Ann Marie Sastry represents how big of a leap forward for technology transfer from U-M can go... and demonstrated it at the Detroit Auto Show.
Excerpt:
University of Michigan engineering professor Ann Marie Sastry – CEO and co-founder of a hot, new automotive battery development company – sits shivering in her overcoat in the cold Cobo basement at the Detroit auto show.
But Sastry and her company, Ann Arbor-based Sakti3, is far from "out in the cold." They are in the auto business for the long haul and do not plan on being relegated to a basement booth forever. Eventually, if all goes well, her company’s battery technology will be powering the cars upstairs on the main show floor's Electric Avenue.
What is it about the "Eureka moment" in her UM lab that prompted her to help found a company two years ago? What is it that turned the heads and opened the wallets of the Michigan Economic Development Corp. and cleantech venture capitalist Vinod Khosla, who chipped in $2 million out the gate? What exactly is her company’s battery technology?
Here's her answer: "We're interested in both materials and manufacturing technologies at Sakti3. So, we're sort of looking at the intersection of those things."
She pauses. She grins slightly, then says somewhat apologetically: "Sorry, I know that's not good enough."
This is Sastry's polite way of saying that any further information is proprietary. She will only add that, "We are working on a manufacturing technology, and we think that's one of the bottlenecks."
Read the rest of the story here.
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