1857 – Fostering Innovation Through Collaboration with Corey Park

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2:09With us right now, Corey Park. Corey, you are the founder and chairman of Academic Technology Ventures. You're found on the web at academictechventures.com. Corey, thank you so much for joining us. Hey, it's a pleasure to be here. I noticed you've done a thousand episodes. You're like the Michael Jordan of podcasts. You're a legend. Hardly, hardly. Maybe a Scottie Pippen, but even then, I think that's quite a stretch. Kind of you to say. So Corey, tell me a bit about the work that you do. I've got, again, your website, academictechventures.com. To our friend that's listening, you can kind of follow along.

2:46I'd love to kind of hear, particularly in the world that you work in. Sure. So 50 % of people want to leave their career to start a new business. a lot of business owners want to start a new business, find something more profitable or more exciting. So what I do is I help entrepreneurs or people who want to be entrepreneurs start new businesses by acquiring technologies from universities and government research labs. It might sound expensive, but we actually have a deal structure we put together where we get these things with very little money down. And then we form companies around those technologies and then launch those companies to commercialize those technologies.

3:31I'm looking at this from the outside in, so I don't really even understand this world. So let's say to an audience of high schoolers who don't really understand this world either, could you kind of maybe just give us a one-on-one of the, you know, how the academic research world works and this interplay between private enterprise as well? Yes. So universities and government labs invent about 250 ,000 new technologies every year and they file patents on them, right? And the thing is, these things go and die in what they call, typically call the valley of death. So never to be seen again, right?

4:09So they get the research money, they get over 200 billion a year in the form of grant money to create all these things. And then, again, most of them go and die in the valley of death. So we built out a database that encompasses millions of technologies where we can search these things up. And then we've kind of built out the capabilities and resources and an investor network to be able to take these things and, well, find them, perform due diligence, close on them, and then take them to market. It's a little known area. You know, the gentleman that taught me how to do this, his name's Mr. Grossman.

4:47When I met him, he had taken a NASA technology and sold it for$72 million. And when he showed me how to do this, it was like a business shortcut, right? Because if you think about it, if you want to be an entrepreneur or a venture, you have to come up with the idea. And, you know, a lot of times, well, the situation with these labs, they have to spend millions and years a lot of times to create these things. So if we can take a shortcut and go in and acquire these technologies after they've already filed the patents, invented the technology, well, now we're in the blue ocean where competition isn't.

5:19And we're not in the red ocean where all the sharks are swimming, fighting over the same scraps, you know, that most people are fighting over. Yeah. So the universities that are approaching you or is it the private companies that want to work with more universities? Good question, Josh. So it's actually us approaching the universities and government labs. So we seek out specific technologies. Again, we leverage the database to go in there, identify them. And that's my team helps with the reach out because they don't just, you know, answer calls very easily unless you're GE, right? So and then we get in there and again, perform due diligence, make sure that it has what we're looking for.

6:00It needs to be disruptive, you know, applicable to a large marketplace, low market adoption risk. So we kind of have an 18 criteria of a risk profile that we basically, you know, look through to make sure it's a good fit. And then fortunately, you know, patents are kind of our superpower. Investors like patents. I mean, if you ever watch people pitching the guys on Shark Tank, right, they'll sit right up in their chair when they hear the word patents. So, you know, we've got a pretty loyal investor base. I'd say we're a lot less like Shark Tank and more like Finding Nemo. We've got a large, loyal, you know, investor base that kind of swims after our deal flow, if you will.

6:42Wow. Wow. And so what would be some examples of kind of matches you've helped put together? And what was the technology? What did they do of the ones that you could talk about? And like, give us a story or two. Well, I'm thinking of one person that joined our program, Josh. He's had two exits now. One of them is a medical software that we took public. It actually saves hospitals over a million dollars a month. We've proven that. It was invented at Stony Brook University Hospital in New York. It saved them over 60 million, made them saved them over 60 million in the last five years because it catches coding issues.

7:20So when they're coding things on the computer, that they miss a code for a surgery, that the hospital doesn't collect that$10 ,000 from Medicaid insurance. we now have the largest um healthcare technology company in the world fully engaging bringing us hospitals and so that one's kind of like a rocket ship right now and then he had another company that was acquired by a prestigious public company so they run the gamut we have medical tech we have agriculture you know you name it i mean that's kind of one of the things we do that works well for us because industry isn't digging around in there that much you think the large companies would be.

7:56They're really not. And even if they are, they're looking for a specific thing. So they might be looking for something that improves their coffee maker and then completely ignore the green data center technology right next to it that we grabbed that, you know, the university had already put$34 million in development, three patents, and we just signed a large deal with a big infrastructure company on that one. So at the end of the day, being industry agnostic gives us quite a strong advantage. Yeah, right. So I don't know if you've noticed any trends, you know, let's say over the past, especially 10 years, but, you know, thinking about, you know, where innovation comes from and, you know, again, kind of this connection or this interplay between the collegiate world and private enterprise, of course, it's generally financially motivated.

8:41Well, the colleges are probably financially motivated too. Can you maybe just get, again, and just kind of a little bit more bigger picture about the dynamic here. And also what I'm curious about is, you know, if you looked into your crystal ball and you're like, I think you need to know what's going on right now. Like I'm really keen to hear your observations on that front. Well, a couple of things you talk about trends. Look, I think AI is quickly coming for a lot of jobs and, you know, over the next couple of years, you know, so to me, this is something I have a lot of people kind of getting involved with us because it can kind of AI proof them, you know, engineers and doctors and others, because, you know, it might be a while before AI can actually go and identify a technology, inform due diligence, negotiate it, get investors and launch the company, right?

9:31Might be a little easier for them to, you know, do something else first. But the universities and labs do benefit when we, you know, have a success. But what's neat, Josh, is they get 200 billion a year, but they're prohibited by the government when they take that grant money from commercializing the technology. So you're not going to see the University of California putting out a new pair of tennis shoes, right? So, and they're the ones that are doing most of the basic research in science. Industry has kind of moved away from that over the last several decades. So when you talk, when you ask about trends, another trend is that, you know, a lot of these companies have gotten out of R &D because they're favoring, you know, they're looking at the stock market.

10:11They want to please their shareholders. So the CEOs are really focused on stock price and in keeping that up versus investing in R &D, they're more focused on, you know, pumping up the stock or keeping it healthy there. Yeah, so when you are working with somebody, what does that journey typically look like? Like, how does engagement begin? I'm sure there's like, you know, a discovery process, but, you know, how do you begin that conversation? Then usually what's the activity that you launch into together? Sure, so before I say that, I wanted to tell you, so where I was trying to go with that last point is that universities and government labs are now doing about 95 % of basic research and science.

10:49That's where the real breakthroughs are coming from. Industry has kind of moved away from that. So at the end of the day, that's where the innovation is really happening. When you ask about innovation, that's where it's coming from. People at Gages, I bring in small groups. It isn't my primary line of business. My primary line of business is I've acquired 74 technologies, and I've got a lot going on there. but I do like to bring in the right people to help us identify more if I feel like they're the right salt to do this with us. And so how do they engage? Well, there's a process where we get to know each other.

11:24I'm not going to partner with someone I don't know. Then we give them access to our database after training them on how to kind of vet things from a high level. Then they're sending those sets of tech over to my team. My team and I vet through those further. And then, you know, we find ones that we want to pursue, we'll reach out to the institutions to set up those initial phone calls. And, you know, I've had some people we pursued free from what they found in just the first month. I've had, you know, I closed on four technologies my first year doing this part time. So it's, you know, it's, I don't make it sound like it's easy.

12:00I had a little bit easier path because I had taken a e-com company public with 10 million from a hedge fund. So I kind of had a bit more street cred for the, you know, I guess, so to speak, for the universities to take me seriously. And, and, and I'd raised a good bit for other companies ahead of that. So that helps, right? I mean, they, you know, they're not going to let their best technology go to someone who's not Coca-Cola, unless they think they can really pull it off and get it off the ground. Yeah. So Corey, you know, of our friends that are listening to our conversation right now, who should be reaching out to you in terms of like opportunity?

12:34And, you know, what are those initial conversations sound like? Well, good question. So look, one of the reasons why I really enjoy doing this, and it puts me in flow, is a lot of these technologies are very meaningful. We have several that save lives, make the world greener. So it's a way to make an impact. I had small businesses for many years that just didn't feel purposeful and meaningful. So really, I like to also help people that have, well, at the end of the day, they're unhappy in their job, right? Right. So we have a work epidemic right now. 85 % of people don't like their jobs. 75 % of people really don't like their jobs, wouldn't even recommend their career to their children.

13:13And only 11 % of people feel like what they're doing is their calling. So I like to help people like that because I was trapped like that. I was part of that 85%. I was stuck. It was hard to find an original idea. And I didn't know how to get in the blue ocean. I was stuck in the red ocean, all the other small business guys, a thousand competitors. And when you're in the red ocean, you have to work harder and longer hours. It's the only way you win. Leads to burnout, can lead to divorce, can lead to all kinds of things. So, you know, that's why I like to play in the blue ocean. These things have IP behind them.

13:46They're unique inventions. And it's just a lot more fun to play in the blue. Yeah, I agree. Corey Park, your website, academictechventures.com. When somebody goes to your website, what would you recommend in terms of next steps? What do they do? I don't know if you have any resources or maybe pillar content you'd recommend to take a look at or, again, kind of next steps in their journey. Well, you and I both know that I should. But like I said, bringing people in to partner with us isn't my primary line of business, but I enjoy doing it. And it is fruitful. so you know they can go to the website uh again academictechventures.com and submit their information through our contact form they can also you know i know you have a pretty sophisticated audience so they can reach out to me directly through linkedin or you park c-o-r-e-y-p-a-r-k and i'd be happy to you know engage them directly and and see if it might be a fit you know i mean it's um i'd like to save some people from work prison if i can and uh show a more fun way.

14:52That's brilliant. Brilliant. Awesome. Corey Park, again, thank you so much. Founder and Chairman, Academic Technology Ventures, the website, academictechventures.com. Thank you, Corey. Thanks, Josh.

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