Global technology titan GE (NYSE:GE) announced a new commercialization partnership with Purdue University’s Research Foundation, planning on helping market everything from medical diagnostics to propulsion technology.
The deal represents a major change in the way academic institutions turn their research into marketable products, Purdue Research Foundation president and chief entrepreneurial officer Dan Hasler said in prepared remarks.
"An agreement like this can be a game-changer. This tests a new model of collaboration and lays the groundwork for advancing the way universities commercialize innovations," Hasler said. "It’s more than providing novel technologies that have a promise of commercialization, because innovation leaders from GE and Purdue will meet on a periodic basis to discuss strategies and forward-thinking, value-added objectives derived from university-based research."
GE and Purdue have been in cahoots for more than a century, the companies said. Just 2 years ago they successfully co-released Veo CT scanning reconstruction technology. Purdue developed the technology and GE helped hurry it to market, and the success of the Veo platform encouraged the duo to seek more avenues for commercial partnerships, according to a press release
"GE already benefits from a long-term collaborative affiliation with Purdue that dates back more than 100 years, and historically GE hires more Purdue students than from any other university in the world," GE university relations region manager Tony Denhart said. "As we have experienced, the core values of Purdue and GE match up well and this agreement moves our partnership to the next level."
The partnership is already considering innovations in enhanced medical diagnostic imaging, advanced propulsion technologies, solar technologies, energy recovery technologies and new biological testing technologies.