Contact: Kathryn Kopchik
570-577-3260
[email protected]
LEWISBURG, Pa. -- The Product Development Center (PDC) at Bucknell's Small Business Development Center has earned an award from the Pennsylvania Small Business Development Center for a system that helps entrepreneurs bring a concept to market.
The 2000 Star Performer Innovation Award, which recognizes innovative excellence for contributions to improved center performance, was given for Bucknell's PDC's Stage-Gate process.
John Politis, director of the Small Business Development Center (SBDC) at Bucknell, said the Stage-Gate process was introduced at the Bucknell-hosted 1999 Pennsylvania SBDC mini-conference in June.
"Since then, business consultants throughout the state SBDC network have adopted Stage-Gate as a management tool for assisting and referring qualified entrepreneurs to the PDC," he said. "Since July 1, the number of Bucknell PDC projects has increased from approximately 50 to 125."
The process also was presented at the 1999 American SBDC conference in San Diego, Calif., in October. As a result, "SBDCs from several states have contacted the Bucknell PDC for assistance in establishing a similar program," said Politis.
"One attendee, a patent officer from the Patent and Trademark Office in Washington, D.C., has requested a tour of the PDC and also has shared our Stage-Gate process with his PTO colleagues."
The stage-gate concept was originally proposed by Bob Cooper, an author and professor at the University of Ottawa, Canada. Politis and the PDC took the book and "adapted his process to meet our requirements. His approach was oriented more toward large businesses. We took his concept and applied it to small businesses," said Politis.
According to Politis, "The Stage-Gate process breaks the normal product development process into six different stages involving the client, consultants and engineers. A product will not proceed to stage three until it passes gate three."
The stages include a technical analysis of the idea, a patent search, engineering drawings, building and testing the product and development of a business plan.
"The process isn't always as structured as we'd like it to be; there are a lot of different variables involved. There's the technology aspect and the business aspect. We could build an outstanding product from a functional and technological standpoint but it could be dead on arrival as far as the marketplace is concerned. It's essential to develop the business strategy in parallel.
"Each step is managed by a gatekeeper -- a team of engineers, business consultants and the client -- who ensures that all the requirements have been met. The team evaluates progress at each stage and determines if the gate opens or closes," Politis said.
Using this process "forces us to concurrently move the technology forward while evaluating the marketability, competition, demographics and cost," he said.
In addition to Bucknell students and staff, the SBDC is working with a group of students at Penn State who are developing a Stage-Gate decision support system as their senior design project. "It will be an automated database system which will allow the users/consultants -- even if they're not engineers -- to facilitate their evaluation of a technological product development.
"For example, a consultant in Pittsburgh will be able to confer with a client, key the answers into the database and forward it to Bucknell. We'll integrate into our database and that will facilitate the decision process at the gate and make everything more objective."
The PDC, which assists inventors and small firms in transforming their ideas into marketable products, combines traditional SBDC management services with the resources and expertise of the engineering department.
Facilities include a fully equipped machine shop, computer-aided drafting and machining equipment and state-of-the-art laboratories. Students work with faculty, staff and entrepreneurs to move ideas from the drawing board to the market. Services include patent searches, manufacturing support, prototype design and engineering analysis as well as development of a business strategy.
Representatives from the Bucknell SBDC will present the Stage-Gate process at the annual ASBDC conference in Miami, Fla., this fall. According to Politis, it will be a follow-on presentation, "describing not only the process but the lessons we've learned and the progress we've made in refining the process this past year.
"We're looking forward to sharing our model with other entrepreneurs and technology centers," he said.
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For more information about this process, call John Politis at 570-577-1249.
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