University, companies tackle new products

Collaborations have yielded billions in sales over the years

Friday, Aug. 25, 2006

About two dozen Maryland companies will start developing an eclectic array of new products on University of Maryland campuses this month, ranging from water-jet cutting machines and a vaccine for urinary tract infections to small video systems designed to help soldiers on the battlefield distinguish between the enemy and their comrades.

The 23 companies received cooperative research awards from the latest round of Maryland Industrial Partnerships funding, now in its 19th year.

Under the program, the companies work with University System of Maryland faculty to develop commercial products, which over the years have racked up $9.8 billion in sales, said director Martha Connolly.

‘‘We want Maryland companies to take advantage of the facilities, resources and expertise that the university can bring to bear,” Connolly said.

‘‘MIPS is a tremendous opportunity for startups,” said Peter S. Spatharis, CEO of Acagi Inc., a small company in the Frederick incubator developing the face-recognition video systems. ‘‘It is not so much the money, but you get to work with the best and brightest.”

MIPS funnels its funding to the university researcher on each project, while the companies also pitch in funding.

MIPS has had some notable successes.

MedImmune Inc. of Gaithersburg developed its best-selling drug, Synagis, which treats pediatric lung disease, partially through MIPS. Sales of Synagis hit $1 billion last year.

‘‘With MedImmune, we did a very small study on mechanism of action for Synagis within a very large development program,” Connolly said. MedImmune has had seven MIPS projects, she said, including one to train workers at its new Frederick plant.

With the help of university researchers, Hughes Network Systems of Germantown jumped a technical hurdle in creating its wireless Direcway multimedia service, which now has 1 million subscribers, said John Kenyon, vice president for engineering.

‘‘But the Quantum Sails Design Group In Annapolis is the best illustration of a company that needed something and we provided the key resource,” Connolly said.

Because winds on the Chesapeake Bay were too unpredictable for testing the company’s sails, Quantum used the Glenn L. Martin Wind Tunnel at the University of Maryland, College Park, under a MIPS project.

‘‘In large part, connected to the America’s Cup, we have worked with one sailing syndicate or another since 1987, mostly with keel designs,” said professor Jewel Barlow, director of the wind tunnel. ‘‘With Quantum, ... we developed ways for them to parameterize [quantify] sail design and check them in the wind tunnel.”

‘‘Here is a Maryland company that was able to use the unique capabilities of the universities and take advantage,” Connolly said of Quantum. ‘‘Our challenge is always to find the next one of those. The right marriage of the capabilities and what the university brings is always what is needed to stay competitive.”

This year the state increased funding for MIPS projects from $1 million to $2.35 million, a record level that will allow funding of 50 projects, she said. Applications for the second round of fiscal 2007 projects are due Oct. 17.

Last year MIPS funded 32 projects. The maximum award for a project is $100,000 per year for large and small companies and $70,000 for startups.

Not all project awards go to large companies such as MedImmune or Hughes. Of the 23 new awards, 15 are for small startups.

One is AriaVax Inc. of Gaithersburg, which is developing vaccines for urinary tract infections and travelers bacteria common in developing nations, said Frank Robey, chief scientific officer. The work will add to the company’s pipeline of vaccine projects, including its development of HIV⁄AIDS vaccine technology from the National Institutes of Health.

Robey, a former NIH chemistry researcher, said that because ‘‘many things can go wrong” in new research projects, it is hard to get excited. ‘‘But this is different,” he said. ‘‘In the MIPS project, everything is together on this.”

Acagi is working with engineers at the College Park campus to build the small video system with face- and voice-recognition programming. Spatharis, who said the system will help soldiers ‘‘tell the good guys from the bad guys,” expects to sell it to the U.S. military within six months.

The system uses a tiny TV screen, called a reticule, mounted on a soldier’s helmet near one eye, plus a small 4-by-6-by-3-inch computer and cloth keyboard attached elsewhere on the soldier’s body. Another potential market is television news outlets, to catalog subjects, he said.

Other MIPS projects, all at the College Park campus, include the following:

*Cardinal Scientific Inc. of Clinton has teamed with engineers to design Web-based methods to manufacture parts with a water-jet cutting machine.

*Prime Circuits Inc. of Potomac is developing a three-dimensional X-ray system for screening travelers’ baggage for explosives.

*Also going after three-dimensional images is Quantum Molecular Pharmaceuticals Inc. of Bethesda. The company is developing a radiation sensor to reduce the size and costs of producing images of body functions through positron emission tomography or PET scans.

*A new fiber optic sensor from Pervasive Technology Engineering LLC of Greenbelt will be tested to gauge structural integrity of tall buildings and long bridges. The sensor may also gauge precisely the integrity of oil and gas pipelines, and other structures over long distances.