Mark Billingsley, director of the University of Alaska Fairbanks‘ Tech Transfer Office and Innovation Hub, joined Beyond the Breakthrough in April 2022 and today we’re revisiting this conversation because it’s still one of the most unusual places covered on the podcast.

How do you do tech transfer when the US federal government’s definition of “rural communities” covers your whole state and rural to you means 30 people that live 200 miles from the nearest road?

Thankfully for Mark, Alaskans are an entrepreneurial culture. And while it is also a culture that is yet to fully embrace innovation, Alaska’s remoteness means startups and founders are much more resilient than they might be in the lower 48 states.

We will be back with a brand new episode next Friday — listen to the end for a sneak peek of our conversation with Kelley Rich from the University of Notre Dame’s IDEA Center, which does things a little differently to your typical tech transfer office and employs a team of more than 30 students.

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