Entrepreneurs, academics discuss L.A.’s place in the startup world at USC Venture & Innovation Summit

Cassius Palacio walked into the auditorium at the USC Venture & Innovation Summit expecting to simply take notes.

A fifth-year student at the USC School of Architecture, Palacio attended the Feb. 12 summit hoping some of the discussions could help him with a group project. He ended up getting far more than that.

The first panel discussion about USC’s influence on the Southern California tech and startup sphere gave Palacio renewed confidence in his chosen path and insight into how he could use his USC education and connections to forge a successful career.

“That gave me a lot of hope about what industries to seek out and look for, and also new ideas and ventures that could happen and start right now,” Palacio said. “It’s given me a lot of perspective on just understanding what can be defined as interdisciplinary.”

Palacio was one of more than 450 guests in the packed auditorium and amphitheater at the Dr. Allen and Charlotte Ginsburg Human-Centered Computation Hall on the University Park Campus. The daylong summit featured more than 30 entrepreneurs, investors and academics from across the country and highlighted several Los Angeles-based startups with USC connections. These industry leaders delved into how the greater Los Angeles region and USC help shape the world of entrepreneurship and innovation.

“This isn’t just about USC — it’s about USC fulfilling a responsibility to the region,” USC Senior Vice President of Research and Innovation Ishwar K. Puri said.

USC Venture & Innovation Summit: The university’s role in L.A.’s startup boom

Thousand Oaks-based biopharmaceutical company Amgen served as the gold sponsor of the summit, highlighting its continued support for biotech in the L.A. region — as well as previewing an upcoming joint accelerator program with USC.

“We have a great relationship with USC … and we’re going to strengthen that even more,” said Rene Hubert, director of early career talent and academic engagement at Amgen.

The first half of the day featured a panel discussion on how USC research and innovation can contribute to the greater L.A. tech startup scene known as “Silicon Beach,” and how the university’s work with venture capital firms like Techstars — and the Keck School of Medicine of USC’s work with organizations like Larta Institute — reflects that.

“The question today isn’t whether L.A. can be an innovation hub — it already is,” said Rohit Shukla, founder and CEO of Larta Institute, an L.A.-based nonprofit that focuses on innovation and entrepreneurship. “The more interesting and harder question is, can L.A. become a coherent, durable and repeatable innovation system?”

For L.A. natives like Zohaib Suhail, a chemistry doctoral student at the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences, hearing about the current landscape from industry experts served as a bit of an “aha” moment.

“It’s pretty difficult finding, at least in the chemistry space, a startup in L.A.,” Suhail said. “That talk gave a lot of insight on why it might be a bit difficult.”

Suhail, an intern with the USC Stevens Center for Innovation, said that his mentor told him about the summit. After Suhail put his name on a waitlist, a spot finally opened. Looking back, he said he’s grateful for the opportunity to attend.

“It was nice to hear, ‘Hey, here are the issues we’ve seen in startups and how we think you can overcome them if you choose to pursue this career path,’” Suhail said.

Optimism for the future at USC Venture & Innovation Summit

Palacio hopes for more events like the summit and encourages students of different backgrounds to attend.

“I’m really hoping that more students take advantage of it,” he said. “I’ve always wanted to know more about how to access these spaces, only because I feel like there are more possibilities outside of architecture, and I’m trying to get other experiences that aren’t necessarily correlated to my school. I’m always impressed and amazed by the people that travel far and wide just to be here and share their knowledge.”

For Suhail, hearing the number of resources that USC, Techstars, Amgen and local startups are investing in L.A. gives him hope that the region’s innovation ecosystem will have staying power.

“I feel a bit more optimistic because I heard how entire groups of people are trying to work together to bring local Angelenos into the startup culture,” Suhail said. “So, hopefully the future is a lot brighter.”