MyWerx in iExchange

MyWerx, the Nashville-based IP-management software provider, and Cumberland Center have joined to create iExchange, to enable technology commercialization from the state's cooperating universities. Read more here.

Asentinel licensing revenue

Asentinel, the Memphis telecom expense management company, has licensed some more technology. Hereyago.

Y-12 IP licensing

We reported on Venture Incite (Solidus) going after ORNL/Y12 intellectual property for commercialization. Here's another one: Y-12 solvent technology. I'm thinkin' it's stronger'n WD40.

TN needs visionaries

All the patents in the world won't create jobs if they aren't investable and transformed into goods and services through commercialization - that seems to be the message from Friday's panel of ORNL, VU and other experts. TN has some catching-up to do with respect to its population of serial entrepreneurs and visionary leaders, too. Read about it here.

TN co-investments

'Less rivalry, more collaboration' might be a reasonable guess at the subtext of today's address by Gov. Bill Haslam, before an audience at the NEXT TN Conference, hosted by TTDC. The governor's INCITE innovation program includes state co-investments, more pressure on commercializing technologies, honors for entrepreneurs, more incubators statewide and more. Read our take, here.

Freedom Innovations, VU in licensing deal

Freedom Innovations licensed intelligent prosthetic technology from Vanderbilt University, more here.

Vanderbilt Vc's?

Vanderbilt University is not only reorganizing and staffing-up its tech transfer unit, but has created an advisory committee that includes VC's and entrepreneurs. Read more here.

Baker Donelson tosses gauntlet

Baker Donelson Bearman Caldwell & Berkowitz landed a prominent technology attorney and has been quietly broadening its venture footprint. The story's right here.

Louisville inventors rally

The first meeting of the Louisville Metro Inventors Council will be January 18th, according to that city's Business Journal.

Attorney Paul Ney to Waddey firm

Waddey and Patterson, Nashville's largest pure-play IP/patents law firm, today announced the addition of Paul Ney (left), of counsel. Ney was previously Nashville Mayor Karl Dean's director of economic development. Their announcement is here.

TNInvestco's 'not enough' says TTDC

The State of Tennessee's new venture-capital formation initiative, TNInvestco, isn't enough, by itself, to propel the state's New-Economy, says a report from TTDC. Meanwhile, TTDC is beginning to jockey for a seat at the Bredesen Administration's budget table. The story's here.

TN delegates want IP protection

The CA reports that U.S. Reps. Marsha Blackburn and John Tanner are among Tennessee Members of Congress pressing for intellectual property protections during climate-change technology talks.

NV Entrepreneur Center peer metrics

Nashville Entrepreneur Center has a good first web presence, but in this interim while a fundraising campaign is being planned and executed, a CEO, an operating budget and a bricks-and-mortar facility remain over the horizon. Meanwhile, the EC has laid out its near-term objectives, and there are many. Among the bulletpoints is a reference to a peer -- the Technology Venture Development office of the University of Utah, which conducts, among a wide range of other activities, actual tech transfer and commercialization, and apparently gets grants and royalties. Related VNC coverage is here.

TN patent share

Data published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office indicate Tennessee's share of all patents of domestic origin awarded since 1963, as a share of patents awarded to originators in the Fifty States, is about 0.9 percent. Here's the chart.

Lawyers help entrepreneurs bone-up on risks

Lots of free legal information is so couched in lawyerly CYA language as to be useless without hiring counsel. Gee, wonder why. But, two recent posts by attorneys with Bone McAllister Norton here in Nashville are both informative and inviting: Paul Kruse alerts owners to another trademark-protection risk-opportunity associated with Facebook...while George Phillips provides a focused and readable set of "steps to success" for any business owner.

Steal this Music

VU's release today: "...First-year students in the 'Stealing in Music City' seminar at Vanderbilt University must devise a workable system for distributing music that delivers content for a reasonable price and allows songwriters, artists and other stakeholders to get paid. “We are challenging the students to re-invent the music industry for a fair model of music distribution to compensate artists, consumers and labels,” said Holling Smith-Borne, director of the music library at Vanderbilt’s Blair School of Music..." On Nov. 12, also, Gov. Phil Bredesen signed into law a copyright-protection bill intended to discourage illegal downloading and sharing of content.

IP Commercialization

NIH? Kauffman Foundation VP Lesa Mitchell told me recently she doesn't expect much interest from Nashvillians in KF's "Proof of Concept" model for seed-stage investing and technology commercialization. Seems she's talked with folks here. My own checking at key Vanderbilt listening-posts suggests that, at first blush, she's probably right. The people I spoke with felt said they're doing fine without POC. They have access to IP, University funds, angel-investor networks, advisors and all the rest (although oversight of these activities is concentrated in a tech transfer unit of the administration, rather than in sci-tech research-oriented schools, themselves).

People

Vandy's Biomedical Engineering department is now led by Chair Todd Giorgio, who said in today's release he'll push to create businesses powered by VU Biomed intellectual property.