innovate arkansas

Lots of folks have great ideas, but most have no idea what to do with them.

Enter the Arkansas Inventor's Network, a non-profit established as a support network for innovative people who need help getting their ideas off the ground.

Chad Collins, president of AIN, said the group began to take shape two years ago when the Arkansas Economic Development Commission organized a meeting to bring inventors together in a formal setting. Collins, a consultant who specializes in helping inventors get from concept to market, took the reigns and created a regular meeting group. By the summer of 2007, a board was formed and by-laws written.

"As a consultant, I hear a lot of ideas," Collins said in a recent interview. "In the last year I heard over 150. A few of those were OK, and I worked on two or three."

The majority of the ideas he hears, he said, are marginal and need a lot of work. But even the good ideas worth bootstrapping - a common funding method used among members - need don't take off without help.

"They need to go to a support group," Collins said.

There are currently 25 AIN members who come together to seek and give advice on everything from obtaining a patent to developing a prototype to marketing the product.

"Most individuals, they're not going to know that process," Collins said. "So we try and walk them through it."

For instance, Joe Calhoun of the Calhoun Law Firm provided an overview of patent law during the group's September meeting.