A University of Notre Dame professor has been named the recipient of this year’s 1st Source Bank Commercialization Award. Joe Urbany, a professor of marketing in the university’s Mendoza College of Business, is being recognized for his success in taking a customer research system he helped develop to the marketplace.

Urbany’s research helped him co-found Vennii, a technology for creating growth strategies by turning customer insights into action. Founded in 2013, Vennii is a software as a service (SaaS) platform that makes customer research simple and fast, presenting the results in an intuitive way so businesses know what to do to increase their competitive advantage.

In 2014, Vennii launched a beta program with more than 80 customers in various industries. Urbany’s leadership and commitment were integral to the success of the beta program and subsequent launch of the technology to the market.

The 1st Source Award, which carries a $20,000 cash prize, was presented Tuesday, April 14, at the Gillespie Center with the theme “It Takes a Village to Commercialize an Idea.”

Other finalists for the award included Gary Bernstein of Indiana Integrated Circuit LLC, Patrick Fay of Traycer Diagnostic Systems, Malcolm Fraser of Transposagen Biopharmaceuticals, Michael Lemmon of EmNet, Marvin Miller of Hsiri Therapeutics, Carol Tanner and Steve Ruggiero of LightSprite LLC and Bradley Smith of Molecular Targeting Technologies Inc.

Source: University of Notre Dame