{"id":19404,"date":"2016-04-19T21:44:15","date_gmt":"2016-04-19T13:44:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/tech-entrepreneur-naveen-jain-fleshes-out-plans-for-bluedot-innovation-factory\/"},"modified":"2016-04-19T21:44:15","modified_gmt":"2016-04-19T13:44:15","slug":"tech-entrepreneur-naveen-jain-fleshes-out-plans-for-bluedot-innovation-factory","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/tech-entrepreneur-naveen-jain-fleshes-out-plans-for-bluedot-innovation-factory\/","title":{"rendered":"Tech entrepreneur Naveen Jain fleshes out plans for BlueDot innovation factory"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_244691\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-244691\" style=\"width: 630px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full-width wp-image-244691\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/160419-jain-630x604.jpeg\" alt=\"Naveen Jain\" width=\"630\" height=\"604\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/160419-jain-630x604.jpeg 630w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/160419-jain-768x736.jpeg 768w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/160419-jain-1240x1188.jpeg 1240w, https:\/\/cdn.geekwire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/160419-jain.jpeg 1693w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 630px) 100vw, 630px\"><figcaption data-nosnippet=\"\" id=\"caption-attachment-244691\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Entrepreneur Naveen Jain takes a zero-G airplane flight. (Credit: Naveen Jain \/ Zero Gravity Corp. via Twitter)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Naveen Jain\u2019s Moon Express is well along in its plans for a lunar mission next year, but the Seattle dot-com entrepreneur is also pursuing \u201cmoonshots\u201d here on Earth through his BlueDot venture.<\/p>\n<p>BlueDot, based in Bellevue, Wash., came into the open last November with the goal of turning the discoveries made at research institutions around the country into innovative products. At the time, Jain told GeekWire that the venture\u2019s first technological targets would be charging devices that harvest ambient energy and non-invasive devices that detect pathogens.<\/p>\n<p>Now we\u2019re learning how BlueDot plans to proceed, and how much it will take.<\/p>\n<p>CNBC reports that the venture has brought in $8.3 million in investment, which translates into a valuation of $60 million. And NASA astronaut Scott Parazynski&nbsp;has surfaced as the company\u2019s co-founder and chief technology officer.<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s an interesting choice: Parazynski is an M.D. who served as&nbsp;John Glenn\u2019s \u201cpersonal physician\u201d during his history-making space shuttle flight in 1998. After leaving NASA, he took on extreme adventures ranging from an Everest climb to medical service in Antarctica. There\u2019s even a local connection: His parents live in Bellevue.<\/p>\n<p>The venture\u2019s other founders include chief operating officer Deepak Savadatti, who has long experience in the semiconductor industry; and Sony Mordechai, a serial entrepreneur and investor who\u2019s the company\u2019s chief information officer.<\/p>\n<p><iframe title=\"The most scarce resource on the planet: Mindset of abundance | Naveen Jain | TEDxBerkeley\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/KX78jynWLD0?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen=\"\" data-ratio=\"0.5625\" data-width=\"800\" data-height=\"450\" style=\"display: block; margin: 0px; width: 800px; height: 450px;\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>BlueDot\u2019s&nbsp;astronaut angle, and Jain\u2019s status as co-founder and chairman of Moon Express, demonstrate that the veteran of the InfoSpace, Intelius and Talentwise is open to further frontiers. That goes not only for space travel, but also for new approaches to tech development.<\/p>\n<p>Jain says that BlueDot is \u201cnot an incubator or an accelerator, but an entirely new asset class.\u201d He points out that the federal government spends tens of billions of dollars a year on research and development, but that many of the resulting technologies don\u2019t get&nbsp;commercialized because they\u2019re not quite ready for prime time.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"icon-quotes-left\"><\/span>&nbsp;The sort of technology I\u2019m seeing is just mind-blowing.<span class=\"icon-quotes-right\"><\/span><\/p>\n<p>BlueDot\u2019s business model involves licensing technologies developed at a research center, then putting together a management team to create a company around that technology.&nbsp;BlueDot owns the company, while the research center receives royalties as a payback on the government\u2019s investment.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOur model is simple: If you can find a technology that can help a billion people, there\u2019s no doubt in my mind that you can create a $10 billion company,\u201d Jain told GeekWire.<\/p>\n<p>For instance?<\/p>\n<p>\u201cImagine a spray that you can spray on a Kleenex, and when you sneeze on it, it will tell you whether you\u2019re sick,\u201d Jain said. The color of that&nbsp;wet tissue&nbsp;could tell you whether you have the sniffles or something more serious.<\/p>\n<p>Other prospects include hand-held&nbsp;MRI-type diagnostic devices,&nbsp;and genetic-engineering strategies to keep mosquitoes from spreading malaria.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe sort of technology I\u2019m seeing is just mind-blowing,\u201d Jain said.<\/p>\n<p>The way Jain sees it, commercializing those technologies could help billions of people, and make billions of dollars in the process. That may sound ambitious \u2013&nbsp;but that\u2019s what moonshots are all about.<\/p>\n<p><em>This report was updated at 2:10 p.m. PT April 19 with further comments from Jain.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Entrepreneur Naveen Jain takes a zero-G airplane flight. (Credit: Naveen Jain \/ Zero Gravity Corp. via Twitter) Naveen Jain\u2019s Moon Express is well along in its plans for a lunar mission next year, but the Seattle dot-com entrepreneur is also pursuing \u201cmoonshots\u201d here on Earth through his BlueDot venture. BlueDot, based in Bellevue, Wash., came [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[5566,5157,21],"class_list":["post-19404","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-bluedot","tag-naveen-jain","tag-space"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19404"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19404"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19404\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19404"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19404"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19404"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}