Brown University has licensed a portfolio of Internet security technology to a group of entrepreneurs who have gone into business as IAM Technology Inc., based in North Hampton, N.H., with research offices in Providence.
The technology was developed by Roberto Tamassia, a Brown professor of computer science and director of the Center for Geometric Computing, and Michael Goodrich, a center associate who is a computer science professor at the University of California–Irvine.
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Known as the “Secure Transaction Management System” (STMS), the technology provides a quick and inexpensive way to validate identity on Internet domains. It’s the result of years of work supported by a Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency grant and by funding from the National Science Foundation. Brown will retain an equity stake in IAM Technology.
STMS addresses what Brown officials said is a $50-billion problem of domain integrity on the Internet. IAM Technology plans to offer a security appliance based on STMS in early 2006, aiming to make it a common part of most enterprise networks.
The startup company will support continued research at the Center for Geometric Computing by Tamassia and Goodrich and their research associates Danfeng Yao and David Ellis, both Brown students, university officials said.
“The evolution of this company and its product has been most exciting for Brown,” said Charles Kingdon, associate vice president for technology partnerships at Brown. “What started as a review of technology for a targeted solution has evolved into a universal appliance for domain integrity. The demand for domain integrity and identity validation is urgent and has grown exponentially in recent years.”
IAM Technology is directed by a group of veteran Internet entrepreneurs including George McQuilken, former CEO of RSA Security and Security Dynamics; David Croston, former CEO of mPKI; Bill Nyhan, former general partner of Anconcagua Co.; and John H. Nuber, a leading technology innovator.
Croston said the entrepreneurs’ partnership with Brown began about a year ago, with an option agreement that provided research funding to Brown for proof-of-principle and undertook collaborative analysis of the market. The licensing deal was announced Tuesday.
Croston called the deal “an ideal partnership,” and said the participants believe it “represents the future of university-based technology commercialization.”
