Stories of Technology, Innovation, & Entrepreneurship in the Southeast

By Tom Ballard, Chief Alliance Officer, PYA

“We see entrepreneurship really broadly at UTC,” says Libby Santin, Director of the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship (CIE) at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. “We will be just as happy if you graduate with a developed entrepreneurial mindset and apply those skills wherever you work, as we would be if you started a business.”

The 14-year resident of Chattanooga is a business owner in the community who got involved with CO.LAB in 2014, became an Adjunct Professor at UTC in 2012, and assumed the role of CIE Director in July 2018.

“It was a perfect fit . . . all of my worlds came together in one role,” Santin told us in a recent interview that also included Thomas Lyons who holds the Clarence E. Harris Chair of Excellence in Business and Entrepreneurship at UTC. Prior to relocating to Chattanooga at the start of the 2019-20 academic year, he directed entrepreneur/business development, product innovation, and research activities at the Michigan State University Product Center.

With CIE now housed in a 5,700-square foot section of the recently renovated James R. Mapp Building on Eighth Street, Santin and Lyons are bringing their complementary skills and experiences to activities that support Chancellor Steven Angle’s goal of having a cross-campus initiative that addresses UTC’s goal to inspire, nurture and empower scholarship, creativity, discovery, innovation and entrepreneurial initiatives. Their work is also supported by Jennifer Skjellum, UTC’s Commercialization Counselor.

“It’s two things – connection to the entire campus and (also to) the community – that are our drivers,” Lyons says, citing the “Chattanooga Smart Community Collaborative” as one of the most visible examples of how UTC is enhancing the proverbial “town-gown” relationship. “We are developing the entrepreneurial skills of our students (through) knowledge, co-curriculars (involvement in real-world activities), and mentoring.”

UTC is clearly embracing Angel’s vision in a number of ways. For example, the Gary W. Rollins College of Business, where the CIE is based, offers a B.S.B.A. in Entrepreneurship with about 150 majors. An Entrepreneurship minor is also offered, and other UTC programs, like the Theater Division, have developed their own subject-specific minor with help from the Rollins College of Business.

For the CIE team, a key indicator of just how much importance the institution is placing on entrepreneurship came in August when two years of planning and construction were finally completed and CIE was able to occupy the space for limited use due to COVID-19. For example, as we reported in this November teknovation.biz article, the annual UTC “Hatch It” competition was held there with appropriate social distancing protocols. Three classes were also offered in the facility during Fall Semester.

So, what is available in the new CIE space? This schematic (CIE 8.5 x 11 Floorplan) shows the layout.

“Our primary area is the Nest, a highly reconfigurable space,” Santin says of the area used primarily for collaboration. It can seat up to 80 people for traditional events. There is also a 50-seat classroom, several offices and meeting rooms, a boardroom, four spaces for meetings with mentors, a lounge and a breakroom.

“The most exciting thing we have in the Center is the makerspace,” Santin adds. Consuming between 10 and 15 percent of the total square footage, UTC turned to one of its own to help determine the best way to configure the facility.

Chantz Yanagida, a UTC alum and the Chief Executive Officer of eLab Repairs, worked closely with schools and digital fabrication labs throughout his UTC career where he saw the impact that non-working equipment had on student projects. So, he and Stephan Rodemann launched the company with a focus on onsite repairs and preventative maintenance consulting services for schools.

“He came-up with two different plans, and we have implemented one of them,” Santin added. “We are now figuring-out how to best leverage this investment. We need to understand all the capabilities of the equipment.”

One immediate goal is to ensure that all UTC faculty are aware of the makerspace so they can include it in their student project assignments.

So, some five years after Robert Dooley, Dean of the Rollins College of Business at UTC, and Beverly Brockman, a recently departed UTC Professor of Marketing and Entrepreneurship, conceived the CIE, it now has a 5,700-square foot, well-equipped home and a strong start on embedding entrepreneurial skills into the students across the campus.

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