Month: January 2010

At a time when many people are looking for work, UVA is still looking to hire its first ever Executive Director for Technology Transfer and Ventures. The role represents UVA’s broader attempt to increase revenue from and recognition for its inventions and innovations.

At the September 11 Board of Visitors meeting, UVA’s Vice President for Research Thomas Skalak gave an update on changes to UVA’s process for technology transfer. Whenever a UVA student or professor invents or discovers something, the university transfers intellectual property rights to a nonprofit organization, the UVA Patent Foundation (UVAPF). The UVAPF and its staff of about 20 people then help patent those ideas and license them to companies in exchange for a fee. But as the minutes for that BOV meeting noted, “Patent Foundation revenues have dropped at the same time that research grants for faculty have increased.” In short, UVA was getting less bang for every research buck.

That downward trend had been occurring more or less steadily since 2001. Even though the UVAPF generated $4.6 million in revenue in 2008, it struggled to break even. According to the minutes of the meeting, whereas the top universities generate revenue from technology transfer worth about 10 percent of their research investments, and the average university nationally generates 2 percent, UVA in 2008 only generated 1.4 percent. Hence, UVA overhauled its system to give more money back to the inventors and the departments or labs that housed them in the hopes of spurring more innovation. So far, it has—with 12 patents, 65 deals and 178 disclosures in 2008. In 2009, 25 U.S. patents were issued and 57 deals with companies and institutions were also recorded and 162 invention disclosures were reported.

But finding someone to lead the way to further improvements and to help court corporate buyers for UVA ideas is crucial, too. “The basic idea of this role,” says Skalak, “is to recognize one of our primary missions is dissemination of knowledge to move new ideas, inventions, and discoveries that come from faculty, students, and scholarly research into society.” The job posting itself calls the process “science and scholarship serving humanity.” Skalak hoped to have an Executive Director for Technology Transfer and Ventures by the end of October. So far, that hasn’t happened.

The position appeared on UVA’s Human Resources job site just before the September BOV meeting. It also made the usual rounds of classifieds for academics, such as the Chronicle of Higher Education, as well as the Wall Street Journal or the website Technology Transfer Tactics. Ideally, the applicant has a science PhD, significant university research experience, knowledge of how start-up businesses and intellectual property work, and the ability to raise capital. The ad stops just short of asking that candidates also play the violin. “The person,” Skalak explains, “will be the primary face of the university with external private partners to build relationships.”

Gary Helmuth, who leads the executive search for UVA HR, did not reply to several requests for information about how many people have applied and when the search might conclude. However, the position is listed as open till filled, with a start date of the 2010 academic year. Meanwhile, says Skalak, “We do believe that the definition of this process and the search have already created national recognition that UVA is a leader in the area of innovation and research.”

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In 2005, David and Elizabeth Breeden put their 1,353 acres near Old Lynchburg Road up for sale. Certain that development would change the pristine woodlands forever, it was not an easy decision. 

“I go for a walk in the woods and there’s a piece of me that knows that this will be over in the next five years,” said Elizabeth then. “And that’s kind of heartbreaking.”

But five years later the land has not changed at all—and it very likely won’t. Last Wednesday, the Commonwealth of Virginia bought the land, known as Biscuit Run, for $9.8 million and tax credits, intending to use it as parkland.
The Breedens had sold it for $46.5 million to developer Hunter Craig and other investors.

Craig’s initial designs called for up to 5,000 new housing units, but after several public hearings, he scaled back to 3,100 housing units—more in keeping with county’s Neighborhood Model.

But in 2007, citing lack of sufficient infrastructure for the area stretching from Old Lynchburg Road to Rte. 20, the Albemarle County Planning Commission unanimously recommended that the Board of Supervisors deny rezoning. Craig went back to the drawing board and returned with proffers worth $41 million. Rezoning was granted in September 2007.

Nonetheless, some, including the Sierra Club, worried about the environmental impact.

With Biscuit Run out of contention, questions remain about where the county will direct growth now. Although Mark Graham, the county’s community development director, says it is still unknown exactly where to direct new growth, south Albemarle will come under consideration: “Currently, in our work program for next year, 2011, we have plans to do a southern urban area master plan, and presumably, if we were going to look at shifting some of that development potential to some other part of the southern urban area it would be done as part of that master plan process,” he says. The southern urban area spreads from Rte. 20 south of I-64, wrapping around Rte. 250 and all the way up to Barracks Road.

The state estimates that its park system, which includes 35 parks, brought in $180 million in 2009 for localities. Pat Mullaney, director of Albemarle Parks and Recreation says, “I don’t see the state park as being an urgent need for Albemarle County residents. The state is looking at it as a regional facility, but I do think we are well-served with parkland without that growth area land going to a state park.” The county park system will include 3,000 acres by the end of 2010.

Somehow, the state, which has been struggling to close a huge budget shortfall, has found close to $10 million to buy Biscuit Run. Kim Hodge, spokesperson for the Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation, says about $5 million came from the 2002 general obligation bond—to be used on parks—and the remaining $4.8 million from “transportation enhancement” money. The sale, Charlottesville Tomorrow reports, is a “bargain sale,” allowing the developer to apply for tax credits amounting to about 40 percent of appraisal. At present, Biscuit Run is assessed at close to $44 million, making the tax credits on that alone worth as much as $17 million or so.

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