Grants from a state-sponsored development corporation will help six Maryland start-up companies turn their research into revenue.
The Maryland Technology Development Corp. last week announced it had allotted around $450,000 in grants to six firms. The grants were made through TEDCO’s Maryland Technology Transfer Fund, which has a $2.25 million budget for 2007.
The grants are often key in enablng small firms without much capital to transform research they have done in federal or university laboratories into marketable products, said Renée Winsky, the organization’s recently appointed executive director.
MobiLabs LLC, a three-person company based in Silver Spring, will use its $75,000 grant to develop an Internet search tool that Internet service providers can use to direct their customers toward local businesses. With the tool, which will be marketed to Internet service providers, customers do not have to rely on giants such as Google or Yahoo for their needs, said Hisham Kassab, the company’s co-president.
“Research is quite expensive, so this will be very, very helpful,” Kassab said, noting the company is also aided by connections the grant gives them to University of Maryland researchers.
Two Gaithersburg-based biotechnology companies also received TEDCO grants; Hygea BioPharma Inc., which is working on a vaccine for chickens against the infectious bursal disease virus, and Immunomic Therapeudics Inc., which is working to enhance DNA vaccines using a certain type of protein.
BCG Wireless LLC of Reisterstown, Dockside Vision Inc. of Baltimore and Nano Solutions Inc. of Tall Timbers also received grants.
