Santa Cruz Works Awarded UCSC 2023 Community Changemaker

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On May 30, 2023, UC Santa Cruz held the inaugural Chancellor’s Innovation Impact Award Program dinner. This new program celebrates the university’s talented faculty, researchers, staff, students, and community partners for their outstanding contributions to innovation and creativity. The three award categories were:

Innovator of the Year

  • Russell Corbett-Detig and his team have developed a computational tool called UShER (Ultrafast Sample Placement on Existing tRees), which has become instrumental in the fight against COVID-19. UShER allows real-time tracking of SARS-CoV-2 and helps researchers identify new virus lineages.
  • Visualizing Abolition is the nation’s most ambitious and sustained art and prison abolition initiative. The project examines the ways people see and understand issues of mass incarceration, detention, and policing in the United States and abroad, challenging the prevailing social, economic, and political worldviews that prisons promote. The initiative was developed by Dr. Gina Dent and Dr. Rachel Nelson, with support from the Mellon Foundation.

Lifetime Achievement in Innovation

  • The Lifetime Achievement in Innovation award, which acknowledges a faculty member’s influential and innovative contributions with long-term societal benefits, has been bestowed upon Research Professors Emeriti of Biomolecular Engineering, David Deamer and Mark Akeson. As the co-inventors of nanopore sequencing, their pioneering work has revolutionized DNA and RNA reading, significantly influencing our understanding of human genetics. Their award includes a $5,000 grant, which they can allocate to a division, department, or lab of their choice to bolster innovative research endeavors.

Community Changemaker

  • Santa Cruz Works (“SCWorks”) has been awarded the Community Changemaker award for their remarkable contributions to regional economic prosperity in the Santa Cruz region through innovation and entrepreneurship. SCWorks has significantly aided UC Santa Cruz by enhancing awareness of their research and its global impacts, expanding SCWorks’s digital footprint during the pandemic, and connecting PPE-producing companies with the university. Their efforts have helped students and innovators develop entrepreneurial skills, evident in their instrumental role in establishing CruzHacks and supporting campus startups via SCWorks’s accelerator program. More than half of the first cohort were UCSC startups. Now in its fifth cohort, the program has supported more than 50 companies in starting their businesses in Santa Cruz, many from UC Santa Cruz. They also played a vital role in bringing Launchpad ’22 and Blue Innovation ’22 to campus, events aimed at supporting research, businesses, and stakeholders interested in water management and ocean climate solutions.

Read the Press Release: https://news.ucsc.edu/2023/06/chancellor-innovation-awards.html

Joby Aviation

Joby Aviation: 2022 Chamber Business of the Year

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JoeBen Bevrit, the founder and Chief Executive Officer of Joby Aviation, has led the team since its inception, more than a decade ago. He has dedicated his life to driving radical innovation in electric propulsion and robotics. In 1999, JoeBen co-founded Velocity11 to develop high-performance robotic laboratory systems, which was acquired by Agilent Technologies.

Joby is a California-based company that builds quiet, all-electric aircraft: Connecting people like never before. With up to 150 miles of range and the ability to take off and land vertically, the Joby aircraft will change the way we move, while reducing the acoustic and climate footprint of flight.

Their long-term vision is to build a global passenger service that helps the world connect with the people and places that matter most, while helping to protect our precious planet. As well as strategic partnerships with Toyota, Delta, Uber, and many more, they have a team of more than 1400 engineers and experts working to bring aerial ridesharing to our skies. Congratulations Joby Aviation. Video produced by Lucid Sound and Picture https://www.lucidsp.com/

Chris Bley Tech Titan

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On behalf of Monterey Bay DART, we are beyond proud of our Board Member and Co-founder, Chris Bley, for receiving the incredible award: “Titan of Tech.” 

Every year, Santa Cruz Works honors the people who have contributed to the growth of the local tech and entrepreneurial community. In the past, several of the nominees have consisted of CEO’s and founders. This year, Titan of Tech awards highlighted the MVPs who are essential to any thriving business and make tremendous impact in more ways than one. 

In his acceptance speech, Chris reflected on “a chance meeting in my neighborhood with a neighbor that worked with Fort Ord Reuse Authority (FORA)… We got together and formed this non-profit (DART), which led into this connection with Joby Aviation and the re-education of under-privileged areas to work in the new manufacturing world that we would love to see in our communities.” He went on to share with the audience “I’m a little bit of an accidental entrepreneur and business owner, but, incredibly, it’s all worked out and I have to thank Santa Cruz for that.”

In addition to serving as a Board Member for Monterey Bay DART, Chris also brings years of entrepreneurial leadership to the Monterey Bay region and remains dedicated to tech related projects including Monterey Bay DART (a non-profit focused on supporting and connecting drone innovators), Insight Up Solutions (drone and sensor resale) and AirSpace Integration (provides shared work spaces, air spaces and training). These companies are located in the Monterey Bay region, La Selva Beach and the Marina Airport. Chris holds a BA in Biology from UC Santa Cruz.

Congratulations, Chris! You make the entire DART community so proud!
Watch his acceptance speech here.