Roadrunner Venture Studios, which last week unveiled its new Albuquerque studio space and introduced its first three portfolio companies, struck a partnership with a big-name tech giant to set up its second studio location.
Roadrunner on Monday announced a partnership with Nokia Bell Labs, an innovation-focused research and development company under Finland-based Nokia Corp. (NYSE: NOK), and existing investor America's Frontier Fund to establish a second venture studio in New Jersey. Although details on that studio's location and opening time frame aren't yet available, a Monday news release from Roadrunner said the new studio "will build on nearly a century of Nobel Prize-worthy inventions under Bell Labs leadership."
Similar to Roadrunner's work spinning technology out of national laboratories and research universities in New Mexico, the organization's planned New Jersey studio will help develop successful companies around Bell Labs research, a Roadrunner spokesperson confirmed with New Mexico Inno. Some of Murray Hill, New Jersey-based Nokia Bell Labs' primary research areas include automation, semiconductors and devices and artificial intelligence and software systems, according to its website.
"This partnership between Roadrunner and Nokia is a founder's dream, uniting Bell Lab's iconic ideas engine with our company creation foundry," Evan Loomis, a Roadrunner board member, said in a statement. "The resulting studio's cradle to exit services will produce new era-redefining technologies."
Roadrunner's inaugural venture studio location is in Albuquerque's Innovation District, which the upstart organization showed off for the first time at an event on Dec. 5. At that technology forum event, Roadrunner also named its first three portfolio companies, which the venture studio plans to provide with supportive resources and office space to help grow.
Those startups — Fab.AI, Hydrosonics and Inaedis — are built on technologies that include advanced manufacturing, hydrogen production and vaccine storage, respectively.
Roadrunner first introduced itself to New Mexico's startup and technology community in June. It's since evaluated over 250 technologies and company ideas, leading up to last week's portfolio companies announcement, the studio's President Adam Hammer told New Mexico Inno before the December tech forum.
That forum also brought national investors, including representatives from large venture firms like Khosla Ventures, Playground Global and Prelude Ventures, to Albuquerque for panel conversations and networking opportunities.
