track device
Houston-area university taps new tech to keep tabs on startups
Texas A&M University has teamed up with a tech company in New York state to track the performance of startups spawned by the College Station school.
The tech company, StartupTree, produces software that manages university entrepreneurship data. StartupTree is creating a performance-tracking platform for Texas A&M University Innovation Partners, which fosters A&M-born innovations, and the Texas A&M Engineering Experiment Station’s Office of Commercialization and Entrepreneurship. The platform will monitor the performance of Texas A&M spinouts. It also will match startups with business mentors, legal advisers, potential investors, and other resources.
Among the Houston companies affiliated with Texas A&M University Innovation Partners are ECM Biosurgery, a medical device maker, and
Pulmotect, a biopharmaceutical business.
“StartupTree is going to make it easier for our startups to be successful,” says Chris Scotti, director of new ventures at Texas A&M Innovation Partners and chairman of the Texas A&M New Ventures Competition. “It will be easier for startups to find mentorship, funding, and other forms of help they may need to bring a technology to market.”
Texas A&M joins the University of Texas System as a StartupTree customer.
“Already, Texas A&M has influenced the product in terms of data collection, including the ability for mentors and administrators to leave notes on venture profiles,” says Theresa Kim, president of StartupTree. “If we can play a role in developing scalable data collection processes for Texas A&M within the platform, we see this paying dividends over time, especially given the trends of external stakeholders being more data-focused.”
Texas A&M’s pilot phase of the StartupTree installation is expected to launch later this year.