SIgnature Series: THOUGHT LEADERSHIP ARTICLES

This series of thought leadership articles captures and conveys the insight shared during Innovate Carolina’s Signature Series events in the fall of 2023. Each article highlights the trends, advice and perspectives shared by industry and academic leaders focused on Future of Work topics including technology, hybrid work models, and talent and workforce development. Articles employ a mix of feature, list and question-and-answer formats based on content delivered through a variety of modes that include presentations, workshops, and panel discussions. Read the series >

‘The most amazing movie I’d ever seen’

Using technology developed by UNC-affiliated startup Mizar Imaging, scientists can transform traditional microscopes into high-resolution instruments that let them see the inner workings of living organisms and cells in ways that weren’t previously possible. How did this startup survive an early entrepreneurial scare and a pandemic to build a company that now advances science in labs across the world? Read more >

sINGLE-CELL SOLUTION

Cell Microsystems, a company with UNC-Chapel Hill origins, is leapfrogging traditional technologies for single-cell cloning, culturing, analysis and isolation. How does the firm help scientists in pharma-biotech organizations speed therapeutic breakthroughs by culturing 10 times more cells in one-tenth of the time? Read more >

The prognosis for pancreatic cancer remains dim. Can energy-based drug delivery brighten the odds? 

Focal Medical, a startup with roots at UNC-Chapel Hill, is finalizing plans with the FDA to enroll pancreatic cancer patients in its first clinical trial. The company’s implantable technology uses an electrical field to deliver drugs in higher concentrations to hard-to-reach tumor cells. Read more >

Can microbubble ‘jackhammers’ create a breakthrough for personalized medicine?

UNC-affiliated startup Triangle Biotechnology’s nanoparticle technology amplifies the power of sound to give scientists rapid, higher-quality sample analysis capabilities—and clinicians hope for pinpointing the right treatments for patients faster and earlier. Read more >

clot-busting combination

SonoVascular, a med-tech startup based on technologies developed by researchers at UNC-Chapel Hill and NC State University, combines drug-based and mechanical therapies into a novel, pharmaco-mechanical device and procedure designed to more safely and effectively treat patients with blood clots. Read more >

A birth control pill for men? How a UNC scientist-turned-entrepreneur plans to curb unintended pregnancies.  

Eppin Pharma Inc, a startup founded by a former UNC-Chapel Hill faculty member, is developing a non-hormonal oral male contraceptive pill that has the potential to ease the economic, social and personal toll of unplanned pregnancies—and bring greater equity and flexibility to family planning. Read more >

Confidence in their craft

Women comprise only 4 percent of the construction trades workforce—a statistic that Nora Spencer is determined to change via her nonprofit startup Hope Renovations. In three years, the venture has trained more than 75 women and gender-expansive individuals with the trade skills to work in high-demand, high-paying construction fields, while performing vital home repairs and renovations for senior citizens. What entrepreneurial lessons are behind the rapid growth of Hope Renovations and its plans for expansion in North Carolina? Read more > 

IDEA-TO-IMPACT: STARTUP STORIES

The Idea-to-Impact stories series is a collection of long-form stories written in a style that mixes feature writing and case study development. These stories focus on UNC-affiliated startups and use a consistent formula to describe how each venture’s technology or idea makes a human, social or economic impact. Each story includes an in-depth look at the startup’s strategy and use of resources across four dimensions of the entrepreneurial journey: funding, location, talent, and entrepreneurial education. Impact data callouts help to quantify impact, while “innovation toolbox” sidebars provide a mini directory of the foundational programs, services and funding sources that each startup used to create impact. Read the series >

launch chapel hill startups ready to venture out

On any given day at Launch Chapel Hill, you’ll find local entrepreneurs immersed in the daily grind, intently plugging away at vital work. One team huddled in a corner developing its technology. Another in a conference room bouncing around ideas: brainstorming, business planning and reviewing customer feedback. And, of course, founders engaged in pitch-prep sessions. But for those who came out to the Launch Demo Day event one early May evening to hear from one of the most diverse sets of companies you’ll find anywhere, the startup accelerator offered a different kind of focus. This event was less about what the companies were doing, and more about where they’re going. Read more >

UNC-Chapel Hill innovation hub gets green light, speeds economic development downtown

University leaders announce approval of a lease at Grubb Properties’ 136 Rosemary Street for a downtown Chapel Hill innovation hub, which will anchor a town-gown strategy for growing more innovation-focused companies, industry partnerships and talent. Read more >

2021 reflections: innovation inspired

As we reflect on 2021, our Innovate Carolina team feels inspired by the many UNC innovators and entrepreneurs with whom we’ve had the opportunity to collaborate this year. Over the past 12 months, our faculty, students, alumni and community partners have found countless ways of using their ingenuity to move the world forward during some of the most challenging scientific, social and economic times. And with each step forward, they’ve brought us closer to the human progress we aspire to achieve: helping our communities and the people who live in them work smarter and live better. Read more >

FOUR ESSENTIALS FOR YOUR STARTUP JOURNEY

What does it take to transform scientific discoveries made on university campuses into startup companies? And to then translate the work of those companies into human and economic impact in North Carolina and beyond? It’s a journey made of many steps, said a group of UNC-Chapel Hill and Research Triangle-area researchers and entrepreneurs who convened at the University’s new Institute for Convergent Science to discuss new possibilities for research-based ventures. Read more >

WINNING MATCHUP: SPORTS ARENAS MEET SOCIAL CHANGEMAKERS

Imagine that you’re running a hard-working but financially fragile nonprofit that’s focused on solving any number of pressing human challenges. You have a small staff who would jump at the chance to raise funds, perhaps by staffing a concession booth at your local sports stadium. Across town sits the arena for your local sports teams with concession lines that are typically too long, too slow and understaffed. So what’s to stop these nonprofits and sports venues from teaming up to raise funds and revenue? Read more >

PRIMED FOR PANDEMIC INNOVATION

Usually when Devin Hubbard walks into the biomedical engineering lab at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, he might turn on the 3D printers and get to work. But this time was different. As the coronavirus pandemic ramped up, Hubbard wasn’t there to use the printers. He was there to take three of them home with him. The chair of the biomedical engineering department had sent a message to Hubbard and other faculty saying they should be prepared to work remotely at home, and they could request permission to take their computers home for remote work. Thinking ahead, Hubbard also requested and received permission to use the 3D printers remotely. His foresight paid off. Just a couple of weeks later when University labs were closed, he was using those same printers to create a physical prototype of a device that may protect doctors and nurses as they care for COVID-19 patients. Read more >

CHILD CARE CONUNDRUM

To care for your child or for pandemic-stricken patients? It’s a choice that most health care professionals – or parents – never imagined they’d face. But due to an upsurge in COVID-19 cases and dwindling child care options, it’s an unsettling reality. When Liz Chen answered an early-March phone call from her UNC-Chapel Hill department chair, Kurt Ribisl, to discuss potential solutions, she wasn’t sure how she would help tackle this problem. She just knew that she was ready to get started. Read more >

NEW SOCIAL INNOVATION SITE BOLSTERS ENTREPRENEURIAL CHANGEMAKERS

At Innovate Carolina, the Office of Social Innovation is introducing its newly launched social innovation site to support students and others at UNC-Chapel Hill who are continuing the legacy of creating social good at the nation’s first public university. The office’s director Melissa Carrier offers insight about what you can find on the new site, why it was created and how you can use it to create meaningful change through your ideas and ventures. Read more >

MAJOR GIFT EXPANDS ACCESS TO LAUNCH CHAPEL HILL ACCELERATOR

As part of a growing innovation hub designed to support the innovation and entrepreneurial community, Innovate Carolina has received a $230,000 gift from Lee-Moore Capital Company to expand programming at Launch Chapel Hill, an award-winning accelerator created via a partnership between the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the Town of Chapel Hill and Orange County. The gift from Lee-Moore Capital, a real-estate and investment firm headquartered in Sanford, will bring more access to accelerator programming, venture-based consulting, investor networks, entrepreneurial mentors and innovation workspaces to the downtown startup community. Read more >

FROM PANDEMIC DOWNTURN TO STARTUP UPSWING

At the outset of the COVID-19 crisis in the early spring, Mireya McKee thought a lot of her day-to-day work with UNC-Chapel Hill startups would be ramping down. But what she experienced was the opposite: an upsurge in interest among Carolina faculty who are interested in starting companies – plus, increased engagement from those who have already founded ventures.

McKee works as the interim director of KickStart Venture Services (KVS), a core program of Innovate Carolina, which is the University-wide initiative for innovation and entrepreneurship at UNC-Chapel Hill. Despite the general economic downturn and university researchers being moved off campus and away from their labs, KVS has been working in overdrive with faculty who want to use this moment to either launch a company or make strategic moves to better position their existing companies for funding. Read more >

PINNACLE HILL BUILDS MOMENTUM

Finding new therapies and medicines for some of the world’s most perplexing and deadly diseases won’t happen with a same-old, same-old mindset. And that’s why, in late 2018, UNC-Chapel Hill and Deerfield Management set out to build something new. By bringing together Carolina’s world-class life sciences research expertise with Deerfield’s funding resources and deep industry experience in drug development, the two organizations launched Pinnacle Hill. After launching less than two years ago, the company has been busy scoping, supporting and launching new research projects and engaging with faculty in discussions about new potential treatments that they envision in the not-so-distant future. Read more >

INNOVATE CAROLINA REPORT: UNC MOVES MORE DISCOVERIES TO MARKET

The number of inventions and discoveries developed and moved into the commercial market by faculty and students at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is on the rise, according to a new commercialization impact report. The report “From Ingenuity to Impact” examines the economic and social impact made during fiscal years 2019 and 2020 by University inventors who work to translate the University’s $1.14 billion research portfolio into products and services that contribute to the public good.

Findings from the report illustrate that the University’s innovation activity involving inventions reported, U.S. patents issued and technologies licensed to industry and faculty IP-based startups continued to expand over the most recent two fiscal years. The report was published by the UNC Office of Technology Commercialization as part of Innovate Carolina, the University-wide initiative for innovation and entrepreneurship at UNC-Chapel Hill. Read more >

Joining forces on faceshields

COVID-19 response efforts at UNC-Chapel Hill and NC State University have turned a dedicated group of applied physical science and engineering professors into the closest of collaborators – and yet, they’ve never met in person.

Professors Rich Superfine and Glenn Walters at UNC-Chapel Hill and their faculty colleague Landon Grace at NC State recently connected based on their shared commitment to create personal protective equipment (PPE) desperately needed by hospitals and health care workers during the COVID-19 crisis. Their determination to make a life-saving difference has them talking on the phone and coordinating continuously as they work together in creative ways to support the coronavirus response. Read more >

STUDENT STARTUPS PITCH POST-PANDEMIC POSSIBILITIES

This year, there were no poker chips for judges to vote with. No blue cups (from the Chapel Hill bar He’s Not Here) that students could use to collect the chips in. And no Kenan Stadium Blue Zone packed with student teams making their two-minute startup pitches.

Like nearly all in-person-turned-virtual events at UNC-Chapel Hill and beyond, the 2020 Carolina Challenge Pitch Party looked a lot different this year than in the past. Yet, the focus of the student teams participating in this year’s competition was unwavering in its focus on the future: How to win funding to help launch startups that will make a social and economic impact, even beyond the reach of the pandemic. Read more >

A MATERIAL DIFFERence

As the COVID-19 (coronavirus disease in 2019) pandemic continues to unfold, faculty from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill are on the front lines combatting the fast-moving virus. But with research and discovery happening at a rapid pace, how can these researchers and scientists share critical research materials fast enough to develop and test drug therapies for the virus as quickly as possible?

Material transfer agreements, or MTAs, play a significant role in furthering research across universities and industries. These agreements are designed to govern the transfer of tangible research materials between universities when the recipient intends to use it for their own research purposes. Although most of the general public may not be aware of MTAs, the agreements and the teams that execute them are essential for making scientific progress possible. Read more >

RISING TO THE ENTREPRENEURIAL CHALLENGE

What gives a college student the confidence to greet hundreds of strangers and pitch the idea of making leather out of mushrooms? Or to explain why musicians should use artificial intelligence to write better songs? Or how a cold storage device they invented will help farmers in India double their income?

The only thing more impressive than the multitude of bold student ideas on display at the Carolina Challenge Pitch Party hosted by Kenan-Flagler Business School’s Entrepreneurship Center last week was the gumption the students possessed in pitching them. For weeks leading up to this year’s edition of UNC-Chapel Hill’s largest campus-wide student pitch competition, 115 student teams worked hard to hone entrepreneurial ideas and build the fortitude to pitch them to 250 judges. Read more >

PITCHES AND POKER CHIPS

A new cold-storage device that extends the viability of produce harvested in developing countries. An e-commerce, Amazon-style site for planning more affordable weddings. A venture that allows people to buy and sell internet connectivity from one another. The annual Carolina Challenge Pitch Party brimmed with these kinds of inventive ideas from 81 student venture teams. Their goal: Convince judges to give them the most poker chips and win award funding to move their ideas forward.

“I love the Pitch Party — it’s my favorite event of the year at UNC,” said Professor Jim Kitchen, who teaches Business 500, the Introduction to Entrepreneurship Course at the Kenan-Flagler Business School. “Student teams get to hone their venture ideas by getting feedback from hundreds of experienced business, community and faculty leaders, and the energy and excitement levels are off the charts.” Read more >

Photoblog: UNC brings innovative spirit, cutting-edge exhibits to Smithsonian

One might say that there is no place more appropriate to celebrate innovation than Washington, DC. After all, the city represents a country founded on revolutionary ideas that, once put into practice, created a nation like no other. Where better to focus on innovation than the capital city of a country that is an innovation itself. That's the pervasive spirit behind the ACCelerate Creativity and Innovation Festival, where UNC-Chapel Hill faculty, students and staff gathered with the 14 other universities in the Atlantic Coast Conference to deliver performances, engage in discussions and present 48 interactive exhibits at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History.

Led by the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Innovation, Entrepreneurship and Economic Development, the UNC delegation represented some of the most cutting-edge Carolina-born ideas at a festival intended to celebrate creative exploration and research across science, engineering, the arts and design. Read more >

makING 'NO' the optimistic answer

Mark Schoenfisch likes to quip that his favorite letters are “N” and “O.” That might seem like a surprising preference for a chemistry professor who teaches his students to explore new scientific possibilities and whose own entrepreneurial spirit leads him to develop life-improving inventions. Yet, when you hear Schoenfisch explain that his fondness for these two letters isn’t based on the word that they form or a contrarian perspective on the world, but rather his passion for researching the molecule nitric oxide (NO), you make the connection. Through his research, he’s discovered a number of potentially huge medical benefits associated with this tiny molecule and is inventing novel ways for using nitric oxide to make a positive difference in the lives of many. Read more >

THE ACCIDENTAL ENTREPRENEURS

Celebrating 10 years of the UNC Faculty Entrepreneurship Workshop

Every spring, small groups of the most enterprising faculty at UNC-Chapel Hill experience flashbacks of sitting in class as undergraduates. While participants in the Chancellor’s Faculty Entrepreneurship Workshop, which is sponsored by Chancellor Carol Folt and led by Innovate Carolina, these researchers and teachers find themselves in the shoes of the students they instruct: showing up eager to learn, collaborating on group projects and working feverishly toward final presentations.

This flipped classroom experience is relatively familiar territory for Carolina faculty. However, the subject of this crash course – entrepreneurship – can feel like entirely new terrain.

After all, faculty have more-than-full-time teaching and research responsibilities that consume their attention. Entrepreneurship is something they may choose to wade into gradually as time allows. Once they’re immersed, however, the transition to faculty entrepreneurs can become an experience of pure serendipity that leads them down exciting, reward-filled paths that they can’t predict. Read more >

pitch-perfect ventures

William Sweet knows how to stop people fast in their tracks. It’s a skill that UNC-Chapel Hill football fans have witnessed the sophomore offensive tackle display on the field. But when visitors filed into Kenan Stadium's Blue Zone one November night, they saw him do it a whole new way. For the evening, Sweet traded his regular block, grab and tackle moves for different maneuvers: eye contact, a warm smile, a firm handshake and a compelling business pitch.

Those were the skills that Sweet and more than 200 Carolina students representing 75 entrepreneurial teams put into practice to stop and grab the attention of judges circulating the room during the 4th Annual Carolina Challenge Pitch Party. The event celebrates entrepreneurship at UNC and gives students a chance to network and pitch their venture ideas to a host of pros in the entrepreneurship community. Read more >

A PLACE WHERE INNOVATORS THRIVE

BYLINED ARTICLE

As the nation’s first public university, UNC-Chapel Hill has always been – both figuratively and literally – a laboratory and incubator of ideas. We believe that ideas are the currency of a better tomorrow. Over time, we’ve seen the evidence. Inklings of new possibilities born in Chapel Hill turn into innovative pathways that improve the lives of millions of people across North Carolina and beyond. Read more >

EVENT REWIND: 2018 UNC Innovation Showcase

The 2018 UNC Innovation Showcase brought together a diverse audience to hear pitches and presentations from the top faculty, student and alumni ventures affiliated with UNC-Chapel Hill. This was a gathering of the idealists. The imaginative thinkers. The roll-your-sleeve-up rebels. The late-night laboratory goers. The technology tinkerers. The ones who dare to ask big questions. And the ones who are passionate enough to chase down the answers.  

Take a glance at the showcase in review and learn how the faculty, student and alumni participants are working to make a significant economic and human impact in our community, state and world. Read more >

For some Carolina students, making isn’t something they go and do. It’s where they live.

When UNC-Chapel Hill students want to make a physical object for a class or research project, many quickly look for places around campus where they can go to get started: a design studio, lab or makerspace. But what if they didn’t have to go anywhere? What if Carolina brought a maker environment to students right where they live?

That’s exactly what happened at the recent opening of Blue, a full-scale, 3,000-square-foot makerspace embedded on the ground floor of Carmichael Residence Hall in the heart of the Carolina campus. It’s the first space of its kind located inside a UNC residence hall and the fourth makerspace to open as part of the Be a Maker (BeAM) network since 2016. Read more >

Emerging technologies meet entrepreneurial ideas
 

Ever seen a ballerina dance on a table? Or tried to climb Mount Everest inside a library? For those who attended UNC-Chapel Hill’s 2017 Global Entrepreneurship Week (GEW) event at Kenan Science Library, the answer is probably yes.

These surreal experiences were made possible by augmented and virtual reality technologies, which were showcased at the event and are now available in several libraries across campus. The discussion panel and demo session were part of UNC-Chapel Hill’s participation in GEW, an annual international celebration of entrepreneurship that draws participation from creative thinkers and innovation enthusiasts from 170 countries. For one week in November, Carolina students, faculty and staff join millions of other entrepreneurs around the world who take part in local events designed to spark new endeavors. Read more >

Carolina student entrepreneur makes a Paris pitch

When Edwina Koch stepped onto the field in Busch Stadium to make her best pitch, she wasn’t planning to throw curve balls, sliders or any other kind of pitch meant to deceive. She wanted her delivery to be precise, well-timed and direct – straight down the middle. In fact, even though she stood preparing to compete in the stadium that’s home to Major League Baseball’s 11-time World Champion Saint Louis Cardinals, throwing a baseball was the last thing on her mind.

The focus for Koch, a recently graduated student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, was on making a compelling case for her business – and delivering a winning business pitch to a panel of high-profile judges and investors. Read more >

Launch Chapel Hill: five years of JUMPSTARTING companIES and economic growth

What started as an entrepreneurial project in 2013 has evolved into an economic force, fulfilling a vision for nurturing new businesses in Chapel Hill and the local community. Over the past five years, Launch Chapel Hill has supported 75 startups and made a lasting impact on the region. And, along the way, it’s proved that Chapel Hill is an ideal place for startups to take root and grow.

Now an internationally-recognized startup accelerator, Launch Chapel Hill emerged as a university-town-county partnership and was co-founded by UNC-Chapel Hill leaders, the Town of Chapel Hill, the Downtown Partnership and Orange County Economic Development. Located in the heart of the downtown district, it provides valuable resources and connections to high-potential founders who want to start and build successful businesses. Read more >

How university startups deliver an economic boost – and improve lives – in North Carolina communities

If the State of North Carolina was actively recruiting a company promising to bring 8,000 good jobs with revenues of $10 billion, that would attract significant interest. Hold that thought.

The next time you’re sitting with a friend or work colleague, ask what comes to mind when he or she hears the word “entrepreneur.” The response likely would be words like “startup company,” “Silicon Valley,” “business plan,” “mobile app,” “revenue,” “economy” or “jobs.”

Do you think they would respond with the word “university?” Not so likely. At first pass, entrepreneurship seems like an odd fit with the view many people have about universities as places people go to learn, teach and research. Of course, these are all fundamental purposes of institutions of higher learning. But quickly becoming core to the mission of many universities is an entrepreneurial approach to converting university-born ideas into practical benefit for people locally and globally. Read more >

UNC startup Bivarus acquired by national leader in health care performance solutions

If you notice improvements in the care you receive during your next visit to the doctor, a technology developed by a company co-founded by UNC-Chapel Hill professor Seth Glickman may be the reason why.

Bivarus, a company that developed a survey-based cloud analytics platform to gain insight into patient experiences, has been acquired by Press Ganey, a leading provider of patient experience measurement and performance analytics for healthcare organizations. 

“The sale of Bivarus to Press Ganey is a great outcome for patients, the Bivarus team, their investors and UNC-Chapel Hill,” said Judith Cone, vice chancellor for innovation, entrepreneurship and economic development. “This is an example of people and programs in the Innovate Carolina network working together to support a university startup.” Read more >

Three novel UNC startups named to the latest class of KickStart Award winners

When UNC-Chapel Hill spinout company G1 Therapeutics made its NASDAQ debut in the spring of 2017, most observers in the medical, life sciences and investment community were solely focused on the big number: an $108.6 million initial public offering of the company’s stock. Not Don Rose.

As the director of KickStart Venture Services at UNC-Chapel Hill, Rose also reflected on a small figure: the number one. That’s because G1 Therapeutics, a clinical oncology startup that is developing novel therapeutics to shield cancer patients against chemotherapy’s toxic effects, was the first company to receive a Commercialization Award from Rose’s KickStart team. Read more >

Nancy Allbritton receives UNC Inventor of the Year Award, inspires future entrepreneurs to defy skeptics

If there’s one invention Dr. Nancy Allbritton is hiding from the world, it might be a new kind of clock that gives her more than 24 hours to work each day, while the rest of the world struggles to keep pace. How else does she get it all done?

That’s at least what other UNC-Chapel Hill researchers and campus leaders might have been thinking as they gathered to honor Allbritton for her productive portfolio of work, translating lab-born university research ideas into a bevy of successful commercial ventures. Allbritton, a Kenan Distinguished Professor and chair of the joint Department of Biomedical Engineering at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and North Carolina State University, has co-founded four startup companies and holds 11 patents, with 8 more pending. Those accomplishments, which grew from her diverse, multidisciplinary approach to research, recently earned her the prestigious Inventor of the Year award from UNC-Chapel Hill. Read more >

Eight ways to boost your innovative potential in 2018

The beginning of the new year is filled with possibilities. What’s new? What’s next? And how can you get the most from your innovative potential? You may have an idea with incredible promise, but how do you put your novel notion into action? Going from idea to innovation isn’t always easy, but here’s the good news: there are a ton of resources to help you – whether you're dealing with an initial a-ha moment or an entrepreneurial venture you’ve been working on for years.

Read on for a list of eight steps you can take to move your idea to the next level. Some are so quick and simple that you can literally take advantage of them in a few seconds. Read more >

Harvard business review: sponsor article on social media

SAS sponsored this Harvard Business Review research on social media trends in business. The report included a two-page sponsor perspective on social technology written on behalf of Jim Davis, Senior Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer.

e-book feature article: how to communicate with members In mind

This piece of sponsored content was written for the weekly e-book newsletter FierceHealthPayer, which targets healthcare plan executives. The feature article outlines SAS' advice for using analytics to engage with modern health care consumers.

success story Q&A: Financial management insights from Poway united school district

An in-depth interview with K-12 leaders on how they plan to use analytics to connect financial data to decisions about educational resource allocation, academic programs and student achievement.