Launched in 2022, Yale Ventures, the home to Yale’s innovation programs and centers, has worked closely with students across Yale, including the Yale School of Public Health. Students can participate during the academic year, and as associates and fellows during the summer.
Yale Ventures supports faculty and students from YSPH, including Executive Master of Public Health students, by providing business training, research funding, and recognition awards. In turn, these faculty members and students help to generate strategic insights that help accelerate the pace of Yale innovation and the commercialization of Yale research, said Amy Kundrat, Yale Venture’s director of innovation community.
By working with YSPH Dean Dr. Megan L. Ranney, MD, and Senior Fellow and Lecturer Kaakpema “KP” Yelpaala, MPH ’06, Yale Ventures looks forward to deepening its work with students and faculty at YSPH, Kundrat added. This summer, Yale Ventures will become a neighbor, as it plans to move into 101 College Street, a new life sciences hub adjacent to the YSPH campus.
Yale Ventures invites EMPH students to engage with the organization, from attending events to working on its teams as an associate, which EMPH students can do remotely.
Yale Ventures is unique in its approach and scope, Kundrat said. “Many universities silo their innovation functions, separating innovation centers, accelerators, corporate strategy, and their technology transfer office… Yale Ventures is a framework that brings it all together under one umbrella,” she said.
Each year, Yale Ventures recruits students to join its interdisciplinary teams as Yale Ventures Associates, supporting Yale faculty, industry experts, and Yale Ventures staff in a wide array of projects. On Oct. 16, Yale Ventures announced its new cohort of 48 students, 16 more students than its 2022-2023 class and its largest cohort to date.
“The Yale innovation and entrepreneurship community is a critical part of the future of Yale,” Rory Bonner SOM ’23, who engages with Yale Ventures through the Venture Lab Fellowship, said. “The Yale faculty are investigating cutting-edge scientific and technological advances through their research that can be successfully commercialized and brought to market.”
The first cohort of Yale Ventures’ summer associates launched on June 12, welcoming 14 students from Yale College, Yale School of Management, and YSPH to support Yale Ventures’ innovations by generating strategic insights on its projects and initiatives.
Students can participate in work at the Yale Center for Biomedical Innovation and Technology, and in faculty accelerator funds such as Blavatnik Associates, Canaan-Yale Fellows, Colton Associates, Venture Lab Fellows, and Roberts Fund Associates. Students can also engage in the organization’s four primary teams: the Intellectual Property and Licensing Services unit, the Innovation Training and Startups team, the Corporate Partnerships team, and the Innovation Community team.
“Having direct contacts and resources with the various health care, entrepreneurial, and professional centers is priceless,” MiChaela Barker ’24, an MBA/MPH student who took part in the Yale Ventures Summer Associate program, wrote in a Yale SOM article in July. “I am so thankful for all of the people that I have met during my time here [at Yale Ventures].”
Yale Ventures is led by Managing Director Josh Geballe, the senior associate provost for entrepreneurship and innovation at Yale University. Kundrat has been with Yale Ventures since its inception helping the organization build an ecosystem that connects and promotes the people, spaces, and ideas across Yale’s innovation and entrepreneurship ecosystem, both on and off campus.
The Yale Ventures team works to elevate the profile of Yale innovation and tell stories about Yale innovators through communications and marketing, in addition to finding new ways to support founders through on-campus networking events or launching new programs.
“In President Salovey’s 2013 inaugural address, he encouraged us to do more to nurture student and faculty entrepreneurs across Yale,” Geballe wrote in the October 2023 Yale Ventures Report. “Ten years later, we’ve made great progress but still have so many additional opportunities to help improve humanity.”