MCO graduate student Stephania Irwin (G5) will join the Harvard Office of Technology Development (OTD) as an OTD Business Development Fellow. The yearlong program offers Harvard graduate students and postdocs training and hands-on experience in commercializing technologies developed in academic labs.
“I decided to apply for the fellowship as a way to explore the more non-traditional career path options for PhD scientists,” Irwin says. “Technology commercialization has a lot of different applications and skills involved, so it seemed like a really excellent way to learn a lot of new things while still interacting with the Harvard community.”
OTD fellows spend a few hours each week evaluating technologies from Harvard labs on commercialization potential, conducting market research, proposing licensing partnership strategies, and developing marketing campaigns. Irwin will be mainly working on technologies with the OTD’s Life Sciences group.
“I will be working with the Business Development team at OTD to help evaluate and assess technologies at many different stages of development from Harvard that could be of commercial interest,” Irwin says. “I am most looking forward to learning about how to approach technologies not just from the scientific side, but also from the business and commercialization aspect.”
She adds, “I am grateful for my research advisor Dr. Emily Balskus and the MCO graduate program for supporting me to explore these sorts of opportunities to complement my research as part of my degree.”
