IEEE entrepreneurs urge federal labs to plug into Hard Tech Venture Summit to accelerate lab-to-market paths

Joanne Wong, a volunteer with IEEE Entrepreneurship, and Cassandra Carruthers, founder of Departure Capital, said the Hard Tech Venture Summit is designed to help hardware-heavy startups bridge the gap between lab prototypes and large‑scale manufacturing and markets.

"We regularly attend many terrific conferences...but the main way the Hard Tech Venture Summit is looking to be different is simply to create a highly curated, literally hand selected group of people," Carruthers said, describing a format that limits panels and centers the day on small roundtable discussions with founders, investors and ecosystem partners.

The organizers said they launched the series to address specific barriers—manufacturability, supply‑chain logistics, certification and long R&D cycles—that hard‑tech founders face compared with software startups. "You have to get back to the basics and the foundations...you need atoms, not just bits," Wong said, summarizing the technical drivers behind renewed investor interest in hardware.

Wong and Carruthers described a three‑location rollout in 2026 (Silicon Valley, Boston and a Canada event) and said the summit sequence includes a half‑day focused on manufacturability with mentors who are manufacturing engineers and manufacturers. Attendees from the inaugural summit gave organizers a 4.6 out of 5 recommendation rating, the guests said.

Both guests invited federal labs and tech transfer offices to engage. "We have a multitude of research labs that they're looking to commercialize...It's like a hidden gem that no one knows about," Wong said, encouraging labs to consider sending spinouts, leveraging lab testing and prototyping services, and using the FLC and partner networks to find industry partners.

Organizers provided contact paths: Joanne Wong (Joanne.Wong@ieee.org) and Cassandra Carruthers (Cassandra@departure.vc or Cassandra@ieee.org), and asked that interested federal lab representatives check the summit website and reach out for partnership opportunities.

The podcast framed IEEE's effort as complementary to the Federal Laboratory Consortium for Technology Transfer (FLC) and other intermediaries (AUTM). Organizers said their long‑term goal is measurable relationship building—tracking capital introductions, contract outcomes or other partnerships that date back to summit meetings.

The episode closes with the organizers inviting federal lab staff and tech transfer offices to attend future summits and to use FLC and partner channels to amplify awareness of lab capabilities.