HJNO Jul/Aug 2021

COLUMN BIO INDUSTRY IN THE May/June edition of the Health- care Journal of New Orleans , this column focused on numbers, data and statistics to help illustrate why the bio industry is wor- thy of investment. (In case you missed it, one reason is that the industry continues to show incredible job security resilience during even the most trying of economic downturns.) This column will take a deep- er dive into how the bio industry develops while hopefully answering some questions received since my last column, such as: • How are ideas from academic faculty members brought to fruition? • Are the universities doing a good job transitioning research into viable products? • How do economic developers help? As mentioned in a previous article, New Orleans boasts some natural strengths that make public and private investment into the industry seem like a no-brainer. For example, New Orleans is one of only Back to (BIO) BASICS 54 JUL / AUG 2021 I  HEALTHCARE JOURNAL OF NEW ORLEANS a few handfuls of U.S. cities that have two medical schools within their vicinities. Add to that mix Xavier University’s College of Pharmacy, the research faculties at both LSU Health New Orleans and Tulane Uni- versity, the Louisiana Cancer Research Center, the New Orleans BioInnovation Center (NOBIC, a biotech incubator) and multiple healthcare systems, and the result is a place with an extraordinarily strong talent pool whose brilliant minds are bound to discover breakthroughs that can be commercialized to provide biotech and healthcare solutions to the world. All organizations have their own unique cultures, priorities and missions, and the same goes for academic institutions. In order for commercialization of new tech- nologies to take place (and the subsequent creation of new, sustainable, job-creating companies), it is up to higher education leadership to cultivate teams of research- ers, faculty members and employees that include individuals who embody an entre- preneurial spirit. Globally speaking, some institutions incentivize entrepreneurial behaviors, some simply focus on attract- ing faculty who exemplify those traits, and some do not place a highly-visible focus on commercializing technologies. Also on a global scale, not all research institutions or universities have in-house tech transfer offices, which is often a first step in the journey of research becoming a future company. However, both LSU Health New Orleans and Tulane Universi- ty fund their own tech transfer offices that are dedicated to working with faculty and employees. These teams help determine whether particular discoveries, devices, and/or designs are truly proprietary and are able to be commercialized. Generally speaking, the tech transfer offices work with their faculty members and employees to craft contractual agreements that serve multiple purposes, including, but not lim-