KTT IGNITE

ICFO’s Organization and Network of Students (ICONS) and the KTT Unit collaborated to bring to life a workshop on tech transfer and business development particularly focused on the process of creating and spinning out high-growth deep tech companies from scientific research.

The workshop, sponsored by SPIE, consisted of two sessions. The first gave a brief introduction into the techniques applied by KTT@ICFO for the incubation of entrepreneurial projects and the mentoring of the scientific teams involved. It introduced two tech-based challenges on DNA data storage and Tribolectric power generation and formed teams to work on these challenges over the week, trying to effectively turn the concept into a marketable product with a consistent business strategy.

In the second session, teams competed against each other, pitching their business plans to a jury in a grand finale. The winning team was Grain Data composed by Alex LeBon, Bárbara Buades and Marcos López.

Eighteen ICFOnians took part in this workshop with mixed background and at different career stages, from Master students to postdocs and visiting scientists. The details of the workshop were developed by Sergi Ferrando, Alastair Cunningham and KTT’s director Silvia Carrasco, along with members of ICONS.

Juan Miguel Pérez, ICONS vice-president commented, “I firmly believe exercises like this are essential to our professional growth, by allowing us to expand our horizons and look beyond the four walls inside our labs. I hope this is just the beginning and this program continues to grow as years pass by.”