By Jim Stafford
The Oklahoman 

NORMAN — Skip Porter's grand vision of an "entrepreneurial village" on the University of Oklahoma campus became a little clearer last week when real-world business models intersected with academia.

It was showtime at 6 p.m. Wednesday at the Stephenson Research and Technology Center when 11 student interns delivered in-depth technology commercialization reports of OU-based business opportunities to an audience of about 50 people.

What really was on display was the first group of interns to serve in OU's new Center for the Creation of Economic Wealth.

The internship program matched ambitious students and "mentors-in-residence" who guided their research and assessments.

The students provided analysis for OU-based enterprises that involved wireless technology developed by a pair of OU professors, oil-refining technology invented by an OU professor and the creation of an OU Seed Fund to provide start-up funding for promising OU intellectual property.

After each presentation, interns fielded questions from the audience.

With the audience filled with business professors, researchers and experienced entrepreneurs, questioners attempted to poke holes in the presentations and expose areas in which the students were unprepared. For the most part, interrogators were unsuccessful.

"They are consultants, and it's not just a class project," said Daniel Pullin, executive director of OU's wealth creation center. "They didn't come up and give you a book report. They came up here and gave you hard recommendations of clear perspective on a path that our university can take."

First up was a group of four students who provided a technology commercialization report on an OU spin-off company called WirelessWhere. The company, which provides a mobile communications system for law enforcement and other first responders, is based on technology developed by a pair of OU professors.

Wireless communications is a crowded field, and the students created a matrix of options for taking the company to market. Students were peppered with questions about every aspect of their assessment, including the potential for a strategic partnership, the licensing agreement with OU and who the ultimate "decision maker" would be to pull the trigger on any deal.

Next up was a group that outlined a new oil refining technology developed by OU chemistry professor Miguel Bagajewicz. The technology improves the refining process and theoretically would yield refinery operators greater profit. Students ran computer models that showed the amount of new profit the process would yield but also took it a step further and conducted live refining experiments in an OU laboratory.

Finally, a group of three interns presented the intriguing possibility of OU creating its own seed fund that would be used to provide start-up capital for fledgling companies based on technology developed at the university. The group cited university-owned seed funds in Utah, Minnesota and Louisiana, and determined that a fund of $7 million to $10 million would benefit both the university and companies spun out of it.

But the question of how to raise the funds and who would manage it drew several sharp questions from an audience that clearly had an interest in the process.

At the conclusion of the presentations, Porter declared the first semester of the internship program a big success.

"The quality of the students and the contribution they have made frankly exceeded what I had hoped might happen," said Porter, who is OU's vice president for technology development and conceived the idea for a $50 million "entrepreneurial village" on campus that would mentor both students and new businesses.

It's only a matter of time before the seed fund is established and a true commercial success is created from an OU spin-off company, Porter said.

Copyright 2006, The Oklahoma Publishing Company