Yesterday [Oct 3 ed.], Democratic Sens. Kerry and Boxer dropped their initial version of a Senate climate bill, so the game’s on. We’ll defer to Brad Plumer’s Vine post for a good side-by-side comparison, but suffice it to say the Kerry-Boxer Senate outline looks a lot like the Waxman-Markey bill that passed the House earlier this year, with a few differences.

Like the Waxman-Markey legislation, the Senate version sets emissions targets (a little stricter than the House standard with a 20 percent emissions reduction from 2005 levels required by 2020 and 83 percent by 2050). Like Waxman-Markey, Kerry-Boxer proposes a pricing and emissions trading mechanism (now called, euphemistically, a Pollution Reduction and Investment tool, with revenue allowances left undetermined).

Entrepreneurs everywhere finance their small or medium-sized ventures more or less the same way. First, they will tap into their personal funds or resources, including building up balances on their credit cards. Next, they may obtain loans from family and friends. All along, they may be benefiting from a secured or unsecured overdraft from their commercial bank. The latter relationship may eventually be converted a 1-3 year collateralised commercial loan agreement. Typical collateral may consist of a mortgage on property or a lien on a vehicle, backed up by the borrower's personal guarantee. Sooner than later, their fledgling business is financed by a preponderance of debt.

According to a reliable source at the Small Business Association (SBA) in the United States, by their third year, sixty per cent of start-ups are being financed by 60-70 per cent debt. Some persons within the small and medium-sized business (SME) sector in Jamaica with whom I have spoken support my suspicion that the debt picture may even be worse here.

The G-20 Summit is over, and the world finally knows Pittsburgh is no longer the dirty, smoky steel town pictured in the history books. Now it’s time to stop talking about how we recovered from job losses 30 years ago and start talking about how we can accelerate job growth over the next 30 years.

The fact that we’ve lost fewer jobs than most regions during the recession doesn’t mean we’ll grow more jobs than other regions when the recovery begins. In the years following the end of the last recession, the Pittsburgh Region’s economy had the 4th worst job growth among the top 40 regions. In fact, the region never recovered all of the jobs it lost in 2002-2003 before the current recession hit.

“…Out of such dreary statistics comes a new class of self-starter, the accidental entrepreneur–someone who never considered owning a business until there was no other option. These entrepreneurs are making tough choices for themselves and their families, living in reduced circumstances, doing without the corporate comforts and resources they once took for granted, sometimes succeeding, very often failing, invariably struggling. But at least they’re not waiting for the phone to ring.”
--Fortune Magazine

I wonder if it’s bad advice and a bad judgment to recommend to someone to start their own business. There are a couple of scenarios.

Scenario one, you are long-term unemployed and you make the judgment to start your own business. Scenario two, you leave your current job due to your “Entrepreneurial Spirit” which can’t be satisfied at your current company and start your own business. What could the future hold?

While the American people remain concerned about the direction of our country and the state of our economy, a growing consensus has emerged in support of policies that encourage private sector and entrepreneurial growth.

In the most recent poll that the Kauffman Foundation conducted as part of its regular research it does on economic growth and entrepreneurship, 34% of Americans say the economy is headed in the right direction, while 54% say it is off on the wrong track. In addition, they remain skeptical about their personal economic situation, and they do not think that the economy is recovering. 54% of Americans say the U.S. economy is not beginning to recover, while one-third believe that it is.

The incoming class of MIT Legatum Fellows has been announced, who aim to bring entrepreneurship to low-income countries.

As is readily evidenced by reading the latest news, for entrepreneurs in America times have been tough. Yet 16 entrepreneurs, armed with grants from the Legatum Center for Development and Entrepreneurship at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), are looking beyond Main Street and focusing their entrepreneurial dreams on helping others in developing countries.

Since 2001, The Baida Center has been a business incubator in Drexel’s Lebow School of Business that houses eight to ten companies on average, mostly winners of the school’s incubator competition. The center is also a big reason the school was named one of the top three entrepreneurship programs for graduate students in the country (three spots ahead of, ahem, Temple University).

Technically Philly sat down with the man behind the scenes: Executive Director and Senior Executive in Residence Mark P. Loschiavo and asked him how the incubator works and why, like the rest of us, Loschiavo has trouble pronouncing “Baiada.”

Every entrepreneur, whether their business is online or offline based, can take advantage of the multitude of free tools that exist online. We’re always surprised when we poll entrepreneurs to know that not many are aware of these tools, let alone using them. And no, we’re not talking about Twitter, or Facebook, or even Sprouter. We’re talking about lesser-known online tools you as an entrepreneur can adopt today to further your business and gain exposure. See below for our list of the top 4 online tools for entrepreneurs:

PRESS RELEASE

MADISON - The in-house research arm of the U.S. Department of Agriculture will work with a Wisconsin tech-based organization to help make its world-class research more widely available to companies and academic institutions in Wisconsin, it was announced Tuesday.

The Agricultural Research Service, which has scientists working at 100 locations across the United States and abroad, has signed a “Partnership Intermediary Agreement” with the Wisconsin Security Research Consortium, an independent, non-profit corporation with ties to the Wisconsin Technology Council. The Tech Council is the independent, non-partisan science and technology adviser to the governor and the Legislature in Wisconsin.

I recently interviewed Mike Moritz of Sequoia Capital and Paul Graham of YCombinator. Mike Moritz is probably the most successful venture capitalist of the last twenty years since he invested in Google, Zappos, Yahoo, and PayPal. Paul Graham’s YCombinator is at the leading edge of tech startup creation. Contrary to the typical bull shiitake that most venture capitalists spin (“we want a proven team in a proven market with a proven technology”), these guys are really making things happen. I picked up these twelve lessons from the interview:

Despite its many otherwise amazing attributes, Argentina is not a particularly tech friendly country.

For tech-geeks, early adopters and innovators, Argentina can be a frustrating place to live because it constantly lags behind developed countries – and even some developing nations – in terms of innovation and the adoption of new technologies.

Positive economic signs for manufacturing continue, according to NEMA, Rockwell Automation, Valve Manufacturers Association, and IEEE.

Numbers from NEMA, along with hopeful signs from Rockwell Automation, valve manufacturers, and IEEE, are among recent news giving manufacturers positive economic hope. Links to related Control Engineering coverage follow at bottom.

The Minister was speaking at a BDO Stoy Hayward business breakfast today in Belfast, as she welcomed the launch of the company’s booklet ‘The Future Of Business Looks Like This’. Published in conjunction with the News Letter, it features a range of local companies and how each is successfully tackling the economic downturn.

The Minister said: “As I, and my Executive colleagues, continue to focus on providing much needed support for business during the economic downturn, I am always encouraged to learn about those companies that are facing the recession head-on, and winning.

The announcement of a new National Science Foundation grant to the University of Wisconsin to further develop a game-based science and math learning program, along with an associated assessment system, caught my eye. It’s the exact type of promising technology-enabled assessment system that I wrote about in “Beyond the Bubble.” It’s also a good opportunity to talk about how the various federal funding streams for assessment do not yet form a cohesive path for the development, testing, scaling, and mainstream use of innovative assessment practices.

Do you consider yourself a small-business owner? Or does that phrase make you cringe? Often, the terms entrepreneur and small-business owner are used interchangeably — but that’s not quite right either. Clearly, not all entrepreneurs are small-business owners and not all small-business owners are entrepreneurs. Still, there has to be some way to distinguish big businesses from, uh … not big businesses.

At an unconference, where many simultaneous sessions compete to lure attendees at the same time, coming up with an appealing title for your session is important.

Topics are determined at the beginning of the day by the attendees, and session titles are posted to a wall that attendees look at to make their decisions about how they'll spend their time. It's an agenda crossed with a bulletin board.

NASA GLENN WINS FEDERAL LABORATORY CONSORTIUM TECHNOLOGY TRANSFER EXCELLENCE AWARD

CLEVELAND -- A metallic foam developed at NASA's Glenn Research Center for the reduction of turbofan engine noise was selected the winner of the 2009 Federal Laboratory Consortium (FLC) Midwest Region Award for Excellence in Technology Transfer. The award was presented at the 2009 FLC Midwest Regional Meeting in Bloomington, Ind.

(Nanowerk News) The EU must do more to develop and deploy key enabling technologies (KETs) such as nanotechnology, micro- and nano-electronics, advanced materials and photonics. This is the main message from a new Commission communication on the subject.

The term KETs refers to technologies that enable the development of new goods and services in a wide range of fields. For example, nanotechnology holds the promise of breakthroughs in healthcare, energy, environment and manufacturing, while micro- and nano-electronics are expected to lead to smart control systems that could revolutionise the energy, transport and space sectors, among others. And advanced materials could lead to major improvements in aerospace, transport, building and healthcare. Currently, the potential of these exciting new technologies remains largely untapped.

Each week, The Chronicle tracks the latest investments, fundraising, mergers and initial public offerings involving Bay Area venture capitalists and startups. Here are some recent highlights.

-- Capital markets snapshot. The value of acquisitions of venture-backed companies in the third quarter slipped to $2.3 billion, down from $2.8 billion the previous quarter and barely half of the $5.2 billion recorded in the third quarter a year ago. But a perceived opening of the IPO markets is causing some optimism. There were two venture-backed IPOs in the quarter, A123 Systems Inc. and LogMeIn Inc., one fewer than the last quarter. But the two third-quarter IPOs raised a total $460.4 million, up from $232.1 million in the prior quarter. Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/10/01/BU3J19VNA7.DTL&type=business#ixzz0SnXZqsTQ

A proposal that would exempt the venture capital industry from strict regulations including requiring firms to register as investment advisers with the Securities and Exchange Commission drew cheers Thursday from the National Venture Capital Association, which has been fighting increased regulation.

The proposed exemption language was part of a draft of the Private Fund Investment Advisers Registration Act and was announced by Representative Paul Kanjorski (D-Pa.), chairman of the House Financial Services Capital Markets Subcommittee.