When Adam Steele worked at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), he and two other colleagues invented a technology that Steele believed had commercial potential. But Steele, a physicist, didn’t have a business background. He said he had no idea how to take the technology out of the lab and build a company around it. His colleagues recommend he apply for the JHU Carey Business School INNoVATE program. He did so, and was soon accepted into the program’s Class of 2011.
Now he and fellow INNoVATE student Brenton Knuffman, who is one of the technology’s inventors, are quickly becoming a success story for the program. The duo, who both currently work for the University of Maryland NanoCenter, recently won first-place – and $10,000 – in the Maryland Technology Enterprise Institute’s 2012 Business Plan Competition in the Graduate Student, Faculty and Researchers Category.