After a night of stellar commercialization plan presentations, the title of 2014 Tech Venture Challenge champs goes to Team OMEDS. The student team consisted of Diksyha Bastakoty, Barbara Natalizio, Meghan McGill, Miroslav Remec, and Ryad Ceddia. They were assisted by business mentor Dan Bailey of Insight Genetics.
Team OMEDS centered on an optical 3-D scanner that analyzes excised breast tissue and assesses the margins for presence of tumor cells. Current methods for analyzing surround tissue can take several days to get results and sometimes require patients undergo a second surgery for additional tissue removal. The 3D scanner uses light to analyze the excised tissue and assess the margins for presence of tumor cells within two mm of its surface. The 3D scan can be performed while the patient is still in the operating room. The technology was developed by lead inventor Anita Mahadevan-Jansen, Ph.D., Quyen Nguyen, Ph.D., Mark Kelley, MD, and Mary Dockery.
The teams formed in February and for the past two months have analyzed the technologies, assessed market potential, and developed commercialization plans under the guidance of the inventors, the team mentors, and CTTC staff. They presented before a panel of judges (pictured right): Brian Laden, partner at TriStar Technology Ventures; Joe Cook, Jr., executive chairman and president at NuSirt Sciences, Inc.; Glenn Perdue, managing member at Kraft Analytics, LLC; R. Mark Lane, previously vice president of worldwide sales and marketing at Mizuho OSI; and Jake Neu, patent attorney at Bradley Arant Boult Cummings, LLP.
The goal of the competition is three-fold: it serves as an educational and networking opportunity for students, it assists inventors in moving technologies forward with commercialization plans, and it spotlights some of Vanderbilt’s leading technologies.