The Commercialization Planning Workshop: Bringing New Corrections Ideas to the Marketplace

Working in any field may eventually spark ideas among professionals about how technologies could be improved to make work more efficient. Indeed, many law enforcement and corrections officers, as well as entrepreneurs and private industries, have ideas about technologies that could aid law enforcement and corrections communities. The process of taking an idea through the development stage and all the way to store shelves can be daunting, discouraging many would-be inventors from pursuing their ideas. OLETC was developed specifically to assist in the commercialization process of technologies designed to aid law enforcement and corrections agencies. OLETC has teamed up with Mohawk Research Corporation to take its commercialization assistance one step further by offering a 5-day workshop that outlines the tools, procedures, and information necessary to navigate the commercialization process. The workshop is offered 3 times a year to groups of 12 workshop participants, selected by the OLETC on the basis of the feasibility of their idea for criminal justice applications. With the assistance of OLETC and Mohawk, would-be inventors are encouraged to think big. Endnotes