UB Technology Incubator Welcomes New Companies
Construction on Sweet Home Road isn’t the only thing being talked about these days at the University at Buffalo Technology Incubator at Baird Research Park. The facility, located on Sweet Home, has welcomed four new companies into its program. Newton LED, an innovative signage company, and Oncology Research Therapeutics, Inc., life-sciences company that specializes in offering cancer-based diagnostics to physicians, joined 23 other associate companies in calling the Incubator “home”. Additionally, BioHammer and VertaSource are taking advantage of the Incubator’s resources as affiliates of the program.
“These two associate companies are a great addition to our Technology Incubator program,” said Woody Maggard, UB Associate Vice Provost and STOR Associate Director. “Both Newton and ORT are carrying out research and development of their products here at the Incubator’s laboratories.”
Moving into the Incubator last summer, ORT has established a laboratory testing service, and research and development facilities to further develop its novel cancer drug delivery system.
“ORT identified the Incubator as the optimal place to conduct our clinical and research operations,” said John M. Moran, Jr., ORT chief executive officer. “It offers GMP quality facilities that are necessary for the clinical and research diagnostic testing we will be offering the greater Buffalo medical community. ORT is a new wave of companies offering personalized medical treatment.”
ORT is currently working on launching a new diagnostic test called Chemofit®. This test is performed on a wide array of solid tumors including lung, breast, colon, pancreas, and bladder cancer tissue in order to predetermine which patients will respond to chemotherapy and avoid drug failure in the treatment of such cancer. Moran noted that the company will also begin development of a novel biomarker blood test aimed at diagnosing cancer years before it evolves into a tumor mass.
Newton LED specializes in the research, development, and use of LEDs in outdoor signage. The company, headed by Dennis Ryan, moved into the incubator in the winter of 2005. They are currently wrapping up a lighting project at the Seneca Niagara Casino Hotel located in Niagara Falls.
The two new affiliates of the Incubator are start-up companies who are not yet currently housed at the facility, but which are part of the services and family. VertaSource is a web design and hosting company that has moved quickly into media advertising using aggressive design and marketing technologies. Recently, it launched its AtHome products nationally with CBS Radio, and its first site, BuffaloAtHome (www.buffaloathome.com) has become extremely popular in a short period of time.
UB Panasci Technology Entrepreneur Competition winner, BioHammer is a student start-up specializes in open source software in the biotech arena, and is licensing this technology from UB.
“Open source software fits well with bioinformatics since it is collaborative. BioHammer will enable access to the various tools becoming available in this space, and will also provide access to other tools of critical importance to the biotech community,” said Maggard.
Development continues on other properties along Sweet Home Road, leading to a demand for better traffic flow on the road and around the university. Sweet Home Road is being widened to four lanes with a raised median. There will also be some modifications to Chestnut Ridge Road, including an additional entrance to Baird Research Park. The construction, which began in April, will continue through to 2007. In the meantime, staff and visitors to the Incubator will have to bear with minor traffic delays.
“Plans for the expansion of Baird Research Park continue to develop,” said Maggard. Adding that current growth by existing incubator companies will provide the impetus for the expansion over the next few years.
In other Incubator news, Teeter Marketing Services, LLC recently opened an office in New York City to help facilitate delegations to and from China. Fred Teeter, president, has made four trips over the past 18 months to China and signed a marketing agreement with a Provincial Government and Chinese trading company, and also addressed a Chinese delegation in Albany. Teeter Marketing has also secured a contract with GlobalSpec.com based in Troy, NY, to produce two on-line newsletters covering Coatings & Surface Engineering and Glass & Ceramics each month. GlobalSpec is the largest engineering search engine in the world.