SkySong Overview• A 42-acre mixed-business-use development located in

Scottsdale, Ariz.

• A public-private partnership

• A joint venture with the university, city of Scottsdale, ASU Foundation and Plaza Companies

• Home to a global business community

• Links technology, entrepreneurship, innovation and education

• Positions ASU and Greater Phoenix as global leaders of the knowledge economy

• More than 800 tech-related jobs

• 97 percent capacity

• Buildings 3 & 4 in planning stages; 400 apartments under construction

• Designed to:

– Create an ecology of collaboration and innovation – Target high-profile technology enterprises and related researchers– Advance global business objectives of on-site enterprises– Raise Arizona’s profile as a global center of innovation – Create a unique regional economic and social asset

• Tenants range from large companies such as Ticketmaster to early-stage startups – over 70 companies

• ASU SkySong, also known internally as Economic Development and Corporate Engagement (EDCE),

– a unit of the Office of Knowledge Enterprise Development, the research wing of the university.

– Occupies two floors of SkySong Building 1

– Consists of three sub-units, including ASU Venture Catalyst

SkySong Overview

ASU Venture Catalyst Overview• Announced in October 2010 – Reorganized in June 2011 –Mission comes from the ‘Value

Entrepreneurship’ design aspiration of the New American University

• Tasked with a wider role of coordinating entrepreneurship across the university since Q4 2012

• Part of the Office of Knowledge Enterprise Development (OKED) and works closely with AzTE (ASU’s technology transfer arm )

• ‘Startup unit’ of the university

– Internal entrepreneurship activity (Edson student startups, faculty startups)

– External startups (Furnace, External startups )

– Support the external startup ecosystem (collaboration e.g. Techiepalooza event)

• Objective to accelerate high potential startups (HPSU)

• Changing name to Entrepreneurship and Innovation Group (reflects wider remit)

• Partnerships e.g. Microsoft alliance, members of Techstars Global Accelerator Network (GAN)

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Entrepreneurship as a Permanent Revolution

• Using ASU and Arizona as a ‘petri’ dish for Experimentation

• Develop new concepts untried elsewhere• Aim to stimulate entrepreneurship activity

inside and outside the university• Test and refine in Arizona• Then propagate these ideas in other cities,

states, countries

ASU Edson Student Entrepreneur Initiative (Startup Accelerator)

Edson 2.0:• Program is funded through privately financed endowment from Edson family• Repositioned as an accelerator (mentor-led, Lean trained) in 2011 • Startup accelerator for student-run ventures (real company creation)• Acceleration period runs from September to June each year• Heavily mentor-led like other accelerator programs (university takes no equity)• Startups very diverse: social enterprises to apps to consumer products to sustainable technologies to manufacturing

2012/13 Cohort: • 338 team applications in last competition (April 2012)• Led to funding of twenty new student-led startups • These Startups received $200,000 in direct (endowed) funding (up to $20K

each)• 2013 is the ninth year of the Edson program

Technology Transfer Office Partners

Funding Partners

Furnace Technology Transfer Accelerator – first in the world

Support Partners

• ASU’s Tech Transfer unit, Arizona Technology Enterprises has spun-out over 60 startups in last 8 years; increases numbers each year but…a lot of technologies are still protected by unused• All research institutions have the same issue with a

lack of external entrepreneurship activity with their patents • Furnace is designed to stimulate even more activity:

• Take the best, unencumbered technologies from Arizona research institutions

• Offer them to external entrepreneurs/mixed teams• Offer acceleration and $25K in grant funding each

• Pilot in 2012 resulted in ten new startups:• Created a successful public/private partnership • Over 200 patents, copyrights uploaded to Furnace website

(after ‘translation’)• Over 50 applications, 22 finalists, 10 chosen startup teams• Total of $250,000 in startup state grant funding awarded

ASU (External) Startup Accelerator

• Moving from random external companies to a 6 months cohort system of 6-10 startups at a time

• Includes a full pracademic program, mentor-led, co-working space in ASU SkySong

• These companies are early stage but high potential startups (HPSU)• They do NOT have to have any connection to the University other than being

based in the greater Phoenix area• Some companies are too early to engage – send to outside groups such as the

SCORE (mentor group)• Objective – to create sustainable businesses to create jobs and wealth

particularly for Arizona• Majority of the new startups are based in the dedicated co-working space in

ASU SkySong• External startups working with us have raised $1.45 million in grants and

venture funding since June 2011

Rapid Startup School (RSuS) – Pracademic training

• Pracademic, free, evening startup program; run in SkySong and external locations (e.g. libraries once the EUREKA spaces open)

• Originally aimed at graduate students, doctoral students, postdoctoral researchers

• Now targeting a wider audience internally (staff) and externally• New specialized RSuS MDV program just delivered: Military,

Defense and Veterans• Delivering Lean Launchpad based on the Steve Blank (Silicon

Valley) lean methodology• Currently running different Rapid School programs for 2013:

- Rapid Fund Raising School- Using RSuS as a platform for ALL startup initiatives in ASU

• ‘Hub and Spoke’ model with designated libraries

• Wide geographic reach across the state• Identify ‘champions’ in each library • Special entrepreneurship and innovation

trainings from ASU Venture Catalyst• Pilot location opens in May 2013 – others to

follow

Alexandria Coworking Network:Supporting Entrepreneurs, Innovators, Inventors and Small Business in our communities

• Create collaboration spaces in each of the libraries:- Co-working ‘light’ – open to anyone - Place for entrepreneurs, innovators and inventors to network with each other - Innovation knowledge locations- Access to pracademic teaching modules - Access to exclusive online material- Layout includes white board and lean canvas material- Location for ASU mentors to be based or liaise with

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Flexible, reconstituted space

• The Applied Regional Economic Action (AREA)48 is termed a Formation Space (pre startup/pre incubator)

• It is designed to help individuals to form new teams, ideas, products, services and skills

• Based in Tempe on Mill Avenue with easy access to both campus and ‘Joe Public’; supported by a grant of $145,000 from the Blackstone Foundation

• It accomplishes this by bringing together a range of underused human assets

including veterans and unemployed

• These work together with a number of academic assets including researchers, staff and students

• Its projected outcomes are:• New innovation and startup teams • New products and services that reach their respective markets• Participants with enhanced innovation and entrepreneurial capabilities and

skills

AREA48: a Formation Space –Birthing New Entrepreneurial Teams and Innovators

Actively Engaged – Being a major ‘node’ in the system

• Developing models that can be replicated elsewhere (Furnace, Alexandria, AREA48)

• Partnership and joint events with key parts of the ecosystem such as:– Mentorship groups like SCORE group– Co-Working spaces like Co-Hoots, Launchspot and Gangplank, SEEDSpot – Local government organizations– Angel groups, venture capital organizations– Major service providers e.g. legal, marketing, IP, new product

development– Source of mentors, pracademics, funding– Other Universities, Colleges in the State