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.