Penn Center for Innovation celebrates 10 years

Perched on the ninth floor of 3600 Civic Center Blvd., just a stone’s throw from the Perelman School of Medicine and Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, sits an office that has shaped some of the most transformative scientific breakthroughs of the past decade: the Penn Center for Innovation.

As the University’s hub for technology transfer, the Penn Center for Innovation (PCI) helps faculty and researchers transform their discoveries into real-world applications that benefit society, by forging and fostering partnerships with commercial entities. These collaborations between the private sector and Penn-led researchers have accelerated the implementation of significant biomedical innovations including CAR T cell therapy—a pioneering cancer treatment spearheaded by Penn Medicine’s Carl June—and mRNA vaccines—the Nobel Prize-winning technology developed by Penn Medicine’s Katalin Karikó and Drew Weissman that successfully enabled COVID-19 vaccines.

Now entering its second decade, PCI’s impact continues to grow. The center has catapulted Penn to the top of national rankings in annual licensing income, supported the formation of more than 300 startups, facilitated over 7,000 commercialization agreements, and secured more than $1 billion in commercially sponsored research funding.

“I think the success of PCI can be attributed to many things,” says Associate Vice Provost for Research and PCI Managing Director Ben Dibling. “This includes Penn’s strategic vision that included a focus on impact and innovation, and, I think, a unique appreciation of the importance and value of engagement with the commercial sector.”

Dibling notes that this reflects a broader shift in how academic institutions approach technology transfer. A sentiment echoed by his predecessor at PCI, former managing director and now Penn’s first chief innovation officer, John Swartley. “I think what really set PCI apart was its emphasis on building long-term, transformative partnerships with the private sector,” Swartley says, pointing to examples like Penn’s alliance with Novartis, which led to the development of the first FDA-approved CAR T therapy, and ongoing collaborations with BioNTech to advance new therapies based on mRNA technologies.

“Penn has long been a home to scientific breakthroughs that change lives,” says Interim President J. Larry Jameson. “Penn’s innovative faculty create breakthroughs—ideas and tools that address some of the great challenges of our time, from climate change to COVID-19 vaccines to cancer treatments. PCI has been instrumental in facilitating this innovative work, enabling our faculty to collaborate with academic and commercial partners to have a broader impact on society. Our inventive founder Ben Franklin would be proud, and I too proudly celebrate their 10 years of accomplishments.”

The emergence of technology transfer

Swartley recalls that the path to modern technology transfer offices at universities wasn’t always clear—or even possible. In fact, for much of the 20th century, university research rarely left the confines of government or academia.

“In the decades following World War II, a surge in federally funded research, from organizations like the National Institutes of Health, really transformed American universities into powerhouses of research and innovation. Yet, much of this newly created intellectual capital remained untapped,” he says.

Under the rules of the time, any invention created with federal dollars automatically belonged to the government, and without an efficient mechanism to license or commercialize these innovations, “groundbreaking ideas often languished unused,” creating a bottleneck that stifled innovation and kept new ideas from benefiting the public. “It was a single-node system, and it wasn’t particularly efficient,” Swartley says.

By the late 1970s, piles of unlicensed government-owned inventions, patents, and related intellectual property were gathering dust on federal shelves, frustrating policymakers and scientists alike.

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Recognizing the need for change, Senators Birch Bayh, a Democrat from Indiana, and Robert Dole, a Republican from Kansas, spearheaded the passage of the Bayh-Dole Act in 1980, a bipartisan legislative shift that gave universities the ability—and responsibility—to patent and commercialize federally funded research.

“The Act was simple in principle, but has become a singularly important factor in unleashing the creative output of universities,” Swartley says.

Over the past 25 years, the Bayh-Dole Act has generated $1.9 trillion in economic impact and supported the creation of 6.5 million jobs across the United States, according to a report from the Biotechnology Innovation Organization and Association of University Technology Managers.

At Penn, Swartley notes, the catalytic action driven by the Bayh-Dole Act birthed the Center for Technology Transfer (CTT) in the 1980s, which later became PCI. Like many other research universities at the time, the Center’s early efforts were focused on managing the newly granted ability to file patents and license technologies.

“From the ’80s through to about the mid-90s, CTT functioned more as an administrative and transactional office facilitating patent protection and licensing, rather than a more diversified driver for partnered commercial innovation,” Swartley says.

From bench to business

Around this time, Swartley was making strides on his switch from academia to business. As a researcher at Emory University Swartley was focused on molecular biology, genetics, and infectious diseases. Initially he enjoyed his work in the lab but began to feel constrained by the type of focus required for academic success.

After meeting with Emory’s office of technology transfer office to file a patent for a tool his lab developed, Swartley grew increasingly interested in the work they were doing. “I found it really inspiring how they were helping scientists, like me, to further develop their inventions for societal benefit. I really loved bench research, but I became increasingly enamored with what happens to discoveries once they leave the lab.”

Recognizing the potential in technology transfer as a “wonderful way to stay in science, but also accelerate discovery and development in a meaningful way,” he pursued an MBA at night, describing the experience as “language lessons” in business speak. After finishing the program and gaining initial exposure to tech transfer at Emory, he moved on to work at Yale’s Office of Cooperative Research.

Swartley points out that, at Penn, a major sea change came in the early-to-mid 2000s when former President Amy Gutmann began implementing a more deliberate, strategic framework based on tapping into the true potential of transformative research. It was through this initiative, Swartley’s predecessor and mentor at CTT, Michael Cleare, was brought into the fold.

“Cleare brought an entrepreneurial mindset to our office, recognizing that universities needed to do more than simply file patents—they needed to create an ecosystem that nurtures entrepreneurial faculty, brings in venture capital, and builds meaningful industry partnerships,” Swartley says. And Swartley says it was Cleare and the clear vision of Penn’s leadership that convinced him to join Penn. 

“I told Mike, ‘Yeah, I could come over for a couple of years, help spin out a few ventures, then become CEO of one of the spinouts.’ But 17 years later, I’m still here,” he chuckles.

Innovating the approach to innovation

Soon after Swartley joined in 2007, he saw that Penn, a pioneer in gene therapy and immunotherapy, was poised to be a leader in tech transfer by adopting a more proactive, partnership-driven approach. This shift in strategy prompted an effort to reorganize CTT and bring in new talent. A few years into Swartley’s tenure as managing director, he recruited Dibling, a fellow scientist-turned-innovator.

Dibling joined Penn’s tech transfer ecosystem in 2016 and like Swartley, had a background in molecular biology, having completed his Ph.D. in clinical medicine from the University of Leeds, followed by postdoctoral research in cancer biology at the University of Chicago. He, too, found himself drawn to the broader impact that tech transfer could offer.

“John and I both come from life science research backgrounds, which has given us valuable insights, and really guided our approach to tech transfer in this space,” Dibling says. “But we also love all forms of innovation, including technologies such as robotics, software, devices, electronics, and novel materials that are outside of our scientific training. We understand the importance of evaluating each opportunity and putting it in the best position to leave the lab and make a real-world impact, so we’re thrilled to work with researchers in all areas who have inventions or discoveries that might address an unmet need.”

For instance, Dibling notes that pharmaceutical and biotech products can take years or even decades to pass through clinical trials and gain FDA approval, while other innovations—such as software and technologies from the physical sciences and engineering—can be commercialized more quickly.

Dibling points to the School of Engineering and Applied Science’s work in unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), highlighting Exyn Technologies, a robotics company co-founded by Engineering Dean Vijay Kumar with the support of PCI, and based on technology developed in Penn’s General Robotics, Automation, Sensing & Perception (GRASP) Lab.

“Exyn moved relatively quickly from formation and licensing of Penn’s technology to having products on the market,” Dibling says. “Although this still took years and a huge effort on the part of Exyn, the timeframe and the capital required to achieve this are significantly less than what would typically be observed with a biotechnology or pharmaceutical asset.”

PCI sees a broad range of technologies arising from Penn’s substantial research enterprise, which requires the office to take a flexible approach when determining the optimal pathway for further development and commercialization. In some cases, the best approach to support translation of a technology may be to identify and foster a relationship with an established company that already has the requisite experience and resources, while in others it may be more effective for PCI to work with faculty and investors to support the establishment of a new venture.

In the area of physical sciences and engineering, Dibling explains, established companies will frequently view university technology as being too early or ultimately disruptive to their business. Forming a new company can sometimes be the only viable approach to advancing the opportunity towards a new product.

PCI takes an adaptable, proactive approach to venture creation and actively markets promising technologies to relevant companies and investors. Dibling cites PCI’s targeted outreach strategies, which include showcasing technologies on their website and at conferences, reaching out directly to potential partners and investors, and helping faculty form companies when a strong commercial opportunity exists.

Current and future growth opportunities

For both Swartley and Dibling, PCI’s ongoing success is rooted in its ability to evolve alongside emerging fields. They point to the rising significance of AI, data, and sustainability as key drivers for future ventures, underscoring the need for Penn to remain nimble in its approach to innovation.

An example of PCI’s investment in AI comes from Presidential Associate Professor César de la Fuente, a researcher from Penn Medicine with a secondary appointment in Penn Engineering, whose lab has been deeply embedded in PCI’s ecosystem since his arrival. De la Fuente, who specializes in applying artificial intelligence to antibiotic discovery, has worked closely with PCI to patent numerous innovations from his lab.

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“I think I’ve filed dozens of patents through PCI,” de la Fuente says. “The team was very receptive from the minute I got to Penn, integrating me into the tech transfer ecosystem because my research is very translational.”

De la Fuente’s lab recently developed APEX, a state-of-the-art AI model that can predict whether a given amino acid sequence will have antibiotic properties. Using experimental data collected over time in the de la Fuente Lab, the model skips the usual step of identifying molecular structures and instead goes directly from sequence to function, making the discovery process faster and more efficient. This has the potential to dramatically accelerate antibiotic discovery, from years to just a few hours.

De la Fuente credits PCI with helping his lab navigate the patenting and commercialization process to ensure that these innovations can reach the market and have a real-world impact. And, while still in early stages, de la Fuente’s lab is in the process of commercializing several technologies through PCI, including the formation of a potential company around their AI-driven discoveries.

“There’s ongoing work to commercialize some of the [intellectual property] we’ve developed,” he notes. “PCI has been instrumental in making sure we stay on track with invention disclosures and timelines, and that we have someone assigned to our lab who understands what we’re working on.”

Another faculty member benefiting from PCI’s hands-on approach is Michael Mitchell, associate professor of bioengineering in Penn Engineering and the Lipid Nanoparticle Delivery Group leader at the Penn Institute for RNA Innovation. When Mitchell arrived at Penn in 2018, he found himself quickly pulled into PCI’s ecosystem when Janssen Pharmaceuticals reached out to his lab about a potential partnership to develop next-generation lipid nanoparticle technologies for genomic medicines. The challenge? Mitchell had never been involved in negotiating a sponsored research agreement before.

“PCI was incredibly helpful navigating through this process,” Mitchell says. “And it has ultimately led to several sponsored research agreements and partnerships with various biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies.”

Mitchell’s prior experience with tech transfer offices, at institutions like Cornell and MIT, had mostly focused on invention disclosures. But he says PCI stood out for its broader approach to supporting faculty.

“With PCI, they have been helpful in many more areas,” he says, “they not only facilitate invention disclosures and filing patents, but they are also incredibly helpful in strategizing how to license our technologies, partner with companies, or form new companies based on our research.”

Mitchell’s lab has worked closely with former licensing officer Tracy Chen and executive director of licensing Terry Bray at PCI to build a comprehensive IP portfolio around lipid nanoparticles for mRNA delivery. He says the relationship has become a cornerstone of his lab’s operations, with regular meetings to review new patents, licensing agreements, sponsored research, and company formation. Mitchell founded a new biotechnology company, Liberate Bio, in 2022 to translate his lipid nanoparticle technologies into new genomic medicines.

“They are an incredible resource that has added an entirely new dimension to the lab,” Mitchell says. “We just finalized a large, sponsored research agreement with a biopharmaceutical company to develop next-gen lipid nanoparticles for mRNA delivery. And we’re in the process of starting new companies focused on women’s health and cancer nanomedicine.”

PCI dedicates time each year to honor Penn inventors and organizations whose patents have led to real-world commercialization achievements. At the most recent Celebration of Innovation, which recognized Penn-led efforts towards sustainability and tackling climate change, Penn Engineering’s Jen Wilcox was awarded Startup of the Year for her groundbreaking carbon capture technology, offering a practical solution to one of the world’s most pressing challenges.

Also recognized was the Penn Center for Health Devices and Technology, known as Penn Health-Tech, a cross-disciplinary community that facilitates the development of novel medical devices and healthcare technologies while connecting and training innovators across the University.

“We’re not just about licensing patents anymore,” Swartley says. “We’re about building partnerships and giving innovators—new and more seasoned—the tools they need that will really help them grow and succeed.”