Here we highlight selected innovation related articles from around the world on a daily basis. These articles related to innovation and funding for innovative companies, and best practices for innovation based economic development.
Whether you have a tech question or a fashion concern, there's probably an existing app that can help you out.
But frankly, with all the apps out there, it's easy to get stuck with the same icons on your home screen — and never so much as click on the newer ones that would benefit your business most.
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Crowdfunding has been used to raise money for everything from providing disaster relief to funding a startup. However, not every crowdfunding project is a success. Along with genius ideas, you’re sure to come across at least a few scams on websites like Indiegogo and Kickstarter.
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I don’t think it is an exaggeration to say that some time in the next two or three months America will see one of the biggest changes to capital markets since the post-recession reforms of the 1930s. At that time rules were established to protect the individual investor from the questionable tactics being used by some to raise money for new ventures. In the wake of the horror stories of the 1920s, protecting the small investor from themselves made sense and was an important part of the Securities Act of 1933.
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The first batch of science-loving settlers are colonizing Harlem’s fledgling Silicon Valley.
Sixteen startups — all of them sporting a health care focus — set up shop inside the new Harlem Biospace, on W. 127th St., becoming the city’s first incubator for the medical research crowd.
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In times of crisis and budgetary restraint, EU governments still need to value innovation and new solutions to tackle the increasing pressure on European healthcare systems, experts say. Since 2008, there has been a rise in health inequalities and they will continue to increase as current governments are running unsustainable health systems.
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Launch Tennessee on Monday announced the re-launch of a program to help Tennessee’s entrepreneurs obtain grant funding to facilitate bringing new technology to market. The Phase 0/00 Program is a competitive process to help small businesses apply for Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) grant or contract funding. The program is funded in part by a FAST (Federal and State Technology) grant obtained by the Small Business Administration.
Let's do a quick experiment: You're sitting at a table in a psychology lab. A researcher hands you a small box full of stuff: matches, tacks, and a candle. Your job, he says, is to stick the candle to the wall beside you, but not allow the wax to drip down onto your table and make a mess. As you take the objects out of the box, you think to yourself, What do I do?
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I’m not a hospital administrator or the owner of a clinic. I’m just a regular person. Yet over my lifetime I’ve had to hire at least three dozen doctors. They’ve been my medical advisors (for family as well as me), my ‘body shop’ people (getting broken parts working again), and those who have risen to the job of ushering us through life’s transitions, beginning, middle, and end.
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It's easy to lose perspective when it comes to air travel. "Everybody on every plane should just constantly be going wow!" Louis CK said in his famous "miracle of flight" rant. "You're sitting in a chair in the sky." What's upsetting even to those of us who appreciate this wisdom is just how easy it is to lose perspective in an airport--and no place erodes our patience faster than the security line.
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A report by the Brookings Institution states that the business model used by most universities to license patents on the technology they’ve developed has been a disaster. According to the report, a review showed that 130 universities did not generate enough licensing income in 2012 to cover the wages of their technology transfer staff and the legal costs for the patents they filed.
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Crowdfunding presents a tremendous opportunity for private companies to raise capital by collecting small contributions from a large number of investors.
Although crowdfunding has been around in some shape or form for centuries – praenumeration is considered an early form of this business model – it has just started to become regulated. The SEC and FINRA recently issued proposed rules, but there are still unknowns as to how it will play out, and there will certainly be more debate and regulation to come.
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Info Tech & IT Services and Internet services remained a favorite among Indian angels between 2005-2012, according to a new report which pointed out that the median angel round size in India is less than half of that in the United States.
A report which went through publicly disclosed angel deals made between 2005-2012 in India, found that the median angel round size is about Rs 1.52 cr in India as compared to the median angel round size of Rs 3.72 cr in 2012 in the United States. Note that the report talks only about the investments made by angel groups.
Brainstorming can be a difficult process, especially at a company with offices in multiple locations. Email is only efficient to a point, and writing everything down can lead to a cluttered mess. It's possible to create digital flow charts and graphs to better organize the facets of your idea, but creating and customizing them can consume time and put a halt on the brainstorming process altogether.
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Many people suggest that rates of new product introduction and adoption are speeding up, but is it really, across the board? The answer seems to be yes. An automobile industry trade consultant, for instance, observes that “Today, a typical automotive design cycle is approximately 24 to 36 months, which is much faster than the 60-month life cycle from five years ago.” The chart below, created by Nicholas Felton of the New York Times, shows how long it took various categories of product, from electricity to the Internet, to achieve different penetration levels in US households. It took decades for the telephone to reach 50% of households, beginning before 1900. It took five years or less for cellphones to accomplish the same penetration in 1990. As you can see from the chart, innovations introduced more recently are being adopted more quickly. By analogy, firms with competitive advantages in those areas will need to move faster to capture those opportunities that present themselves.
Andrew Schoen, a former analyst of the Structured Mergers & Acquisitions group of Blackstone Group said venture capitalists exist because no other investors are willing to take on such a high degree of risk with their money. In an interview with The Cornell Daily Sun, Schoen said venture capitalists believe that the high stakes game will give them better returns compared to typical investments.
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Venture capital investment in Canada was up sharply in the third quarter while the number of buyout and private equity deals have slipped so far this year, according to the latest data.
Venture-capital funds invested $541-million between July and September, up 48 per cent from the $366-million invested in the year-earlier period, Canada’s Venture Capital and Private Equity Association and research partner Thomson Reuters said on Monday.
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Talent is the V8 engine of competitiveness and innovation for today’s globally connected mobile economy. Those that have mastered the development of skills inside their countries and lowered the barriers to entry for foreign talent are creating vibrant and sustainable economies. Those that haven’t are facing a wide array of challenges, from skills shortages to high joblessness.
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In a cultural context where idealists have linked social media to democracy, egalitarianism, and participation, the tech scene in Silicon Valley considers itself to be exceptional. Supporters speak glowingly of a singularly meritocratic environment where innovative entrepreneurs disrupt fusty old industries and facilitate sweeping social change.
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There are potentially countless innovations or enterprises ready to be developed to help address global challenges and there is a heightened interest in these market-based solutions to poverty. As the entrepreneurs behind these enterprises and innovations know, there are many inherent challenges in developing, testing, selling and scaling these enterprises.
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(Nanowerk News) This book is the summary of a 2013 symposium convened by the National Research Council Board on Science, Technology, and Economic Policy and members of the Nano Consortium that drew state officials and staff, business leaders, and leading national figures in early-stage finance, technology, engineering, education, and state and federal policies to review challenges, plans, and opportunities for innovation-led growth in New York.
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