Michigan engineers medical fund

Michigan University has launched its Monroe-Brown Seed Fund aimed at funding viable engineering and medical research projects and bringing them to market.

The fund is a collaboration between the College of Engineering’s Center for Entrepreneurship and the Medical School’s Fast Forward Medical Innovation program. It is backed with a $3m gift from the Monroe-Brown Foundation.

The Monroe-Brown Foundation is a memorial to Monroe Brown and Robert Brown. It was established in 1986 to promote higher education for students in Michigan, with the aim to keep talented and entrepreneurial students in Kalamazoo County.

The seed fund will invest in businesses that bring together the engineering and medical schools such as companies operating in the medical device, diagnostic, health IT and digital health sectors.

David Munson, the Robert Vlasic dean of engineering at Michigan University, said: “The fund will give our school additional ways to apply our faculty and students’ illustrious research to solving society’s complex problems in health care.”

Marschall Runge, executive vice president for medical affairs and dean of the Medical School, said: “The new fund will help us attract and retain world-class researchers as well as biomedical entrepreneurs.”