UCLA researchers get down to business

As a research institution, UCLA is a hotbed for new ideas and
innovations. Every day, students as well as professors are making
new discoveries in areas from biotechnology to mathematics to
communications.

The Venture Development Project, a program that was redesigned
in 2003, was created to match up academics, scientists and
researchers who are creating these new innovations with business
students at the UCLA Anderson School of Management.

The project has been expanded and reorganized to make it easier
for those wishing to commercialize a technology to connect with
business students.

“UCLA is fabulous at innovation. But historically, UCLA
has not been good at commercializing. Things are changing,”
said the director of the project, Lee Cooper, professor emeritus at
the Anderson School.

“There’s a point in a professor’s career when
they want to see what they’ve worked on to have an impact in
society, and the students at the Anderson School want to learn
about these new innovations,” Cooper continued.

The project’s goal is to help professors move from simply
publishing their work to making their ideas into feasible
businesses that can benefit fields such as health care and
engineering.

Students at the Anderson School design organizations that allow
faculty to develop these commercial ideas without having to give up
their roles as faculty members.

The professors won’t have to spend all their time finding
the most effective ways to market their ideas and products because
this is done for them by students assigned to their projects,
Cooper said.

The Ventures Development Project has been involved in a wide
range of business ventures on various levels, including within the
scientific arena.

Projects include medical diagnostics that test for diseases such
as ovarian cancer and dengue fever, tests that examine the toxicity
of nanoparticles and research in the area of micro fluidics.

Other projects are more humanities-based, such as organizing a
fund-raiser for the UCLA Friends of Jazz or helping to create a
viable business for a student information system designed to comply
with the No Child Left Behind Act.

Students who wish to become involved in these projects are
usually enrolled in Strategic Marketing Planning for New Ventures
or two of the other classes offered at the Anderson School geared
toward this topic. Students may also be assigned to specific
projects and join teams independent of a class.

“My team is taking a marketing new ventures class, and our
task is to help the company progress. We’re meeting with (the
professor who developed the technology) to figure out what his
agenda is, and we get very involved in the business for a
while,” said Biren Shah, a second-year business student at
the Anderson School.

Furthermore, the Ventures Development Project ensures that even
after the quarter and classes are finished, the business plans get
passed down.

“Since the ideas are going to last longer than the
business students in a class, one team will pass the project on
from one class to the next. We just make sure there’s
continuity,” said Chris Koh, a second-year student at the
Anderson School and co-editor in chief of The Anderson
Exchange.

“It’s exciting to be a part of seeing all these
ideas take shape, to see the research ideas coming out,” said
Lee Tenny, a second-year business student.

For information on VDP, visit
www.anderson.ucla.edu/programs/vdp.

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