But one should think carefully about “one trick pony” companies. Companies very focused on creating a market or developing a single technology can be a great “krill” company (as my colleagues and I call them) for a “whale” company to gobble up — and the product may never have come to market any other way.

The incentive structures at universities — the department structure and the licensing revenue sharing policy — which faculty create — also would benefit from change to enable more creative kinds of research & deals, faster.

• Small gap funding grants to undertake proof of concept work on commercially interesting technologies (e.g. developing prototypes, doing initial animal studies etc.). These grants are awarded competitively and are available to all non-profit institutions in the state. The awardees are selected by a group of external, commercially savvy, business reviewers.

• The Platform Program at which a researcher with a commercially interesting idea pitches their potential business to a small group of invited industry, investor and business executives. Presenters are coached extensively by the MTTC before their presentation. The Platform Meetings are “Candid but Kind” and are designed to get objective feedback as to whether there is an opportunity to found a new company and to obtain leads on who might be interested in supporting the development of the company.

• A series of technology showcases – conferences at which early stage spin-off companies from the institutions and researchers who are considering starting a company present their business opportunities. The MTTC runs these in areas where there are a large number of spin-off companies and considerable regional investor and industry interest such as life sciences and nanotechnology. Our largest program is in late October and focuses on clean energy (and – yes – energy efficiency is also covered along with alternative energy sources).

These programs help all institutions reach out to the entrepreneurial, industry and investor communities in the state while also providing these constituents with an easy way to access multiple institutions. For smaller research institutions it is especially hard to justify the establishment of these kinds of programs – but by working with all research institutions (representing an annual research budget of approximately $5.5 billion) the MTTC is able to provide them with these services. Since we were founded three years ago we have worked with over 25 Massachusetts institutions ranging from Harvard, MIT, and Boston University – to McLean Hospital and Hampshire College. For more information please visit our website at http://www.MaTTCenter.org.