Bayh-Dole Award 

AUTM Annual Meeting

2020 Bayh-Dole Award Winner – John Fraser 

The Bayh-Dole Award is given to those who ardently support the practice of technology transfer and contribute substantially to AUTM’s public policy and advocacy efforts. This year is the 40th Anniversary of the Bayh-Dole Act.  

This year’s Bayh-Dole award winner is John Fraser

John served as our Association’s President in 2006 and has long advocated for the tech transfer profession both in the United States and internationally. He is the former Assistant Vice President of research at Florida State University, a serial entrepreneur, expert witness and now a tech transfer consultant.
 
Among his many accomplishments, John organized, led and implemented the first Better World Report, recognizing that it is critically important to share success stories about the benefits of academic commercialization rather than just relying on metrics.

John has also served as a consummate International Ambassador for AUTM, being invited to 29 countries to discuss academic technology transfer and Lessons Learned. In each case, he promoted the value of a global tech transfer community and encouraged them to form a national association and join both ATTP and AUTM.
 
Before John left office, he laid the foundation for the strategic board model we use today. And for that we are very grateful.
 
AUTM is pleased to present the Bayh-Dole Award to John Fraser.

John Fraser
I am honored to be the 2020 Bayh-Dole Award winner, particularly on the 40th Anniversary of this important American legislation. I want to thank the current AUTM leadership for selecting me this year.

We are here to learn how to do things better and share knowledge, particularly those of us with white hair.

As you will hear, this is the 40th Anniversary of the legislation, and as people such as Joe Allen, Orin Herskowitz, Steve Susalka and Mike Waring amongst others remind us, it is important for us to educate our representatives in Washington about the important role that universities play in our economy and our society.
 
The Green Paper entitled: "Return on Investment Initiative for Unleashing American Innovation", part of the President’s Management Agenda, was published in April.

I want to make an observation that I think needs to be considered as we see Action Items flowing from the Green Paper.

We tend to see and discuss the commercialization results from the largest Universities – the top 10, the top 20. Most are in large cities which are already Innovation Hubs.

But the largest number of US research universities and Federal laboratories are not in the large cities, they are in smaller cities and rural settings. That’s where I worked all my career. I know that these are the areas desperate to retain their young people, keep the local economy healthy with either some job growth or slowing job loss.

We already have these massive institutions embedded in many of these smaller cities and rural settings where their overall activities are what is needed to address these local wants and needs.

A bit of a tweak of the fed lab rules and incentives and growth can happen, all across America – where it is needed.

We need to tell elected officials that we are part of the solution.

We are not making self-serving promises – there are now numerous studies proving that technology transfer does work and positively impacts long term job creation and wealth creation all across this country.

We need to remind people that we are all working towards making this a Better World. 
 


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