Accelerating Technology Transfer From Federal Laboratories to the Private Sector—The Business Development Wheel

Abstract

In this paper, we suggest a way to maximize economic utilization of science and technology from federal laboratories—the Business Development Wheel (BDW). Commercializing federally developed science and technology is challenging because the science and technology must first be transferred to a private organization and then brought to market. Historically, many important advances manage to migrate from federal laboratory to market, but this journey often relied on fortuitous events. Recent developments have, however, improved the process at some laboratories. The BDW offers a framework to assist in the commercialization process. This model is based on the experience and strategy of Sandia National Laboratories in the commercialization of its portfolio of science and technology. A portion of this work has been supported by Sandia, a multiprogram laboratory operated by Sandia Corporation, a Lockheed Martin Company, for the United States Department of Energy under Contract DE-AC04-94AL85000.