New Simone Center promotes innovation

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A. Sue Weisler | photographer

Casey Jordan, left, and Patrick Bosek, founders of Jorsek, are taking advantage of the services provided by the new Albert J. Simone Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship.

Patrick Bosek and Casey Jordan could certainly put together impressive résumés and begin traditional job searches. Jordan will graduate this winter from RIT with a physics degree and Bosek recently graduated from the University at Buffalo with a degree in computer science.

But the two high school friends (Penfield High School ’03) have caught the entrepreneurial bug. They would rather work 16-hour days developing a new software product and service. They would rather do Web consulting for a start-up alternative-fuel company. They would rather field phone calls from venture capitalists. They would rather control their own destiny and build their own business.

“The safe lifestyle of 9-to-5 isn’t going to work for me,” says Jordan. “We’re building our business at full speed. Failure is not an option.”

Bosek and Jordan are the founders of Jorsek, where they are developing a virtual operating system on the Web that will provide workflow efficiencies for small- to mid-sized companies.

Jorsek is one example of the many activities taking place within the Albert J. Simone Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship. More than $3 million has been raised from more than 200 donors for the center, named in honor of RIT’s recently retired eighth president. A portion of the funds will be used to support an endowed professorship in Simone’s name.

The center connects students with Venture Creations, an RIT subsidiary that works with faculty, staff, alumni and with outside businesses to bring technologies to market.

Students have the opportunity to work in the same building as Venture Creations, a business incubator, where they have access to business-startup expertise from faculty, graduate students and alumni. There are 10 start-up companies in Venture Creations, located off John Street in Henrietta.

The Simone Center is designed to promote, nurture and expand innovation and entrepreneurship activities with the RIT community. It is divided into three distinct activities:

• Academic and campus-based programs featuring the Student Business Development Lab
• Commercial activities featuring Venture Creations
• Programs that integrate both off-campus and academic initiatives

“Students will have a chance to see start-up companies up close. They will see all the difficulties and challenges,” says Donald Boyd, RIT vice president for research. “It made sense to put Dr. Simone’s name with this center. He pushed hard to see this combination of students and start-up companies learning from each other. It falls into the Category-of-One concept, that we can do things differently than other business incubators.”

“How are we unique? Our advantage is that we are leveraging both teaching and creativity to create experiential events for our students,” says Richard DeMartino, associate professor of management in the E. Philip Saunders College of Business, who serves as director of academic and campus based programs within the center.

“Sure, we would love to see the students create successful businesses. But our larger goal is to give the students a real-life business experience.

“They will learn the process of commercializing technology through businesses. RIT will provide a map to guide future entrepreneurs through the complex process of product commercialization.

The program is designed to provide a unique applied experience to students seeking to gain learning in entrepreneurship and product commercialization.”

DeMartino says more than 200 students per year provide some form of support to the incubator companies or student business teams, mostly marketing and strategy reports.

One area where DeMartino sees a distinct RIT advantage is building entrepreneurship in digital-related products and services. Jorsek fits into this niche. Through strategic partnerships and consulting, Jorsek will be marketing their product to businesses seeking a powerful Web presence or company intranet applications.

And thanks to having offices in Venture Creations, Bosek and Jordan have also done some Web consulting for Cerion Energy. Cerion, a startup company that recently hatched from the incubator, makes a product that makes diesel fuel burn more cleanly and efficiently.

It is this type of collaboration and entrepreneurial spirit that excites Boyd and DeMartino. They also see the center as an important asset to the Rochester community. “We need to promote entrepreneurship with the technical strengths of the Rochester community,” says DeMartino.

For information, visit the Simone center website.