Pitt innovators exploring entrepreneurship have many resources to assist them on their journey to impact through commercialization. None may be as valuable as the corps of volunteer mentors who give their time freely to help them navigate the often unfamiliar terrain. The 2023 Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship James "Chip" Hanlon Volunteer Mentor of the Year, Jan Berkow, is emblematic of the characteristics of an innovation mentor.
Jan is the program manager for commercialization at the University of Pittsburgh Center for Military Medicine Research, where he is responsible for bringing to market U.S. Department of Defense-funded advanced medical technologies.
He previously led InteloMed Inc., a Pitt startup company, as co-founder and chief technology officer. The medical device company leveraged private and federally funded military grants to develop noninvasive cardiovascular monitoring devices. For the past five years, he has served as a volunteer mentor on numerous Pitt innovation teams, helping to guide them through early commercialization exercises in customer discovery and value proposition development as part of the NSF I-Corps First Gear program, as well as assisting teams participating in the Michael G. Wells Student Healthcare Competition.
If you are someone with entrepreneurial experience and/or deep domain expertise in product development, marketing, finance or other critical areas for startup creation and would like to volunteer your time to assist a Pitt innovation team, contact us at innovate@pitt.edu with the subject line "Volunteer Mentor."