innovation DAILY

Innovation, defined as doing things differently and making it work, is the hallmark of Philadelphia’s past. Given its present trajectory, the city is poised to reclaim this brand going forward.

The four pillars of innovation are business models, process, product & services and culture — the last of which defines the spirit of innovation that can be brought to bear for an organization or a region.

Image: http://philadelphia.regionsbusiness.com 

Dear participants of the Baltic Dynamics 2013 Conference in Riga,

Thank you very much for your participation and contribution to the Baltic Dynamics Conference. It was a great pleasure for me and my team to meet people which are really interested in innovation processes and create new personal contacts for further cooperation. I do hope that everybody get new ideas, knowledge and stimulus for your everyday activities. Thanks a lot for all speakers! See attached special issue of “Innovation America” – Thanks to Rich Bendis!

You can view the edition here:  http://touchpoint.dmvg.us/issues/archive/e3d64fa7b5197fb05f89519130cb69f8

Barrels of ink and money have been devoted to predictions of where Americans will migrate, particularly younger ones. If you listen to big developer front groups such as the Urban Land Institute or pundits like Richard Florida, you would believe that smart companies that want to improve their chances of cadging skilled workers should head to such places as downtown Chicago, Manhattan and San Francisco, leaving their suburban office parks deserted like relics of a bygone era.

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If a life-sized Lego car that actually drives and is powered by nothing but air doesn't sound cool enough, consider this: The project was funded in part through a single tweet.

The car runs on compressed air, is made up of more than 500,000 Legos and can cruise along at some 15 mph. It's the brainchild of Raul Oaida, a 20-year-old Romanian who previously launched a Lego shuttle into space.

Ho ho ho, and happy holidays! While Santa Claus is busy making a list and checking it twice, we’ve been busy here at LinkedIn learning about the many talents of Santa Clauses around the world – from the French Père Noël to the German Weihnachtsmann. After looking through nearly 1,000 LinkedIn Profiles globally, we’ve got some fun findings to share with you.

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This year, conversations about creativity and innovation have been happening all over the world. And while there's still a long way to go, we're excited to see just how many schools and communities are embracing the importance of letting a child’s imagination run wild.

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As 2013 winds down, we asked several venture capital investors to reflect on the past year and give us their outlook for 2014. The latest in our series is John Neis, managing director, Venture Investors.

Mr. Neis speaks about the challenge of putting together syndicates for life-sciences investment, how returns are improving and the need for biotech companies to perform after going public.

Image: Venture Investors 

You know those people who get so much done it seems like they have 30 hours in every day while the rest of us mere mortals have a measly 24? You know, the ones who seem to get more accomplished before breakfast than you do all day?

Image: http://www.entrepreneur.com 

Millions of artists, entrepreneurs, crafters, and solopreneurs dream of making a living doing what they love. But turning their vision into a viable business plan can feel like trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. Jennifer Lee knows what it’s like to make the entrepreneurial leap — and how to do it successfully. The key is showing creative types how to use — rather than stifle — the imagination and intuition that make them creative in the first place. Lee’s illustrated, colorful worksheets and step-by-step instructions are playful yet practical, enabling readers to get down to the essential business of defining their vision and nailing down plans for funding, marketing, networking, and long-term strategy. Both budding and seasoned business owners will benefit from Lee’s wonderfully original approach in The Right-Brain Business Plan.

Tech entrepreneurs can be tough to shop for. They are notorious workaholics with separation anxiety when it comes to their business. As a result, it can take serious planning to attract their attention — if you’re not a check-bearing VC or a member of their target market.

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Getting things done effectively in a startup requires total individual and team accountability. You can’t afford excuses and multiple people doing the same job. In my view, “taking responsibility” is the core element behind accountability. Many people hear responsibility as an obligation, but I hear it as “the ability to respond.”

It’s counter-intuitive: This time of year we should be taking time to enjoy life, but for many entrepreneurs, it’s the busiest season of the year. And that’s not just for those who work in retail. We’re busy with holiday party obligations, buying client gifts, volunteering, sending cards…the list goes on and on.

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I’ve heard this phrase many times throughout my life:

“Do what you said you’ll do, when you said you were going to do it.”

Over the past couple of years, I’ve pondered this advice further as I meet more job seekers ready for the workforce. Now, this advice applies to everyone. It’s particularly poignant to job seekers and networkers. Because so many people don’t follow this great advice, those who do immediately stand out. Here’s why…

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5G, 1,000 times faster than Long Term Evolution (LTE), will be commercialized by the year 2020.

The Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning (MSIP) announced on December 17 that it laid out the “Strategy to Implement 5G Mobile Communications,” which includes starting the world’s first commercialized 5G services in 2020.

Image: http://www.businesskorea.co.kr 

Remember the adage, “Don’t put all your eggs in one basket”? This old saying certainly holds when making investing decisions; in fact, diversification—both between asset classes and within individual asset classes—ranks among the most powerful tools in your arsenal when it comes to reducing avoidable risk. As I’ve talked about before in this column, diversification is critical for any type of investing, in particular alternative investing.  Equity crowdfunding is simply a mechanism to facilitate investments into private companies.

Image: Wikipedia 

Seems like everyone is doing something on social media these days.

You’re texting with your friends, tweeting your random thoughts, instagramming your meals, snapchatting your selfies (speaking of, “selfie” was chosen as Oxford dictionary’s “Word of the Year” for 2013).

Social media, and its business component social media marketing, has seen a huge explosion in the past few years. So you may be thinking about a career in social media… or you may be wondering how to make social media work for you… and your job search

Image: http://www.youtern.com 

At the moment, Andreessen Horowitz is among the most prolific venture capital investors in the tech ecosystem. Just in the past eight days, the venture firm has announced six deals covering everything from bitcoin to crowdfunding to digital health. And the bets have often been on the larger side in terms of dollars invested.  In what is the largest bitcoin deal to-date, the firm led a $25M Series B deal to Coinbase then followed it up with an even bigger bet on virtual reality, leading a $75M investment into Oculus VR.

Image: http://www.cbinsights.com 

Later this month, I’m coming up to my first anniversary as an entrepreneur. Needless to say, I’ve learned a few vital lessons in my 365 days of self-employment that I couldn’t have anticipated when I first struck out on my own. Here’s the hard-won wisdom I plan to take with me into year two and beyond:

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I’m sure there are exceptions somewhere, but so far, in 35-plus years of taking note of this, everybody I’ve met and gotten to know who devoutly adheres to this discipline becomes exceptionally successful and everybody I’ve met and gotten to know who ignores this discipline fails. Is it possible that this one discipline alone is so powerful it literally determines success or failure?

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Venture capitalists spent 2013 doing something they haven’t been able to for a while: reaping enormous returns.

At least 10 U.S. venture firms generated more than $1 billion each in returns from initial public offerings and acquisitions this year, according to filings and data compiled by Bloomberg. Consumer Internet, business software and e-commerce companies contributed to the gains.

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"Being an entrepreneur isn't an easy job," says Andres Teran, cofounder of Toplist, a social shopping recommendation startup. "There are moments that you have nothing and feel like things are never going to getting better."

Teran is referring to the days before his company's vital pivot point, when he and his team had dedicated their lives to creating a site they loved with features they themselves would want.

GSK announced a $1 million dollar prize for innovation in the emerging area of bioelectronics research. This prize will be awarded to the scientists who are first able to solve the challenge of creating a miniaturised, fully implantable device that can read, write and block the body’s electrical signals to treat disease and it is hoped that after finding a solution to this challenge will open and accelerate significant avenues of research in this field.

In 2013, the industries being upended, reimagined, forever altered, and, yes, disrupted by Innovation Agents were as diverse and intriguing as the agents themselves. From French chefs to Hunger Games directors, and war-ravaged generals to a girl who codes, innovation--and the men and women driving real change--was everywhere.

Image: http://www.fastcompany.com 

There’s but one short week until Christmas, which means that your favorite local businesses/the nearest mall/your click-“expedited-shipping” finger are going to get busy in the days to come. But when it comes to buying presents for the creative folks in your life the pressure to come up with something both useful and clever can make this a stressful time of year. For that reason, we’ve assembled this list of can’t-miss presents for creative people of all stripes, and those looking to expand their creative horizons in 2014.

Image: http://www.fastcocreate.com 

It's almost 2014, which means it's time to reflect on the past year, with its ups, downs, inspiring moments and tragic events.

For the second year, filmmaker Jean-Louis Nguyen has created a video montage that remembers the year's most headline-making moments — or as, he writes in video's YouTube description, "the stories that brought us together this year."

Image: http://mashable.com 

As a lawyer dedicated to helping early stage entrepreneurs develop and polish their value propositions I have been struck by the confluence between entrepreneur rap sessions with potential investors and jazz jam sessions (given my parallel career as a professional jazz pianist for over half a decade). My thesis for this piece is that the optimum creative and integrational modalities of a quality jazz jam session may be instructive to prospective and practiced entrepreneurs.

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Everyone is saying “curated.” And that can mean only one thing: “curated” is played out. At Potomac Tech Wire's 2014 Venture Capital Outlook Thursday, five D.C. area venture capitalists were asked to name the most tired phrases of 2013, those eye-roll-inducing terms entrepreneurs drop over and over when describing their startup.

Image: Joanne S. Lawton 

More often than not, I meet with a hopeful entrepreneur about a potential venture capital investment and leave the meeting with a simple response: the person’s company just isn’t ready. Your company may have traction, could have customers, or might even have revenue – but that doesn’t mean you’re ready for venture funding. Check out this list and then give my office a call.

Image: http://www.forbes.com 

You’re an entrepreneur. You believe in the product or service that you’ve built. But then sales stall. What went wrong?

The truth is that over half of all small businesses are gone within five years, and only 30 percent ever make it to ten years. That’s because most entrepreneurs have great ideas for products and services, but they don’t know how to market them. Here are the five most common marketing mistakes to avoid:

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Although the ghost of the Great Man still haunts leadership studies, most of us have recognized by now that successful organizations are the product of distributive, collective, and complementary leadership. The first step in putting together such a team is to identify each member of the team’s personality makeup and leadership style, so that strengths and competences can be matched to particular roles and challenges. Getting this match wrong can bring misery to all concerned and cause considerable damage.

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WHEN IT COMES TO DATA VIZ, 2013 WAS THE BEST YEAR YET. HERE ARE SOME OF THE BEST. One of the basic laws of quantum mechanics is that information can never entirely be lost, only assume other forms. One of the most exciting forms information can take is that of the infographic, and over the past 12 months, Co.Design has covered some of the prettiest, most innovative design permutations information can take as part of our Infographic Of The Day series.

Image: Pop Chart Lab 

America is getting healthier--or, to put it another way, it's not getting any unhealthier. According to a major new report from the United Healthcare Foundation, physical inactivity is down, smoking is down and obesity levels are flattening out. Infant mortality is falling nationally. Fewer people are dying from cardiovascular disease and from cancer compared to two decades ago, when the foundation first made its research.

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As another year goes by, it's time for a true show of unity With the remarkable founders of the First Round Community.

In the past years, we celebrated with song, dance and spice. A weekend anthem and First Round Style made the holidays twice as nice.

We don’t choose these videos. They’re based on the year's top memes. Then we do our version — as silly as it seems.

Where is life best? Traditionally, the answer to this question has mainly been to ask another question: Where is the economy best? But recently economists have started to focus on how people are experiencing life, and everything that goes into making that better or worse, instead of just peering at the latest economic output reports.

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Batteries made from pigments found in cuttlefish ink may lead to edible, dissolvable power sources for new kinds of medical devices. Researchers led by Carnegie Mellon University materials scientist Christopher Bettinger demonstrated the new battery. “Instead of lithium and toxic electrolytes that work really well but aren’t biocompatible, we chose simple materials of biological origin,” Bettinger says.

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"Ever more people today have the means to live, but no meaning to live for." - Viktor E. Frankl

The first job I ever had was working second shift in an injection plastics molding factory in Binghamton, New York during the summer between my first and second years of college. I started on the simplest machine making tiny, yellow, dynamite caps and worked my way up to operating injection molds that made plastic liners for sewer pipes, contraceptive foam applicators, and plastic cogs for sewing machines. Each mold was operated by one person so there was no one to talk to, except on break, but the novelty of moving from machine to machine every night was enough to keep me motivated for the first couple of weeks.

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Everyone in the business world has heard of the old bestseller by Geoffrey A. Moore titled “Crossing the Chasm,” but most entrepreneurs have no idea how it relates to them. In fact, it’s all about the “focus” required to get early stage technology products across the deadly chasm from early adopters to mainstream customers.

The original idea for an “idea lab” was only supposed to last one year.

“I wasn’t thinking long term. I didn’t think I’d be doing this 17 years later,” said Bill Gross, founder of Idealab, Los Angeles’ first startup incubator, which was formed in 1996.

Phone booths offer some office privacy for those working for or running the start-ups that have set up shop at business incubator 1776’s space in Northwest Washington.From left are Josh Hurd of Nonprofit Metrics, Kim Bryden of Kitchensurfing and Jeb Ory of Phone2Action. Michel du Cille / The Washington Post

Image: http://www.washingtonpost.com