Robotic methods for environmental monitoring have been in development for many years. Getting to market has been challenging, not only due to the demands for equipment performance and reliability but also keeping costs contained. In this talk, Dr. Mike Lipsett will describe how research results were brought to commercial implementation by a company founded by his former students. Technical aspects of commercializations as well as the realities of a start up will be discussed.

Michael Lipsett is a Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Canada, with a PhD in robotics from Queen’s University. He currently holds the Poole Chair in Management for Engineers; and he is Director of Innovation, Creativity, and Entrepreneurship programs for the Faculty of Engineering. Mike has held technical and leadership roles in several Canadian energy companies. His research interests are the reliability and sustainability of integrated energy operations, transportation systems, and other complex systems, with a focus on robotics and automation for inspection and diagnostics, and applications of machine learning for asset integrity management.