Stories of Technology, Innovation, & Entrepreneurship in the Southeast

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)’s Office of Technology Transitions (OTT) has announced nine Phase 2 winners for the Making Advanced Technology Commercialization Harmonized (Lab MATCH) prize, and one of those is ThermoVerse, a participant in the 2023 cohort of the “Innovation Crossroads” program at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL).

The three-phase Lab MATCH prize, funded by the Technology Commercialization Fund, asks entrepreneurs to create actionable plans for groundbreaking national laboratory intellectual property (IP) that can be brought to market.

After competing in and winning Phase 1 of the prize, all 19 competitors in Phase 2 were asked to develop a more detailed pathway to commercialization. For their progress in Phase 2, each winning team will be awarded $30,000 in cash prizes and earn their eligibility to compete in Phase 3 of the prize.

Next, the nine winning teams from Phase 2, the Plan Phase, will compete in Phase 3, the Action Phase. In this final phase of the prize, competitors will collaborate closely with national laboratory researchers and technology transfer offices to demonstrate significant progress toward IP commercialization. In the case of ThermoVerse, it will work with ORNL’s Building Technologies Program. Phase 3 is set to conclude at the end of March, and up to three winning teams will each be awarded a $100,000 grand prize.

The Lab MATCH prize is part of the DOE’s American-Made program, which fast-tracks clean energy innovation through prizes, training, mentoring, and cross-sector collaboration. The American-Made program helps fast-track clean energy innovation, connecting the nation’s entrepreneurs and innovators to America’s national labs and the private sector. Teams competing in the Lab MATCH prize will have access to the American-Made Network, which provides tools, resources, and support to accelerate the transition of ideas into real-world clean energy solutions.

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