I-Corps Sites: UCLA Innovation Corps (I-Corps) Site

University Of California-Los Angeles, Los Angeles CA

Investigators

Abstract

Intellectual Merit: This project establishes an I-Corps Site at the University of California-Los Angeles (UCLA). NSF Innovation Corps (I-Corps) Sites are NSF-funded entities established at universities whose purpose is to nurture and support multiple, local teams to transition their technology concepts into the marketplace. Sites provide infrastructure, advice, resources, networking opportunities, training and modest funding to enable groups to transition their work into the marketplace or into becoming I-Corps Team applicants. I-Corps Sites also strengthen innovation locally and regionally and contribute to the National Innovation Network of mentors, researchers, entrepreneurs and investors. This project at UCLA provides mechanisms for thirty teams a year to receive seed funding to accelerate translational research in the fields of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) across campus. The additional funding and entrepreneurial instruction enabled by this grant complements existing programs at UCLA and prepares the selected teams to benefit from a variety of resources available on campus, facilitating commercialization and new business formation. Led by the Price Center for Entrepreneurial Studies in the UCLA Anderson School of Management, the goals of the Site are to establish: 1. An interdisciplinary UCLA I-Corps Site Team Selection Committee to oversee the annual award of thirty grants to competitively selected UCLA I-Corps Site Teams per year that will use the grants for STEM related projects to prepare applications for UCLA?s collection of entrepreneurial plan competitions, on campus accelerators and incubators, and translational governmental funding; 2. A new UCLA I-Site Lean Startup Course that will be taught three times annually for UCLA I-Corps Site Teams by Price Center entrepreneurship faculty; 3. Three existing UCLA entrepreneurial courses enhanced to enable enrolled UCLA I-Corps Site Teams to utilize grants during the course. Broader Impacts: This grant may benefit society given that sponsored translational research and training at UCLA will directly impact the Southern California Economic Region which consists of 18.4M people (5.9% of the U.S. population) and contributes $924B in GDP (16th largest economy in the world). With 28,700 undergraduates (11.8% are international students) and 12,000 graduate students representing all fifty states and nearly 80 countries worldwide, this grant in conjunction with entrepreneurial education at UCLA impacts beyond the borders of California.