Materialize is focused on Columbia's innovations that are solving large enduring needs in areas including biomanufacturing, sustainably-produced goods, sustainably-sourced food and water, sustainable transportation and mobility, and under-represented healthcare.
Launching in November 2023, the first Materialize cohort will receive curated access to educational modules, training sessions, and hands-on guidance and mentorship from experienced entrepreneurs and investors.
Throughout the accelerator, participants will work alongside the Material Impact team to develop an operational plan to elucidate their business models along with a resourcing and capitalization strategy. Sessions are led by venture capital leaders and entrepreneurs who have built and exited successful technology companies.
At the conclusion of the program, all participants will have the opportunity to pitch to the Material Impact team. Finalists will be eligible for a seed round of financing led by Material Impact.
“Our world faces a great number of large scale challenges that require large scale innovations steeped in science-based deep technology. Our mission with Materialize is to identify groundbreaking technologies which have been greatly de-risked in the lab setting and help transform them into companies that are addressing major pain points for humankind,” said Material Impact Co-Founder and Managing Partner Adam Sharkawy. “We are excited to partner with Columbia Technology Ventures and its growing ecosystem of entrepreneurs towards successful productization and commercialization of innovative technologies making a meaningful impact. We are thrilled to help build the deep tech community in New York City with its hot bed of innovation that has historically been tied to financial and consumer technologies. We see the broader New York City area as an excellent locale and micro-venue to incubate innovations that touch many issues affecting the city at large but which are indicative of challenges globally.”
“Materialize is a unique opportunity for Columbia’s materials-focused researchers to receive hands-on guidance from a leading venture investor from the time the technology is spun out of the lab,” said Orin Herskowitz, executive director of Columbia Technology Ventures. “Material Impact’s goal of solving the world’s biggest problems pairs well with our researchers’ history of developing technologies that benefit society. We look forward to seeing the success of this collaboration at pitch day in Spring 2024.”
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About Material Impact
Material Impact is a champion of the bravest ideas for the future, building deep tech companies powered by material science that solve enduring, large-scale, real-world problems. Learn more at http://www.materialimpact.com.
About Columbia Technology Ventures
Columbia Technology Ventures is the technology transfer office for Columbia University and a central location for many of the technology development initiatives, entrepreneurial activities, external industry collaborations, and commercially-oriented multidisciplinary technology innovations across the university. CTV’s core mission is to facilitate the transfer of inventions from academic research labs to the market for the benefit of society on a local, national, and global basis. Each year, CTV manages more than 400 invention disclosures, 100 license deals, and 25-30 new IP-backed startups, involving over 750 inventors across Columbia's campuses. CTV currently has over 1,500 patent assets available for licensing, across research fields such as bio, IT, clean tech, devices, big data, nanotechnology, materials science, and more.
