LaunchTN wins $350K grant to lead first national study of multi-institution tech transfer
The Nashville-based nonprofit will lead the first national evaluation of a commercialization approach it helped pioneer in Tennessee.
Launch Tennessee has secured a $350,000 research grant from the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation to conduct the first national study of Multi-Institution Technology Transfer Offices, or MITTOs, a model designed to expand commercialization capacity at smaller research universities and in rural communities.
The study will evaluate three existing MITTOs: LaunchTN’s own Tennessee Technology Advancement Consortium (TTAC), Kentucky Commercialization Ventures, and Wisconsin’s WiSys. Beyond documenting what’s working, researchers will assess how the model could be replicated elsewhere, with Kansas City’s KC Biohub and Georgia’s Partnership for Innovation serving as test markets.
What does this mean? LaunchTN CEO Lindsey Cox put it plainly. It means that the state has been quietly building infrastructure that the rest of the country is now paying attention to.
“The Kauffman Foundation’s investment is external validation that the TTAC model is addressing a real gap. Tennessee is leading the nation in developing program infrastructure, governance, and administration for multi-institution commercialization,” she said.
The TTAC model was created to solve an access problem. Most research institutions outside flagship universities lack the staff, networks, and resources to move discoveries from the lab to market.
MITTOs pool those resources across institutions, giving smaller schools a commercialization pathway they couldn’t build alone.
Charles Layne, LaunchTN’s technology advancement director, noted the study will be the first time MITTOs have systematically documented their outcomes and worked toward shared standards, describing it as creating a national playbook where none currently exists.
The study’s findings are expected to inform how regions across the country, including mid-size metros underserved by traditional tech transfer pipelines, can build their own innovation economies.
LaunchTN will soon release a Request for Proposals for an external evaluator to lead the formal research component. Interested parties can reach out here.
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