2016 AAAS Annual Meeting (February 11-15, 2016)

February 10 - 15, 2016

Global Science-Driven Entrepreneurship: Determined Pursuit of Innovative Success

Entrepreneurship is the process of building commercial value out of an initial concept or startup endeavor. This multidisciplinary symposium examines entrepreneurship at a strategic level: Can traditional innovation processes keep pace with urgent global development needs? How important is entrepreneurship in the overall technology innovation milieu (acknowledging that an early-stage company can offer an exciting environment for directed scientific research, technology innovation, and career progression)? How is an environment that breeds entrepreneurial successes established? What policies and actions of academic campuses, national laboratories, research institutes, local governments, and international organizations best yield translational benefits? Can entrepreneurship be taught? Are certain entrepreneurial success factors common across different fields of technology? Will the role traditionally played by venture capital evolve, or be replaced? Speakers provide a range of entrepreneurial experience: investor angels, incubators, leaders of successful startups, and those heading their first startup. They will share experiences, highlighting factors involved in successfully moving an innovation from basic discovery to a commercial product with real and beneficial impacts.