Protomet

The story of Protomet begins with Jeff Bohannon who received his bachelor's and master's in mechanical and industrial engineering respectively from the University of Tennessee. His professional career began at Y-12 as a co-op where he participated in a 2 year rotational program geared towards upper management. He decided to leave ORNL and take on the risk of becoming an entrepreneur. His endeavors began as a consultant for Y-12 which lead to his desire of wanting to make parts. Jeff firm beliefs in writing out personal goals allowed him to be able to pursue his desire and begin his company. His first big contract came from Mercedes which consisted of a making one million parts for the automobile company. The per unit asking price was $4 to make a seat belt bushing. From this transaction Jeff learned that producing a high volume products is more lucrative than producing high end technology at a low volume. His biggest customers currently are Mastercraft and the Department of Homeland Security. Through his efforts he helps his customers understand the manufacturing process. He is also venturing into manufacturing a modular dome kit which has a retail value of $4200 which is half the cost of having the same dome hand made at a cost of $8500. Jeff attributes his success to his formula for innovation which is a step function as output increases input decreases therefore a steady input is required to balance the two.

Jeff speaking to our class about a copper machined part.

Material is sent into the warehouse where it is machined to it specified part.
Modular kits are formed for customers.
Machine used to make parts.

Control Technology Incorporated (CTI, Inc)

CTI, Inc. was another wonderful experience, which provided insight into the world beyond SBIRs and establishing a company for the long haul and not the quick money. Mark Medley is a good friend of Dr. Martin for about 20 years. His start came about in the early 1990s when Mark met with the head of Sony in Japan in the early 1990s and obtained some useful information about letting machines do their jobs of repetition and allow humans to do their job and apply logic.

In 1972 Mark started 2 companies with 4 fraternity brothers where they published magazines for high school and college as a small business. The money was borrowed from parents, professors, friends, and friendly bankers. Before Mark ventured into his own business he worked for Proctor and Gamble as a manufacturing manager head of making pampers. The decision to leave came about when he noticed his father pass up the opportunity to leave his profession and gamble as a business owner. Mark dislikes venture capitalists because he believes that they force small business to make decisions that are not in the small business best interest.

After his initial business he focused on making a product that a large corporation such as Texas Instruments can benefit. He found holes in their product where he would not compete against the larger businesses. His company also sold his product to Siemens where they eventually began competing against this giant. Siemens soon after sued Mark's company by stating that Mark stole their design. The court hearing took place in Nashville where Siemens ceased the arguments after $250,000.

A generally principle that Mark believes in is to govern with rules, use broad policies, and deal with one or two individuals. Last Mark stressed the importance of finding a balance in life between spiritual, family, and health. Mark started CTI in 1980 and knew then it was a company to harvest and grow.

Circuit Board to Commemorate 1,000,000 Shipment.

Pieces of manufacturing assembly

Completed circuit boards

Mark speaking to our class

Visit with Joe Matteo

My visit to Joe Matteo's operation was an exceptional site to see to say the very least. This 1989 Inventor of the Year recipient for Defense Robotics truly has the talents to be an entrepreneur. His numerous collaboration effort throughout the years has set him up to be in the right place at what seems to be all the right times. His early focus was on medical devices and toys which has brought him through a journey full of excitement and success. The former owner of CTI took the company and went public in which he sold his 1/2 of the company for $6 billion. The focus of this company was protein acceleration. In 1994 he took his first leap into entrepreneurship with a company named Matteo Automation and Robotics. Through this company he wrote 2 successful SBIRs for NASA. This is where he came into contact with Dr. Martin. Other achievements through this venture were 2 issued patents which allowed him to venture into rapid prototyping. Joe achieved many skill sets when the opportunity presented it self to become Division Director of CTI where he acquired such skills as R&D management, Manufacturing, Marketing, Facilities, Contracts, Sales, Business Development, and Service. Joe is a true believe that everyone is exposed to great opportunities in their life it is up to the individual to jump on the opportunity. This led Joe to the field of micro-fluidics where he was involved in Nanotek in 2004. Being in a small business he had the chance to be "mean and lean" which was used as his leverage for rapid prototyping. Through this venture he made more contacts through such agencies as UT, Siemens, and GSK. He was awarded 1 patent in this time frame and has 3 pending. The product of this company sold their devices for $200,000 a piece. His company Nanotek was situated in a 4200 sq. foot building. The focus of this operation was to make it appear legit and a world class research facility. In 2006 he had 6 full time employees. The companies success included 5 SBIRs, 7 commercial units sold, and outsourced resources. Nanotek was acquired in August 2008 by Advion BioSciences. This left Joe able to begin his new company MicroTypes with the umbrella business structure to include: proprietary product development, development services, and partnerships. He is currently 10 months into this company and already has reason to be successful. He currently has a DARPA funded project, partnership in progress with IONix Devices, patent in progress, contract with a R&D company, consulting, and other collaboration efforts. Finally Joe was kind enough to leave us with a few words of wisdom. Build skills to recognize opportunities, get a financial planner now, maximize staying power, surround yourself with role models, and to most importantly be a role model yourself. I truly thank Joe for taking the time to invite our class to his home and for sharing his story.

Protein Discovery

The first place that we visited in the Survey of Technology Entrepreneurship course is Protein Discovery. The owner is impressive in his own right due to the fact that he managed to start this tech company without having a background in science or technology. This UTK MBA prior to going into entrepreneurship worked for a phone service provider in which he felt his efforts weren't fully rewarded. This was enough motivation to become an entrepreneur. Originally he wanted a service based company but that idea was changed to a product based company. He began his endeavor by writing 25 SBIR proposals in 6 months. Out of the 25 only 2 received Phase I funding. The idea that stuck was about to receive a million dollars in venture capital when his partner backed. I can only imagine the feelings that are going at this point of time.

The office space that the company is located in is in a life science tool space building in downtown Knoxville. In 2007/2008 the owner achieved completion of the protein prep device. The initial selling cost of this device was an astonishing $50,000. This initial device was considered a failure for several reasons. In 2008 the company received $10 million from a group out of Texas. The new and improved product sells for $15,000 which was launched in June 2009. I believe this story is just the first of many that I will personally find of great interest during the remainder of the semester.

I used my cell phone to take pictures of my visit but I believe I pressed the wrong button to save. This is something that I will try to correct on our next visit.