Solutions Fair 3

John Sinnott

John Sinnott is the program manager for the Industrial Partnerships Program, part of the Cornell Center for Materials Research (CCMR). The mission of the program is to promote active cooperation between Cornell and industry, foster technology transfer, and support economic development in New York State. John joined the CCMR Industrial Partnerships Program in April of 2009. He has over 25 years of experience working on University-based research projects in Physics, Engineering, and Materials Science. Prior to joining the Industrial Partnerships Program, John managed the CCMR Materials preparation and testing facilities helping numerous companies with technical challenges. He worked at Yale University for 12 years prior to coming to Cornell in 1998. John is a graduate of the Bridgeport Engineering Institute and a Mechanical Engineering major from the University of New Haven.

Paul Goldfarb

Paul Goldfarb is the Director of Business Development for the Center for Advanced Information Management (CAIM) at Columbia University. In this role Paul leads new internal and external business and industry relations as well as marketing efforts on behalf of CAIM. He also manages all financial budgeting, expenditures, and reporting operations. He has represented CAIM at numerous industry, government, and academic events and conferences and lectured on entrepreneurship at Columbia Business School. Paul brings a varied range of experience to the Columbia Center for Advanced Technology (CAT). A CAT veteran, he previously worked for the New York University CAT in Digital Media. His prior employment in the entertainment industry includes work with NBC, ABC, Dragon's Head Productions as well as with the BBC in London. Paul is also the co-founder of a small film production company. Paul received his BFA degree from New York University and an MBA from Columbia University.

Shivendra S. Panwar, Ph.D

Shivendra S. Panwar is a Professor in the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department at Polytechnic Institute of New York University. He received the B.Tech. degree in electrical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur, in 1981, and the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical and computer engineering from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, in 1983 and 1986, respectively.

He joined the Department of Electrical Engineering at the Polytechnic Institute of New York, Brooklyn (now Polytechnic Institute of New York University). He is currently the Director of the New York State Center for Advanced Technology in Telecommunications (CATT). He spent the summer of 1987 as a Visiting Scientist at the IBM T.J. Watson Research Center, Yorktown Heights, NY, and has been a Consultant to AT&T Bell Laboratories, Holmdel, NJ. His research interests include the performance analysis and design of networks. Current work includes cooperative wireless networks, switch performance and multimedia transport over networks.

John A. Blaho, Ph.D

John A. Blaho, Ph.D, is the Academic Center Director for University-Industry Collaborations within the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research at the CUNY Center for Advanced Technology. In his position at CUNY, Dr. Blaho is responsible for creating and maintaining productive sponsored research projects between industrial entities and CUNY research faculty. Dr. Blaho was trained as a chemical engineer and performed National Science Foundation-supported research on biomass conversion. Prior to joining CUNY, Dr. Blaho served a full time Chief Scientific Officer function at a biotech company in Princeton, NJ. During his tenure in the biotech sector, Dr. Blaho held a Full Member (Professor) position at the Cancer Institute of New Jersey and was a Visiting Scholar in Systems Biology at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton. He is currently an Adjunct Full Professor of Molecular Biology at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey and an Adjunct Full Professor of Microbiology at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine.

Colleen Gibney

As Technology Consultant and Small Business Innovation Research Program (SBIR) Director for ITAC, Colleen works to grow companies and to retain jobs in New York State. As a New York State SBIR Regional Specialist, she also performs outreach in the Hudson Valley and on Long Island. Colleen provides consulting services for small technology firms and advanced manufacturers in New York City seeking Research and Development funding, new product development processes, and university assistance to develop and commercialize innovative new intellectual property. A certified facilitator of The Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation’s FastTrac® TechVenture, GrowthVenture, and NewVenture entrepreneurship training programs, Colleen also provides consulting in lean product development, lean and sustainable design, technology-driven market intelligence, technology scouting, and ExporTech.

Prior to working at ITAC, Colleen served as Project Manager for the CUNY Institute for Software Design and Development (CISDD), where she managed CISDD’s two-year National Science Foundation Partnerships for Innovation grant, and as a project manager in the software industry. Colleen holds an MSIS in Information Management from Stevens Institute of Technology, an MA in International Affairs from The George Washington University, and an AB in Asian Studies from Mount Holyoke College.