colorado State University</li>
<li>Ecometrx 鈥� Colorado State University</li>
<li>Octave Photonics 鈥� NIST</li>
<li>Precision Vascular Graft Technology (pGraft) 鈥� 蜜桃传媒破解版下载</li>
<li>Razix Solutions 鈥� Colorado State University</li>
<li>Robotic Endoscopy Solutions 鈥� 蜜桃传媒破解版下载</li>
<li>Safe Autonomy 鈥� 蜜桃传媒破解版下载</li>
<li>Shine On 鈥� 蜜桃传媒破解版下载</li>
<li>Socialcontext.ai 鈥� 蜜桃传媒破解版下载</li>
<li>Technical Universal Group 鈥� 蜜桃传媒破解版下载</li>
<li>TissueForm 鈥� 蜜桃传媒破解版下载</li>
<li>TSM Microwave 鈥� 蜜桃传媒破解版下载</li>
</ol>
<p>[/box]</p>
<p>Participants were also tasked with presenting three four-minute pitches throughout R2M to course instructors Jean Redfield,聽Tom Teynor聽and Steve Albers. The instructors were hand-picked for having聽years of experience as startup founders, C-level executives聽and academic leaders, and also serve as national course instructors for the Department of Energy's Energy I-Corps program. After each pitch, all three gave immediate feedback so the startups could refine.</p>
<p>Telling stories with pictures rather than an excess of words was a key piece of advice the instructors聽emphasized. Redfield, Teynor and Albers explained that it鈥檚 more important to focus on why industry professionals should care about the problem a technology can solve for them rather than on the technology itself.</p>
<p>鈥淩2M is a great way to work with scientists and engineers, help them build skills and challenge them in ways that maybe they haven鈥檛 been challenged before,鈥� said Redfield. 鈥淲e were thrilled in the amount of work these startups put in to polish their pitches and frame their value propositions appropriately.鈥�</p>
<p>The range of technologies at R2M included everything from <a href="/today/2019/05/28/robot-may-one-day-perform-your... that could one day perform colonoscopies</a>, to a bike lamp that backlights the rider for added visibility, to software algorithms that model complex supply chains and their greenhouse gas implications.</p>
<p>Several of the startups at R2M had previously participated in 蜜桃传媒破解版下载 hallmark entrepreneurial programs, such as the <a href="/venturepartners/innovators/lab-venture-challeng... Venture Challenge</a>, <a href="/nvc/">New Venture Challenge</a> and <a href="/venturepartners/business-partners/destination-s... Startup</a>.</p>
<p>Arpeggio Biosciences, a 蜜桃传媒破解版下载 spinout from the <a href="/biofrontiers/">BioFrontiers Institute</a>, is one of these companies. Its drug-screening platform uses a combination of enhancer RNAs and machine-learning artificial intelligence to aid in drug discovery and predict the effects of a drug on patients.</p>
<p>鈥淭his was an amazing program and impressive amount of work to organize,鈥� said Joel Baskin, scientist with Arpeggio Biosciences. 鈥淐ustomer discovery wasn鈥檛 just a one-time exercise for me. It is now an ethos extending beyond commercialization and into my personal life.鈥�</p>
<p>[box title="Couldn't apply for R2M this spring?" color="lightgray" style="filled" float="right"]</p>
<p>Check out our <a href="/venturepartners/innovators/commercialization-ac... Blocks</a> program, a shorter, more introductory version of R2M. Attend a 2-day workshop (August 2 & 16) based on the I-Corps methodology, specifically designed for university researchers commercializing their inventions.</p>
<p>[button url=" color="blue"]RSVP Now[/button]</p>
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<p>Susan Strong, an <a href="/venturepartners/innovators/entrepreneurs-reside... with Venture Partners and principal of The Strong Group, attended all three days of R2M and noticed each startup made significant progress. 鈥淚 don鈥檛 think anyone fully articulated their value proposition or truly understood who their customers were at the beginning of the program,鈥� she said. 鈥淚n three weeks we saw a huge difference and for that reason, startups聽shouldn't miss out on this program. I give it maybe 10 stars.鈥�</p>
<p><a href="/venturepartners/innovators/commercialization-ne... Network</a> mentor Mike Connolly echoed Strong. 鈥淭he R2M program provoked, educated and supplied techniques to help technical startups get real. Having these startups focus on the business model canvas, value proposition and customer discovery seems to illuminate viable next steps toward success.鈥�</p>