Stories of Technology, Innovation, & Entrepreneurship in the Southeast

From Middle Tennessee State University:

The Murfreesboro-based university has announced the launch of its NIL Headquarters powered by FanWord and its athlete directory product, FanWord Directory. It was a multi-year agreement with FanWord to further maximize Name, Image, and Likeness support for all its student-athletes.

FanWord’s athlete directory product, FanWord Directory, gives all Middle Tennessee State student-athletes a website-like profile that allows them to aggregate everything about themselves in a single place, including their social media channels, personalized merchandise, NIL opportunities, awards, photos, and much more. This not only gives student-athletes a powerful tool to market and promote themselves, it also makes it easy for supporters to instantly see all of the different ways they can connect and collaborate directly with the athlete.

From the University of Georgia:

The University of Georgia (UGA), Truist Bank, and the Truist Foundation dedicated the new Truist Plaza outside of UGA’s Delta Innovation Hub, recognizing Truist’s support for the University’s innovation and entrepreneurial community. The new outdoor gathering space commemorates a 2021 grant of $1.25 million from the Truist Foundation.

Located at the interface of downtown Athens and UGA’s North Campus, the Delta Innovation Hub is the heart of the Innovation District at UGA, which was created in 2018 as a comprehensive ecosystem of places, programs and people working to foster entrepreneurship through commercializing ideas.

During the Truist Plaza dedication ceremony, UGA President Jere W. Morehead highlighted the University’s long-standing partnership with Truist, which continues to make a positive impact on campus and in local communities. Truist’s partnership with UGA dates to 1967 with the company’s support of several UGA units such as Georgia 4-H, Public Service and Outreach, the Georgia Museum of Art, and the Terry College of Business.

From the Georgia Institute of Technology:

A former researcher at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) who is now on the faculty at Georgia Tech is part of the team working to help Georgia create the state’s first climate action plan. Marilyn A. Brown is currently a Regents’ Professor and Brook Byers Professor of Sustainable Systems in the School of Public Policy, but served at ORNL for two decades that included her final five years as Director of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.

“Georgia Tech and our academic, business, and community partners from across the state are uniquely suited to help Georgia identify implementation-ready solutions that can significantly reduce emissions and have beneficial impacts on Georgia communities,” she said.

The plan will help the state compete for up to $500 million in federal funding for climate mitigation efforts under the 2022 “Inflation Reduction Act.” Under a contract with the Department of Natural Resources’ Environmental Protection Division, the Georgia Tech team will work with partners across Georgia to help the state develop its greenhouse gas inventory, develop a plan to address the most important immediate opportunities the state can take to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions, and potentially help develop policies and programs to reach those goals.

From the University of Virginia:

Darden School of Business Professor Saras Sarasvathy added a new honor to her celebrated career in mid-November, delivering the prestigious Schumpeter Innovation in Enterprise Lecture at the European Union’s SME Week. The annual event, held this year in Bilbao, Spain, showcases the work of small and medium-sized enterprises and attempts to equip businesses with the necessary tools and knowledge as they transition toward sustainability and digitalization. 

Sarasvathy is the originator of the theory of Effectuation, which she first described in a 2001 paper. The theory, which describes how entrepreneurs make decisions and how the entrepreneurial process unfolds, has become a global phenomenon, firmly taking root both in academic institutions and publications and inspiring entrepreneurs across the world. Effectuation is uncommonly accessible, offering easy to understand tools for navigating the uncertainty of the venture creation environment. 

“Effectual reasoning is a systematic way to make decisions and take actions in the face ‘true’ uncertainty, when the future is not only unknown but unknowable,” Sarasvathy said in an interview with the European Commission ahead of the talk. “Instead of trying to predict, plan and place bets, effectuators work with things already within their control to cocreate new futures.” 

From Arizona State University:

It was a big year for the Tempe-based university, which happens to be the alma mater of Katelyn Keenehan, teknovation.biz Assistant Editor. Arizona State (ASU) was ranked among the top five research institutions without a medical school for the first time in fiscal year 2022 for inventions disclosed, U.S. patents secured, patent licenses and option deals closed, and start-ups launched, according to the Association of University Technology Managers’ latest survey of 180 reporting institutions on licensing activities at U.S. universities and research institutions.

ASU rose one spot, to fourth, for inventions disclosed, and two spots, to fifth, for license and option deals closed compared with the previous fiscal year. The school remained in the second spot for start-ups launched in fiscal year 2022 and, by a slim margin, dropped one spot, to fourth, for U.S. patents issued.

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