Innovation Boot Camp offered at LU’s Center for Innovation, Commercialization and Entrepreneurship
Lamar University’s Center for Innovation, Commercialization and Entrepreneurship will host the 2017 Innovation Boot Camp II for regional innovators, entrepreneurs, faculty and students December 1-2.
The two-day program will feature opportunity to learn from and interact with several expert speakers, 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. Friday, and 8 a.m. to noon Saturday. On the speaking agenda are NASA Astronaut Scott Parazynksi, M.D., philanthropist and inventor Jack Gill, BioTech entrepreneurs Larry Lawson, Brandon Price and Brittany Barreto, and technology entrepreneur Anthony George.
The event is free with registration. For more information and a link to register visit www.lamar.edu/cice.
A special presentation will be held 6:30 p.m., Friday, in the University Reception Center, 8th floor of the Mary and John Gray Library, featuring Dr. Scott Parazynski, on his experiences in space as an astronaut, this two ascents of Mt. Everest, and his view on new technologies as an inventor.
An astronaut, Stanford-trained engineer, medical doctor and inventor who has flown on five NASA Shuttle missions and on numerous spacewalks, Parazynski is the founder of Fluidity Technologies, developers of precise hardware control devices with adaptive software. A prolific inventor who’s passionate about the ability of technology to meet some of the world’s most challenging needs, he is equally passionate about exploration, having twice scaled planet Earth’s highest peak, Mount Everest, rappelled to the shoreline of Nicaragua’s Masaya Volcano’s lava lake, and free dived into the Licanabur Lake, one of the world’s highest bodies of water. With his significant large-project strategy, analysis, budget development and management skills honed at NASA and in start-up ventures, he brings unique perspective to the role of entrepreneur.
Jack Gill is the founder and retired managing partner of Vanguard Ventures in Palo Alto, California. He has earned distinction and honors as a scientist, senior executive, entrepreneur, venture capitalist, university professor and philanthropist throughout his career. Gill is also a member of Lamar’s CICE Advisory Council and created the Gill Chair in Technology Entrepreneurship at LU. The Gills are members of Lamar’s Legacy Society in recognition of their support to the university. Gill holds a Bachelor’s of Science in chemistry and engineering from Lamar University, and a Ph.D. in organic chemistry from Indiana University.
Larry Lawson is founder and chairman of HeartCoR Solutions, a COR laboratory providing fast, flexible and accurate arrhythmia research solutions globally. After attending Lamar and switching careers from music to health care and excelling in a career with Johnson & Johnson, Lawson founded eCardio Diagnostics in 2004. The company became the leading arrhythmia-monitoring company in America. He serves on boards of a number of leading health care technologies companies, and is on the Advisory Council of the LU’s CICE.
Participants will also learn from Anthony George, CEO and founder of Nautical Control Solutions, and inventor of FuelTrax, a marine fuel management system. He began his control systems engineering career at Temple-Inland where he served as a Systems Engineer. In 1991, Anthony formed Control Dynamics International, a control systems design and engineering company, where he managed the development of FuelTrax for Kirby Inland Marine, leading to the creation of Nautical Control Solutions, LP in 2006. Anthony holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Physics/Electrical Engineering from Lamar University. He is also a member of Lamar’s CICE Advisory Council
Brandon Price, holder of the Ben J. Rogers Chair in Entrepreneurship at Lamar University, has more than 30 years in the biopharmaceutical industry, and co-founded Biogenin, a Mexican company that develops and licenses human and veterinary pharmaceuticals for Latin American markets. He has been CEO of four biotechnology start-ups. In addition, Price co-founded the Institute for Cell Analysis at the University of Miami (Fla.) and the International Center for Entrepreneurial Excellence at the University of Guadalajara. He holds a Ph.D. in biophysics.
Brittany Barreto, holds a Ph.D. from Baylor College of Medicine and is a genetic engineer and the founder of Pheramor, a technology-based matchmaking company.
The CICE is a partnership between Lamar University’s College of Business and College of Engineering and the Southeast Texas business community to encourage industry and university interaction. It supports projects, on-going research, student experiential learning, special events and training that prepares students for their careers by exposing them to real-world experiences.
