The Venture Professor Track
Spending time building companies in a university takes academics off the Professor track.
There is no path to become a "Venture Professor". The default career pipeline is to publish and academics (in Australia at least) are not rewarded for entrepreneurial activity. So a year out might be seen as a year BACK and, even when academics get over that, they will be weighed as a poor academic and struggle on the professor track if they are spending time entrepreneurially instead of publishing.
I propose a new career pathway that is recognised and rewarded. A Venture Professor is a senior, highly regarded academic who stays in the institution and has a focused output on company spin outs and creation over publishing. Like a venture investor is a company builder operating across a portfolio rather than a single spin out, a venture professor is an academic who operates across a portfolio. Like a some of the well known examples in the US, these professors will have a small amount of equity in tens of companies that they have incubated in the university.
So what is the track to get there? Well, it begins with a Venture Fellowship where post docs can do a 1 year fellowship. This is a deep immersion into creating companies from science. There is specific training in company creation and mindset through residencies in VC firms. There is time in the most 'agile' of labs in research orgs that are already working dynamically with external innovators and adapting as they go.
The objective is to incubate a science leader who is passionate about building impact through companies and spin outs. These people might be our 'Founders' in company creation projects for that first year. Then we would be more focused on hiring chief scientists into the companies.
I have discussed this with a few of the more entrepreneurial scientists I know and they have liked the idea.
The trick will be to make sure that the university culture does not repel them when they come back enthusiastic about this approach.
This pathway might internalise an incubation engine that creates customers, employers and inspiration for the university.
WDYT? How do we build on this idea, and who wants to try it? Join the discussion on LinkedIn.
The 'Time Problem' in Research and Industry Collaborations
In research, we need time. The culture and system around it for funding is anchored on this. Grants are open for applications once or twice a year and take a long time to process. Programs like CRCs take a long time to agree IP sharing regimes with collaborators. Teams think in longer timelines and optimise funding to spread the project over as long a period as possible.
In industry, we have no time. We need to start today. And when we have started, we need to get to an outcome as soon as possible. Whilst a research collaboration brings a depth of possible value creation that would not be possible for industry to achieve on their own, putting it on a critical path introduces too much risk.
From Industry's perspective, this means that research collaborations are often avoided or only focused on lower priority projects.
If we fix the time problem, I think we can open the gates.
Deep Tech Venture Building and "Hit Factories"
Motown founder, Berry Gordy worked at Ford’s Lincoln-Mercury plant and it gave him an idea.
"The factory had this assembly line and I would see the cars start out a bare metal frame and go round a circle. And different stations would put things on there, and they would go out another door a brand new car. I said, my goodness, I could do this with people."
His record label was built on this idea to become a "Hit Factory" that would work like an assembly line to take raw talent and package them up with producers, writers, musicians, choreographers, sales and marketing.
We often start a deep tech venture with just the 'bare metal' - the founding idea and some IP. This is the equivalent of the raw talent when Diana Ross walked into Motown. It is a unique advantage that others will struggle to replicate, but there needs to be more.
Motown would have been very different if Gordy had just given Diana Ross some money and expected her to figure it out.
In deep tech venture building we can't waste time for founders to figure out on their own how to package their technology into a the world class company that will deliver it to the world.
A "Hit Factory" is needed.
The Lunar Society Downunder
During 'The Enlightenment' the world saw science collide with the ambition of entrepreneurs to create an industrial revolution.
Between 1765 and 1813, one group of people met on a Monday by the light of the moon to discuss ideas. They called themselves 'The Lunarticks' and their group was known as 'The Lunar Society'.
Principal members included James Watt who invented the steam engine; his partner Matthew Boulton who also revolutionised coin minting and social innovations like workers compensation; Erasmus Bolton who was already imagining Evolution before his grandson Charles completed the theory; Joseph Priestly the chemist who discovered oxygen and carbonated water and; Josiah Wedgewood the potter and social reformer.
These innovators, and many others collaborated outside of their Monday gatherings in daily conversations, exploring the ideas and discoveries that would move society forwards.
Today, we live in a similar time, but the steam engines of today are quantum computers and large language models. The discovery of oxygen is the ability to harness nature to build products in a sustainable way. The sailing ships that opened up the world are rockets taking us to Mars and beyond.
Last week, we convened a new Lunar Society as Australia's deep tech founders gathered for Deep Tech Week.
And the work continues now it is over.
I think we should make it 'a thing'.