CU Boulder ranked No. 1 for launching startups based on university discoveries
Photo: Associate Professor and co-founder of Mana Battery, a startup developing sodium-based batteries for sustainable energy storage, Chunmei Ban, is working with chemical engineering student Kangmin Kim in the CU Boulder College of Engineering and Applied Science lab. Source: Jesse Morgan Petersen
The University of Colorado Boulder reached a historic milestone, launching 35 new companies based on university intellectual property during fiscal year 2024, more than any other U.S. campus that year. In addition to holding the No. 1 spot for that year, the achievement also places CU Boulder No. 2 for the most startups launched in a single year by a U.S. campus.
Venture Partners at CU Boulder drives the transformation of research breakthroughs into real-world impact by empowering innovators at CU Boulder (as well as CU Denver and UCCS) to create companies and forge industry partnerships.
From steady growth to record-breaking results
A decade ago, CU Boulder launched an average of four to six startups based on university inventions annually. Today, it stands as a national leader, having launched more startups in FY 2024 than any other university campus, followed by the University of Michigan, the University of Minnesota and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), according to data released in July from AUTM (Association of University Technology Managers), the leading association tracking university technology transfer. AUTM counts startups that are founded with an agreement between the company and university to commercialize specific university intellectual property (IP).
In AUTM’s data going back to 1990, only Stanford University has exceeded CU Boulder in the total number of startups launched in a single year, with 38 startups in 2022.
What really sets CU Boulder apart is efficiency, mainly the number of startups per dollar of research funding, according to Bryn Rees, associate vice chancellor for innovation and partnerships at CU Boulder.
“Universities spinning out similar numbers of startups have significantly larger research budgets feeding their innovation pipeline,” says Rees. “Among institutions with the highest single-year outputs, CU Boulder tops that efficiency indicator with 5.1 startups launched in FY 2024 per $100 million in research funding. That’s more than double the next most efficient university campus among the top 10 startup generators in the same year—a fantastic result and a real credit to our approach.”
CU Boulder’s rise—achieved outside traditional capital hubs like Silicon Valley and Boston—reflects a uniquely collaborative and highly effective innovation ecosystem.
A “relentless commitment to supporting founders”
Through experimentation and entrepreneurial thinking, the Venture Partners team has redefined how academic research translates into impactful businesses. “Our journey reflects years of careful planning, experimentation and a relentless commitment to supporting our startup founders,” says Rees. “We’ve embraced Boulder’s collaborative ethos and created a model that aligns with our community’s values while delivering national impact.”
Venture Partners prioritizes the experience and development of its founders—usually faculty, postdoctoral researchers and graduate students, but also entrepreneurs from outside the university. Their Licensing with EASE® simplifies the startup process with pre-negotiated intellectual property licensing terms, reducing administrative friction and allowing founders to focus on building their ventures. This philosophy extends to providing tailored mentorship and long-term support, creating an environment where new founders thrive.
From entrepreneurial training to funding, Venture Partners offers a comprehensive suite of resources for founders and startups. For example, Venture Partners’ Center for Translational Research (CTR) helps bridge the “valley of death” between early-stage research and commercialization with comprehensive support for researchers applying for grants that cater to startups. In federal partnership, the National Science Foundation I-CorpsTM Hub: West Region programming at Venture Partners provides startup training to researchers in and outside of the university, while the Lab Venture Challenge (LVC) awards over $1.25 million in proof-of-concept grants annually in partnership with the Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade (OEDIT).
Venture Partners’ willingness to experiment and learn from failure has been critical to its success. “Have you heard of the ‘i-Teams’ program?” Rees jokes. “Of course not! It was a failure. We wanted to match lab innovations with business students. It was a fun experience and great learning for the students, but we didn’t start any new companies.” However, it provided insights that led to the creation of the highly successful Embark Deep Tech Startup Creator, which launched 10 of the 35 companies in 2024 by matching entrepreneurs, including from CU Boulder’s Leeds School of Business, with cutting-edge CU Boulder innovations.
35 startups accelerating toward impact
The 35 startups launched in FY 2024 represent a diverse array of industries, from clean energy to biotech. Among them is Mana Battery, founded on research from Chunmei Ban’s laboratory (CU Boulder Paul M. Rady Mechanical Engineering), winner of a 2023 LVC grant. Mana Battery is developing sodium-based batteries as a safer, more sustainable alternative to lithium-ion technology, addressing critical challenges in energy storage. Over the past decade, CU Boulder has spun out several battery-focused startups, collectively creating hundreds of jobs and attracting over $1 billion in investment to Colorado.
CU is a growing international leader in both quantum and healthcare research and technologies, both of which are found in the new startup Flari Tech. The company is developing technology created by Jun Ye (CU Boulder Physics, JILA, NIST) and Qizhong Liang (JILA) to detect diseases via the breath, all built upon the Nobel Prize-winning frequency comb developed at CU Boulder and NIST. Eva Yao founded the company in the first cohort of Embark.
Another shooting star is Mesa Quantum. Venture Partners helped match a motivated grad student, Sristy Agrawal (NIST, CU Boulder Mathematical Physics), with a novel atomic clock invented in Svenja Knappe’s lab (CU Boulder Paul M. Rady Mechanical Engineering). Mesa Quantum was first conceived in the I-Corps Hub West programming offered at Venture Partners. Mesa Quantum is ushering in the next generation of chip-scale atomic clocks and quantum sensors, powering the industries of tomorrow in fields like autonomous vehicles and advanced deep-water oil exploration.
CU Boulder’s success is bolstered by recent ecosystem wins like the NSF ASCEND Engine in Colorado and Wyoming and the Elevate Quantum Tech Hub designations. These initiatives enhance CU Boulder’s capacity to attract top talent, secure funding and support high-impact startups.
“These programs bring together the resources and expertise we need to address global challenges,” says Rees. “They’re amplifying our impact and positioning CU as a leader in innovation.”
Looking ahead
As Venture Partners celebrates its record-breaking year, the team is focused on the future. Plans include expanding incubator spaces, enhancing funding opportunities and growing its investor network. The university is also working to refine programs like Embark and explore new collaborations with other institutions.
“Our goal is to create ventures with lasting impact,” Rees emphasizes. “We measure success not only by the number of companies we create but by the societal and economic benefits they deliver.”
Over the last five years, startups spinning out of CU Boulder have raised $3.9 billion in total financing. CU Boulder’s inventions and startups contributed $8 billion in national economic impact and $5.2 billion in Colorado from 2018-2022 alone, according to a 2022 report conducted by Leeds School of Business. Ten unicorns—companies valued at more than $1 billion—have spun out of the campus to date, including Infleqtion, which announced its initial public offering last week.
CU Boulder’s dramatic rise as a leader in university-driven entrepreneurship has illuminated its role in the broader U.S. innovation ecosystem. By prioritizing founders, embracing Colorado’s unique strengths and continually evolving its approach, Venture Partners offers a model for other institutions seeking to foster innovation.
The Newsroom
For marketing and communication inquiries or news tips, contact Daniel Leonard, senior marketing and communications specialist for Venture Partners at CU Boulder.
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