![\"v_butoday_16-9888-PRATT-027\"](\"\/federal\/files\/2017\/06\/v_butoday_16-9888-PRATT-027.jpg\")
Mike Pratt has been promoted to managing director of the Technology Development Office after being interim managing director since August 2015. Photo (right) by Jackie Ricciardi.<\/em><\/p>\nTalk about taking one for the team. In 2008, BU researcher\u00a0Ed Damiano<\/a>\u00a0needed a couple of healthy adults as controls for the first human clinical trials of the bionic pancreas for people with type 1 diabetes that he\u2019d been working on for several years.\u00a0Mike Pratt<\/a>\u00a0volunteered. He spent 27 hours in a bed at Massachusetts General Hospital with IVs attached to both arms. An administrator with the\u00a0Technology Development Office<\/a>\u00a0(OTD) for 17 years, Pratt says he was inspired by the College of Engineering biomedical engineering professor\u2019s research mission\u2014to improve the lives of children with the disease. \u201cI believed in Ed\u2019s work,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n Now, after leading OTD as interim managing director since August 2015, Pratt (Questrom\u201913) has been named to the position. As University leaders have undertaken a critical review of OTD over the past year, Pratt has been instrumental in refocusing the office\u2019s goals: \u201cto provide prompt, informed service to faculty inventors\/creators while protecting and licensing their creations through clear, transparent, and efficient processes,\u201d Gloria Waters, vice president and associate provost for research, writes in a letter announcing Pratt\u2019s promotion. Waters commends Pratt\u2019s vision for \u201cfurther enhancing BU\u2019s ability to interact with industry\u201d in order to promote \u201cthe institutional goal of widespread dissemination\/use for societal benefit.\u201d<\/p>\n For Pratt, who holds a BA in physics from the College of the Holy Cross and an MBA from the Questrom School of Business, his job at OTD is an opportunity to connect people from two different worlds\u2014academia and industry. \u201cIt\u2019s an important responsibility to try and commercialize these technologies so more people can benefit from all the hard work that goes into research and discovery,\u201d he says. \u201cPeople connecting with people to solve common problems: that\u2019s tech transfer to me.\u201d<\/p>\n Getting a discovery to market can take years\u2014if it gets there at all\u2014and Pratt says his goal is for OTD to help faculty navigate the paperwork, and the inevitable obstacles, as smoothly as possible. \u201cWe\u2019re not a gatekeeper,\u201d he says. \u201cWe\u2019re an enabler. We want people to view tech transfer not as an administrative burden, but as an office that helped them through this difficult process and didn\u2019t hold them back.\u201d<\/p>\n OTD should enable faculty to fulfill their own visions for collaborating with industry, he says. \u201cWe want to empower faculty to make good choices, but we also need to draft legal agreements that protect the institution from downstream liabilities.\u201d<\/p>\n Pratt joined OTD in May 2000 as a licensing associate responsible for inventions that came out of research in the physical sciences. Over the years, he has held a series of different roles, each with increasing responsibility: director of corporate business development, director of translational research and corporate relations, executive director of business development. Before coming to BU, he was the global support manager at\u00a0NESLAB Instruments, Inc.<\/a>, of Portsmouth, N.H.<\/p>\n In 2015, Pratt\u2019s office helped Damiano navigate a mountain of licensing and intellectual property agreements to start Beta Bionics, Inc., as a\u00a0public benefit corporation<\/a>. The company\u2019s mission is to serve the type 1 diabetes community by getting Damiano\u2019s bionic pancreas through final clinical trials and the regulatory process and into commercialization.<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s BU empowering Ed to pursue his dream the way he wants to pursue it,\u201d Pratt says. \u201cIf we were just trying to make money, someone would have said to Ed, \u2018Don\u2019t do it that way.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Damiano credits Pratt with guiding him and his Beta Bionics partners through \u201can incredibly complex licensing deal involving many stakeholders, under an absurdly short timeline, and through the 2015 holiday season.\u201d<\/p>\n It was on a Friday night in mid November 2015 that Damiano let Pratt know that he had to complete the licensing paperwork for\u00a0Beta Bionics<\/a>\u00a0before the end of the year. \u201cWe went to Ed\u2019s house that Saturday,\u201d says Pratt. \u201cWe said, \u2018If we\u2019re going to get this done, we\u2019d better start right now.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Pratt and his team \u201caccomplished in six weeks what most academic institutions wouldn\u2019t be able to do in six months,\u201d Damiano says. \u201cBoston University is extremely fortunate to have Mike\u2019s dedication, talent, and commitment to lead its Technology Development Office.\u201d<\/p>\n