New Commercialization Pathways and Policy Levers for Innovation

Interview with Lesa Mitchell, VP, Advancing Innovation, Kauffman Foundation, during the Cleantech Open National Conference

1060 views

Share:

More...

00:14:21 - Uploaded by Song Essinova, LLC on August 19, 2010

Drawing upon her experience in the life science industry, Lesa Mitchell warns against policy barriers in the field of energy compromising innovation's potential for leap frog changes in the marketplace. "There are some lessons from the life science space we should stop and learn right now, before we go down this road of energy... While we call the lessons from the life science side transparency and access to data, I'd call the lessons on the energy side a lack of transmission and distribution channels". She also points out a common oversight between the two verticals in the area of firm formation and growth - lack of infrastructure building and standard setting. She encourages both industries to learn from other sectors and platforms such as the Internet and semiconductor industries which have benefited from that step.

Lesa Mitchell is a vice president with the Kauffman Foundation. She has been responsible for the Foundation’s frontier work in understanding the policy levers that influence the advancement of innovation from universitieLesa Mitchells into the commercial market and the new relationships between disease philanthropy and for profit companies.

Under Mitchell’s leadership, the Foundation is defining and codifying alternative commercialization pathways, and identifying new models to foster innovation. Mitchell was instrumental in the founding of the Kauffman Innovation Network/ iBridge Network, the Translational Medicine Alliance, the National Academies-based University–Industry Partnership and leader in the replication of innovator-based mentor programs across the U.S. In addition, Mitchell serves on the boards of Gazelle Growth in Denmark, the University of Kansas Institute for Commercialization and is an advisor to the Institute for Pediatric Innovation.

Prior to joining Kauffman, Mitchell spent twenty years of her career in global executive roles at Aventis, Quintiles, and Marion Laboratories and ran an electronic clinical trials consulting business in support of global pharmaceutical clients.

Tags: Lesa Mitchell, Kauffman Foundation, Cleantech Open

COMMENTS

There are 5511 comments. You must be logged in to comment.

  • Lee Ackerson says:

    September 20, 2010

    Lesa, Good points. One major issue we have here in the U.S. that other regions of the globe do not have to deal with is the fiefdoms of county building inspectors. Most counties in the U.S. are free to set their own electrical standards.If they adopt the National Electrical Code as their guiding regulation body, they may not keep current with the latest version. Worse yet, they may only adopt portions of it and use a mixed bag of rules which are open to interpretation. But I think the biggest shortcomings we face are a lack of very clear goals and paths to achieve them at the state and federal level. It's fine to espouse a desire to wean ourselves from the oil habit, but the FEDs should be using the carrot and stick to create the future with well defined milestones along the way. Lee Ackerson CTO, Soquel Energy Corporation

Legal & Policy

audio lectures, audio interviews, panel discussions