Update on U of C Booth L3C event

This is from the Linked In L3C Connect and Marc Lane:

Group: L3C Connect
Subject: Announcement from L3C Connect — U. of C. Seeks Foundations to Invest in Promising Medical and Scientific Research
Many university tech transfer offices are struggling with the funding gap associated with “translational research” that brings “orphan drugs,” medical devices, complex computing solutions, new materials and other technologies to market. While public and private-sector grants fund the initial stages of commercialization, the universities have struggled to secure funding to get to specific becnhmarks where angel or venture capital, or a licensing arrangement with a major company, would be attractive.

Booth Graduate School of Business at the University of Chicago is doing something about it. Booth will be hosting a Mission Investment Forum — the first of many, it is hoped — built around the L3C. Students and professors will actively source and screen potential translational research deals coming from the University and other parts of the Chicago community. This same team will select three or four strong deals, conduct further research and then prepare the companies to make a presentation at the Forum. I’ve been asked to provide the educational component.

If you know of a foundation whose management may be interested in participating, particularly a foundation that has previously supported medical or scientific research through grants or investments, please let me know (at 312-372-5000) and I’ll be happy to provide the particulars. This is an extraordinary opportunity.

Marc

Ill gets L3Cs and Chicago Community Trust/Knight $ offered for news orgs of all types!

banner_2jpg.jpegWhat a week – Gov. Quinn signs L3Cs into law AND the Chicago Community Trust with the Knight Foundation Community Information Challenge offers funding for Community News that Matters to NPOs, to for-profits [we hope like the L3C], as well as to individuals – an incredible offering to the future of Chicago’s news stream!

Oh please, let’s see some collaboration here.The deadline is tight and fast approaching: Sept. 15.

Community News Matters

The Chicago Community Trust has created an innovative new program, Community News Matters, to spur the growth of new sources of local news and information about the Chicago region, in conjunction with the Knight Community Information Challenge. Through September 15, the Trust is soliciting proposals from nonprofits, for-profit businesses and individuals for new activities and projects that:

• Increase the flow of truthful, accurate and insightful local news and information in the Chicago region in new ways that engage residents, bring important issues to light, help people make sense of things and enable them to work together to find solutions;

• Help the Chicago region’s cutting-edge media innovators develop new forms, methods and models for providing this information that can be sustainable in the future.

There’s also a special information meeting:

Friday, August 21, 2009
10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m.
26th Floor Conference Room
111 East Wacker Drive
Chicago, IL 60601

The New News: Journalism We Want and Need, was the first part of the Community Trust’s initiative. The CCT went on to say:

Based on the findings of this report and recommendations received from the project’s advisory committee members, the Trust is issuing this Community News Matters Request for Proposals (RFP). The purpose of the RFP is to support and stimulate development of new ways to provide the Chicago region with the local news and information residents need to be good citizens and to improve both their quality of life and the vitality of their communities.

In November, the Trust will award grants and contracts to nonprofit organizations, individuals and for-profit companies for
activities and projects.

The CCT says awards may be as large as $100,000, most will be in the range of $25,000 to $50,000. But the CCT does not say how many grants it will be making or how large the fund is.