What it will take for the Space Coast to launch more business ventures based on licensed space technologies? An event early Tuesday evening, investors, space officials and entrepreneurs attempted to lay out a road map of sorts to show the way.
More than 100 people attended the program at the headquarters of Satcom Direct, just south of Rockledge. It was hosted by SD Data Center and featured the Kennedy Space Center’s Technology Transfer Office and Groundswell, a Melbourne-based incubator program aimed at assisting start-up technology companies in the area. SD Data Center is a division of Satcom Direct.
“We’d really like to see more licensing of NASA technology within the Florida business community,” said Michael Lester, manager of technology development partnerships with the Kennedy Space Center’s office technology transfer.
Lester was the keynote speaker at the event, which also included comments by venture capitalists from South Florida, who offered their thoughts on the money available for start-up companies and how Florida fits into the the mix of where investment cash is streaming compared to places like Silicon Valley in California and the Boston, Massachusetts area.
But with space technology, the money and benefits appear to flowing throughout the United States.
Lester noted that in the last 10 years, NASA licensed technology has created 18,000 jobs, $5.1 billion in revenues and saved 444,000 lives.
“We’re having a positive impact on the economy,” he said.
NASA has 10 technology research centers scattered throughout the United States, which each location possessing specialty technology licensing. NASA’s licensed technology at KSC, maybe not surprisingly, is environmental remediation that follows decades of launching rockets into space.
“We’ve developed state-of-the-art clean-up technologies,” Lester said.
Jenna Buehler, co-founder and chief executive officer of Groundswell, called the possibilities for companies using NASA technology for business ventures “the ultimate Space Coast collaboration.”
Resource: Florida Today
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