28Oct
30Jul
Listening Before Launch
Steven Pentland, Associate Professor of Information Technology Management at Boise State University, joined the NSF I-Corps regional course to learn how experienced entrepreneurs approached commercialization in practice. Already familiar with The Lean Startup, he wanted to move beyond theory and gain practical insights from people who had successfully brought technology to market. Steven and his team are developing Rhetorix Lab, an AI-resilient assessment platform that helps instructors promote authentic student learning through asynchronous oral assessments. The platform integrates with learning management systems and gives instructors streamlined grading and communication-focused feedback tools. "I was curious about what I-Corps had to offer. I had previously read The Lean Startup and knew that I-Corps was built around many of the same principles. While the book provided a strong conceptual foundation, I was interested in learning how experienced entrepreneurs (the course instructors) actually applied those ideas in practice." Looking Beyond the Customer One of the biggest takeaways from I-Corps was learning not only who the team's initial customers should be, but also who could influence adoption within those organizations. "The customer discovery process helped us recognize the individuals within organizations that could accelerate adoption. That distinction proved to be an important insight as we began thinking more strategically about commercialization." The customer discovery interviews also encouraged the team to test assumptions and make decisions based on evidence. "Instead of limiting ourselves to the audience we initially thought would adopt the technology, we intentionally reached out to adjacent markets and stakeholders with different viewpoints. That broader exploration gave us a much richer...
30Jun
From I-Corps to NIH STTR: Kris Campbell’s Commercialization Journey
Receiving an NIH STTR Phase I award for the ENVIR-OGT device for PFAS detection in water marked a major milestone for Kris Campbell and her team. Along the way, the team participated in the 2024 NSF I-Corps regional course, where customer discovery helped shape their commercialization strategy and informed the next steps in bringing their technology to market. At the time, Kris was looking to better understand how research could move beyond the lab and into the hands of those who could benefit from it. "I was hoping to get insight into the process of commercialization starting from the research in the lab," Kris said. "I didn't know how to locate people with potential interest in a research idea." Together with undergraduate researcher Lukas Crockett and small business collaborator Bamidele Omotowa, CEO of Pearlhill Technologies, Kris joined I-Corps to explore the commercial potential of their technology. Customer Discovery Changed Their Perspective Before I-Corps, the team believed they had developed a promising technology. Talking directly with potential customers gave them a deeper understanding of where their research could make the greatest impact. "I knew we had a potential product, but it wasn't until we reached out to the people working in the field that I started to appreciate just how significant our research was." Those conversations helped the team identify which features mattered most, understand how people were solving the problem today, and refine their commercialization strategy. Just as importantly, customer discovery helped the team build lasting relationships. "It was definitely the people we met during interviews and customer discovery....
28May
From Novel Idea to Operational Plan Through Customer Discovery
By Matthew Swenson, Associate Professor in Mechanical Engineering, Director of the Interdisciplinary Capstone Design Program, and NSF I-Corps Faculty Lead, University of Idaho About seven years ago, an idea was born to potentially develop a novel suspension system for trailers that we pull behind our vehicles. The premise was to design a system that dampened and redirected the shock loading that the cargo experiences when traversing uneven terrain. Through the collective work of a capstone design team, a graduate student, and myself, a new design was realized that reimagines the physics for trailer suspension systems. But even with a working design, the question remained, would anybody actually buy this? To find out, I enrolled in an NSF I-Corps™ Regional training course in the Fall of 2023 and interviewed a multitude of industries that utilize trailers as part of their business. Most of them indicated that they did not have an existing problem, and it seemed they would not have interest in a clever new alternative. But one industry emerged as the clear beachhead. Horse trailers transport animals that would benefit from being more comfortable, and this is an industry that is emotionally attached to their cargo and is willing to spend money to improve the lifestyle of their horses. This was my “aha moment”. With this invaluable information, I worked with the University of Idaho to pursue a patent. The process took nearly two years but ended in the successful outcome of a utility patent for this novel design earlier this year. Armed...
14Apr
NSF I-Corps Hub: Desert and Pacific Region Announces Leadership Transition
I am pleased to share that the NSF has approved our Hub Director leadership transition plan. We are fortunate to have Zachary Holman and Leith Martin stepping in as Hub Co-Directors effective May 1, 2026. They will also continue to concurrently serve in their roles as Hub Tech Scout Lead (Zachary) and Hub Lead Instructor (Leith). Zachary Holman serves as Vice Dean for Research and Innovation for the Fulton Schools of Engineering at Arizona State University where he is also appointed as Professor in the School of Electrical, Computer, and Energy Engineering. Zachary was a National I-Corps Teams participant, served as the ASU I-Corps Hub Faculty Lead in 2023 and 2024, and serves as the Hub Tech Scout Lead since January 2026. He is the co-founder of three start-up companies based on ASU research: Swift Coat, Sunflex Solar, and Beyond Silicon. Leith Martin serves as the Executive Director of the Troesh Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation in the Lee Business School at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. Leith led the UNLV I-Corps program as a Site, is an active Hub regional instructor and is a certified national instructor. Leith has served as Hub Lead Instructor since January 2025. He has been a founder or co-founder of several start-up companies and is an investor. Zachary and Leith’s shared leadership will ensure continuity and progress toward our goals as a Hub. Let me express my thanks to Ji Mi Choi who led the proposal development for this Hub and has served as Hub Director since its inception...
26Mar
Research to Real-World Impact: NSF I-Corps™ at UNLV
Zachary R. Miles, Esq., Interim Vice President in the Office of Economic Development at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, Executive Director of the UNLV Research Foundation, and I-Corps Project Director (UNLV), helps lead the university’s efforts to advance research commercialization and regional economic development. As a partner university in the NSF I-Corps Hub: Desert and Pacific Region, UNLV collaborates with peer institutions to provide faculty, postdocs, graduate students, and select local startup companies access to structured customer discovery training opportunities and commercialization resources. We spoke with Zach about the role I-Corps plays at UNLV, why customer discovery is an essential step in the innovation process, and how building a culture of commercialization strengthens both researchers and the broader regional ecosystem. What challenge does NSF I-Corps address for universities and researchers seeking to move innovations into the marketplace? Many times we receive invention disclosures and are just not 100% sure where to go with them. NSF I-Corps provides the necessary training and programmatic approach to help construct a pathway for that given technology, pressure-test it to ensure it is a viable commercial opportunity, and determine the next steps to continue validating it and move it along the technology readiness level pathway. Additionally, it helps inform inventors and researchers of the value of commercialization, encourages them to think through the potential for life-changing products and services, creates applied learning opportunities for their students, and supports economic development in the region. Many researchers are experts in science but not entrepreneurship. How does NSF I-Corps help bridge that...
26Feb
From Insight to Innovation: I-Corps Catalyzes the Public Impact of Research
By Hala Madanat, Vice President for Research and Innovation, San Diego State University and SDSU Principal Investigator, NSF I-Corps Hub: Desert and Pacific Region As Vice President for Research and Innovation at San Diego State University, I have been continually impressed by the impact of the NSF I-Corps™ program in catalyzing both research and entrepreneurship across our campus. SDSU faculty bring deep disciplinary expertise to their work, generating new knowledge, publications, and externally funded research. Like most academics, they hope their discoveries will extend beyond scholarly journals to create real-world impact—a core reason public investment in academic research is so important. Yet translating fundamental research into impactful products and services requires an understanding of entrepreneurship that is rarely part of faculty training outside of business schools. This is where I-Corps plays a transformative role. Participation in I-Corps has had a profound effect on our faculty and student teams. Researchers are naturally immersed in the technical details of their work and, as experts, often assume they understand how and why their research will be applied. I-Corps challenges this assumption by shifting the focus from the details to the bigger picture. By pushing teams out of the lab and into conversations with potential users, decision makers, and others involved in the adoption of new technology, the program reveals a consistent surprise: the real needs of users are often different from what researchers initially expect. Importantly, those needs are frequently just as significant—and well aligned with the team’s research in new and unexpected ways. For some teams,...
27Jan
NSF I-Corps™ as a path to more effective research
By Visar Berisha, Professor and Associate Dean for Research Commercialization, Fulton Schools of Engineering, and NSF I-Corps Faculty Lead, Arizona State University (ASU) In 2016, at the suggestion of a National Science Foundation (NSF) program officer, our lab at ASU participated in one of the first joint NSF–NIH (National Institutes of Health) I-Corps programs to explore whether our research-based discovery of speech-based biomarkers could enable earlier diagnosis of neurological disease. Like many academic teams, we began with a well-supported value proposition hypothesis: clinicians and speech-language pathologists would value objective tools for earlier diagnosis and tracking of conditions such as Parkinson’s or Alzheimer’s disease. What we learned through customer discovery was that our assumptions about where the real problems lay were incomplete. Neurologists told us that diagnosis was often already sufficient, early detection was not always actionable, and from speech language pathologists we learned that even promising clinical tools could fail to matter without a clear path to adoption. The most consequential insight came from outside our disciplinary comfort zone. When we began speaking with pharmaceutical companies, we discovered that a key bottleneck was not diagnosis, but measurement: the lack of reliable, objective endpoints for tracking disease progression in clinical trials. That realization reshaped not only the trajectory of our subsequent company, but the way I think about research, impact, and the role of structured discovery in expanding an academic research agenda. This experience was a turning point not just because it led to a commercial outcome, but because it reshaped how we...
17Dec
How I-Corps Immerse: SEMICON West 2025 Shaped ASU Professor Xiangyu Guo’s Research Approach
Dr. Xiangyu Guo, Assistant Professor in the School of Manufacturing Systems and Networks at Arizona State University, recently took part in I-Corps Immerse: SEMICON West 2025, a hands-on learning experience built to help researchers and innovators sharpen their customer discovery skills and explore early-stage problems connected to their technologies. This I-Corps Hub Desert and Pacific Region course paired NSF I-Corps™ regional training with an on-site experience at SEMICON West in Phoenix, Arizona. Travel and registration support made it possible for participants to conduct on-the-ground customer discovery work, gather industry insights, and connect with leaders across the semiconductor ecosystem. We spoke with Professor Guo about their team’s experience and what they learned through I-Corps Immerse. What motivated you to join the I-Corps Immerse course? As a new faculty member at ASU, I took the I-Corps Immerse course to see if my early-stage semiconductor metrology ideas had any commercial value and to learn how academic research can be useful in the real world more quickly. I wanted to meet new people, expand my network, and improve my business skills to go along with my technical skills. I-Corps gave me a structured way to test my ideas, learn from people who work in the industry, and make sure that the solutions I come up with as a new faculty member really do benefit the understanding towards important manufacturing processes and problems. Beyond my own development, I saw I-Corps as an opportunity for my students — Vikrant Vivek Deo, graduate student, and Alexander Liu, undergraduate student...
20Nov