Community Impact

The university is one of several partners in a new planning grant from the National Science Foundation that may eventually lead to a five-year, $25 million National Center for Wireless Spectrum Research (SII-Center) known as SpectrumX. Under the planning proposal, CU Boulder – led by the College of Engineering and Applied Science – would serve as one of several hubs for research into the electromagnetic spectrum.

It’s hard to imagine a teenager who could resist exploring mechanical engineering after learning about Endoculus, the small device developed by CU Boulder Professor Mark Rentschler and student researchers in his lab that can navigate the human gastrointestinal system with ease and may someday help doctors care for their patients. Futurum helped translate Rentschler’s complex research into easy-to-digest (no pun intended) content that teachers can incorporate into their lesson plans and share with their students.

Student musicians created lullabies as part of an interdisciplinary project between CU Boulder’s Renée Crown Wellness Institute and College of Music. With help from the College of Music’s Entrepreneurship Center for Music (ECM), the pilot project through CU Boulder was ready to launch in December 2019. Two months later, the coronavirus pandemic hit.

Register now to attend the biggest Destination Startup® yet, from February 16-18, 2021. Twenty-five startups from 10 different universities across six states in the Rocky Mountain region will showcase their technologies, drawing investors from around the world.

As the first program in the nation to focus on the role of the private sector and entrepreneurship in the sustainable commercialization of space activities, the Space and Sustainability Initiative at CU Boulder will orient much of its work toward the development of norms of responsible behavior for commercial space activities.

Long before the pandemic sent people scrambling into isolation, musicians have longed to jam virtually with others across the globe. Now researchers from CU Boulder’s ATLAS Institute’s ACME Lab and Ericsson Research are developing ways for musicians to play together remotely through the AR Drum Circle project.

SomaLogic is developing blood-testing platforms to measure for thousands of proteins in a patient’s blood or urine sample that may signal current illnesses or risks for developing a future health condition.

A recent study by Leeds Associate Professor of strategy and entrepreneurship, Jeff York and co-authors focuses on founders’ personal identity—a characteristic underexplored in current entrepreneurial founders research.

As we wind down for the holidays, the Venture Partners team wants to celebrate the accomplishments of our resilient community of world-class innovators, business partners and dedicated mentors. We’re excited to share our highlights of this year.

In 2019, Venture Partners at CU Boulder—the university's commercialization arm—launched the state's first-ever showcase for research-based startups spun out of Colorado universities and federal laboratories. Destination Startup® aims to connect these startups with investors and the greater innovation ecosystem in hopes of securing capital and making industry connections to advance their companies.