From patents to partnerships, to startup, the Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship has guided SymphonyMR every step of the way from lab to market
A modern operating room contains a collection of cutting-edge equipment, a phalanx of digital screens, and more doctors, nurses, and technicians than the Pitt Panthers put on the football field.
At the center of this complex environment is the surgeon, who, like the conductor of an orchestra, must ensure that the surgery’s different movements coalesce seamlessly and progress toward a successful coda.
Edward Andrews, University of Pittsburgh assistant professor of neurological surgery, is quick to point out that even with all the advances in medical imaging, surgical tools, and techniques, communication and workflow during surgery remain largely unchanged.
Andrews and the interdisciplinary lab he co-directs with Jacob Biehl, associate professor at the School of Computing and Information, are working to change that.
To bring what they call their “operating system for the OR” to life, Andrews, Biehl, and a pair of entrepreneurial students are partnering across the Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship (OIE). The team credits OIE with providing the same kind of on‑demand support for their commercialization journey that they are working to bring to the operating room itself.
Sci‑Fi Inspiration to Surgical Innovation
Andrews, a self-professed sci‑fi fan, has focused his research on minimally invasive spine surgery and neuro‑oncology. During his residency at UPMC, he developed a keen interest in applying spatial computing to surgery—akin to Tom Cruise manipulating virtual screens in the film Minority Report.
He found his technological counterpart not long after Biehl arrived at Pitt in 2020 from Silicon Valley, where Biehl had worked in a corporate R&D lab developing human‑computer interaction and Internet of Things (IoT) platforms to improve workflow.
Together, they created the Surreality Lab with strong support from local foundations. It has since grown to more than 25 core members, with double that number of students, residents, and other Pitt faculty participating. While the lab has been active in conducting research and publishing its findings, its primary focus remains on translating those ideas from the lab into the real world.
Turning Academic Insight into Industry Impact
Early in the lab’s life, Andrews and Biehl reached out to the Office of Industry and Economic Partnerships, a division of OIE, to explore potential industry collaborations. For the past three years, they have worked closely with Brian Vidic, director of industry partnerships.
“Brian has been our superhero in navigating potential partnerships—and what a partnership would even look like,” Biehl said, noting that Vidic immersed himself in the mechanics of the process, including non‑disclosure agreements, material transfer agreements, and the outlines of sponsored research.
“We introduced Jake (Biehl), Ted (Andrews), and their technology to more than a half‑dozen large medical device companies—some of the biggest in the world,” Vidic said. “We managed those interactions so they could focus on the science.”
Although discussions progressed with three companies, Andrews and Biehl ultimately chose a different route. Armed with market insight gained through those conversations and supported by ambitious entrepreneurial students, they opted to pursue a startup instead.
Laying the Groundwork
As their work advanced to the point of submitting disclosures of potential innovations to the OIE, they began collaborating with Janice Panza to develop a strategy for intellectual property protection.
To date, Panza has helped them file for five patents, in addition to protection for software and know-how.
“Janice helped us think well beyond filing patents,” Andrews said. “She pushed us to understand how intellectual property fits into a long‑term commercialization strategy. She helped us translate our ideas into something durable and defensible while helping us see how each piece of IP fits into a much bigger picture.”
To inform product development, the team enrolled in the NSF I‑Corps short course offered through OIE. Over the month‑long program, they interviewed dozens of surgeons and stakeholders.
Leading the customer‑discovery process were Griffin Hurt, a PhD student, and Ethan Crosby, a senior undergraduate, both at SCI and research fellows in the Surreality Lab. As part of the process, they immersed themselves in operating rooms, observing dozens of surgeries.
Biehl said the team deliberately avoided pitching solutions during those interviews. Instead, they focused on understanding workflow pain points.
“We asked about workflow—about what interrupts it,” he said.
One recurring frustration emerged: surgeons often must scrub out mid‑procedure to view or manipulate imaging such as CT scans. Relying on a technician to adjust images can be inefficient and imprecise, leading surgeons to step away from the patient themselves.
To overcome this challenge, the Pitt team developed software that, when paired with Apple Vision Pro goggles, lets users manipulate real-time surgical information as virtual assets in midair using their hands, allowing them to remain sterile while performing those tasks.
The technology has progressed from lab studies to cadaver studies, culminating earlier this year in a live surgery at UPMC Presbyterian to remove a pituitary tumor.
Moving from the Lab to the Market
Last year, Crosby and Hurt competed in the Wells Healthtech Challenge and began working with Pitt Ventures entrepreneur‑in‑residence Tony Torres through the Pitt Ventures Startup Academy, which supports promising companies with milestone‑based guidance spanning regulatory strategy, fundraising, and legal formation.
“Tony has been great, particularly as we began seeking external investment,” Biehl said. “If we get stuck, he either has a solution or knows exactly who to connect us with. Everyone at OIE has been incredibly supportive.”
Torres said working with SymphonyMR, the name they have chosen for the company, has been easy because they are just as focused on the problems they are trying to solve as the technology that can help solve them.
“They’ve been incredibly coachable,” Torres said. “Every time they got feedback, they used it to sharpen both the technology and the business. I am excited to see how far they can go because the need is universal; every operating room deals with the workflow disruptions that this team is solving”
Conducting the Future of Surgery
Today, Crosby and Hurt are negotiating a significant seed investment from a local investor and preparing to license the university’s intellectual property to launch SymphonyMR.
“Surgeons have been telling us this is ready for the OR,” Crosby said. “So we decided to take the leap. What this platform does is make surgeons the conductors of a medium with no physical bounds—giving them control over information streams. We call it information ergonomics: delivering the right information at the right time.”
Andrews said Pitt is an ideal place to launch, given its close affiliation with UPMC and its steady pipeline of surgeons eager to try new approaches.
“Surgeons are surprisingly open to change when it makes their work easier,” he said. “That’s how technologies get adopted.”
The journey from lab to OR required curiosity, collaboration, and the courage to bet on their own solution. Now, with a company forming and early adoption underway, Andrews, Biehl, and their students are proving that the future of surgery is possible at Pitt.
Got an idea? Let’s talk. The team behind SymphonyMR didn’t build their startup alone — they had patents to file, partners to find, and investors to meet. OIE helped them do all of it. If you’re working on something that could make a difference, don’t wait. Submit an invention disclosure to the Office of Innovation and Entrepreneurship today and take the first step toward turning your research into something the world can use.