Ms. Lita Nelsen spent 30 years in the Technology Licensing Office of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 25 of them as director of the office. During that time, the MIT TLO licensed over 500 startup companies based on MIT research technology. She is the author of many articles and book chapters on technology transfer. During her tenure at the MIT TLO she was invited to lecture and consult in tech transfer and university-based entrepreneurship in over 20 countries around the world. She was a co-founder of Praxis (now Praxis-Auril) a UK non-profit company for training tech transfer professionals, or which she was awarded a Member of the British Empire (MBE) by the UK government. Other awards include Lifetime Achievement awards from Xconomy and from the Massachusetts Biotechnology Council Having retired from MIT, Ms. Nelsen is now a consultant for startups licensing technology from universities and an advisor to Good Growth Capital’s venture funds, and sits on several biotechnology company scientific advisory boards. She volunteers as a mentor in the MIT Sandbox Program, mentoring student entrepreneurs.
Ms. Nelsen’s education includes B.S. and M.S. in Chemical Engineering, and an MBA as a Sloan Fellow at the MIT Sloan School of management. Prior to joining MIT’s Technology Licensing Office she worked in R&D, consulting and venture management in medical devices and membrane separations companies.