Building resilience to climate challenges demands innovative technologies and approaches, particularly in observation and information systems

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) awarded a $450,960 Cooperative Agreement under the Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS) program (CFDA 11.012) to the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) to support the development of an accelerator program focused on climate resilience technologies and entrepreneurial innovations.

The funding will enable WHOI, in partnership with Babson College and other industry collaborators, to design and launch an accelerator program to support early-stage companies working on ocean observation, climate data, and market-ready products and services relevant to NOAA's climate resilience mission. Key elements of the accelerator program include providing entrepreneurial training, facilitating stakeholder workshops, and developing a tailored curriculum to help translate research into commercialized solutions. The accelerator aims to effectively link research, development, demonstration, deployment, and manufacturing to advance NOAA's climate resilience goals.

Startup companies are critical to building these capacities, yet they face many challenges on the pathway to commercialization. We propose an accelerator program that marries entrepreneurial training with the resources of flagship academic and industry partners to support early-stage companies taking their products through development and onto the market. Our partnership brings institutional capacities that will further enable, develop, and accelerate technologies into market-ready products, services, and processes. The woods hole oceanographic institution (whoi) has world class facilities and domain knowledge in ocean-based observation technologies and ecosystem services. Babson college is a preeminent business school for entrepreneurship. Our private sector partners (analog devices INC., national instruments, first horizon bank, and propeller VC) provide industry perspectives for product development and go-to-market strategies, as well as connecting US with large networks of investors and capital providers. We aim to build an integrated translational enterprise that effectively and efficiently links research, development, demonstration, deployment, and manufacturing with noaas climate-resilience mission goals.