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The Tritech Small Business Development Center, which is part of the Riverside Community College District, has partnered with NASA in an attempt to create jobs and apply space technology to Inland Empire businesses. The agreement isn’t unprecedented: TriTech has a similar pact with a branch of the U.S. Navy.
It seems like one of the most incongruous partnerships imaginable: the TriTech Small Business Development Center, which is part of the Riverside Community College District joining ranks with the agency that put a man on the moon and developed the space shuttle.
But that’s what happened April 17, when TriTech and NASA officials signed a contract designed to create jobs and bring 21st century space technology to small businesses in Riverside and San Bernardino counties.
The Space Act Agreement will require both entities to seek out technology and other practices developed by small businesses that NASA might use, said Mark Mitchell, TriTech’s director.
NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center, located at Edwards Air Force Base near Lancaster, will carry out the space agency’s share of the partnership, which is scheduled to last five years.
The final part of the agreement – Regional Economic Development, or RED – is meant to carry out TriTech’s basic mission: create businesses, retain jobs and help small businesses in the Inland Empire get access to capital.
This is the first time that NASA – which has had its budget cut every year for the past 10 years, including a $330 million reduction last year – has partnered with a community college district. The agreement, which will allow TriTech to license NASA research and development technologies, took about a year and a half to put together, Mitchell said.
One reason Corona-based TriTech is a good fit for NASA is that, out of several thousand small business development centers in the United States, it’s one of only a few that focuses on high-tech, high-growth businesses.
“NASA and community college does seem like a strange partnership, especially when you consider that TriTech is not a very big organization,” Mitchell said. “But NASA wants to increase its access to small businesses, not just in the Inland Empire but all over Southern California, and that’s what we’re going to help them do.”
This will not be the first time TriTech has worked with a well-known agency of the federal government. In August 2015, it signed a five-year agreement with the Naval Surface Warfare Center in Corona, one of 10 such facilities in the United States.
Naval Surface Warfare Centers train personnel and conduct research on ships and submarines. The Corona facility connected with TriTech Center after Naval officials let it be known they wanted a better relationship with the local business community, especially small businesses.
“Some networking was going on and they found out about us,” Mitchell said. “We’ve opened some doors for them and introduced them to some people. We’ve connected them with small businesses that are tech oriented, which is what they were looking for. It’s the same agreement we have with NASA.”
There’s a reason why the Naval Surface Warfare Center, and now NASA, want to connect with small businesses: they’re the ones who come up with new ideas and new approaches to doing business, especially in technology.
“The U.S. Navy and NASA deal with companies like Boeing and Lockheed Martin, and companies that size don’t innovate,” Mitchell said. “The new ideas, the real innovation, comes from small businesses.
“That’s why [TriTech] partnering with NASA isn’t that unusual. We aren’t part of a major research university, but we do know the business community.”
NASA, which founded in 1958, has a history of developing technology that was eventually put into civilian use.
Artificial limbs, LED technology, ventricular assistance devices, radial tires and certain advanced firefighter suits are a few of the devices that began in the space program, according to spinoff.nasa.gov.
Most agencies that specialize in research and development, especially large ones like NASA, have some technology “sitting on the shelf” that businesses could use if it were uncovered and applied correctly, said Mike Stull, professor of entrepreneurship and director of the Center for Entrepreneurship at Cal State San Bernardino.
“It’s there but they might not know what it is or they might not know what to do with it,’” said Stull, who called the TriTech-NASA partnership “a good idea” with a lot of potential. “If you can identify it and get it to the right business, then maybe you can market it.
