Ready to Commercialize 2008
Office of Technology Commercialization
The University of Texas at Austin

Tuesday, November 18, 2008
The Four Seasons Hotel, Austin, TX

Previous shows have sold out - save over $200 by registering online ($675 vs. on-site registration of $895).

UT Austin's Ready to Commercialize Conference brings together venture capitalists, industry executives, entrepreneurs, and others active in early stage high technology. The interactive fast-paced day includes substantive panels, speakers, and inventions that are ready to commercialize. Agenda highlights include: (click for complete agenda)

• Steve Baker, senior technology writer, BusinessWeek, and author of The Numerati (released 9/15), achieving best-seller status with reviews by WSJ, excerpts by BW, will be joined by Dave Morgan, founder of Tacoda (sold to AOL); Rayid Ghani, Accenture Technology; and Greg Skibiski, Sense Networks, to discuss future trends in social networking. Click here for a brief video on The Numerati.
• Jimmy Treybig, founder, Tandem Computers; Ray Rothrock, Venrock; B. J. Stanbery, Heliovolt; and John Chang, VSC Advisors/Aspect Gaming, will discuss the fundamental changes in venture capital caused by energy, international market forces (e.g., one billion middle-class Chinese), non-Nasdaq IPOs, and consequent changes to capitalization.
• Entrepreneur-in-residence (EIR) programs are now being used by institutions to move technologies into products. The two leaders in this experiment are the U.S. Department of Energy and The University of Texas. Michael Bauer, Foundation Capital; Drew Bond, U.S. Dept. of Energy; Tom Brennan, ARCH Ventures; David Wells, Kleiner Perkins; and UT's new incentive-based EIRs will discuss finding new deals in government labs and universities.
• Patrick Ennis, Intellectual Ventures, will present game-changing approaches to commercializing inventions, while Danny Hillis, Applied Minds, will lend perspective to the current invention climate.
• UT faculty from commercialization startups in an interactive discussion about the institutional factors that affect the success or failure of these types of startups.

Inventors

The invention speed view sessions (three sessions throughout the day) will showcase UT Austin inventors presenting compelling presentations in just 100 seconds each. Immediately following, attendees will be invited to visit the inventors’ kiosks to learn more about their inventions face-to-face.

Reasons to Attend

• Deal flow from leading-edge technology that is ready for licensing, partnering, or commercializing into profitable products and services
• Insights into the current emerging technology trends from top technologists, entrepreneurs, investors, speakers, and panelists
• Networking with venture capitalists, corporate investors, angels, CXOs, and growth company management

Who'll Be There

• VCs/angels looking for investment opportunities
• CXOs looking for their next company
• Corporate investors looking for blockbuster technologies
• Research professionals/faculty looking for research collaborators

The last Ready to Commercialize Conference was a sold-out event where new relationships were made and technologies started on the path towards commercialization. View 2006 conference.