As EU Research Commissioner Carlos Moedas pushes ahead with his plan to establish a European Innovation Council (EIC), sceptics are standing up to voice their doubts.

One case in point is Hans-Olaf Henkel, a German centre-right MEP, who is not convinced of its potential. “I have not finally made up my mind. I have to see more details. But at the outset I’m very sceptical about these kinds of initiatives,” he told Science|Business.

From his perspective as deputy chairman of the Parliament’s Industry, Research and Energy Committee, Henkel does not dispute claims Europe has problems when it comes to commercialising its research, or that new opportunities are too often exported across the Atlantic.

Image: Hans-Olaf Henkel, German MEP and deputy chairman of ITRE - http://www.sciencebusiness.net

As recently as last fall – and, indeed, even in today’s popular political discourse amidst the 2016 U.S. Presidential elections –  there’s been a growing popularity in the belief that American innovation is dying (or even dead). Making specific references to the decline in spending on research and development, proponents of the argument claim that the U.S. is quickly getting buried under the shadows of Finland, South Korea, and even China. Upon closer inspection, though, there’s no better time to believe in American innovation.

Wherever government extends its tentacles, innovation follows.

To some contemporary technologists, that might sound like a joke without a punch line. But it’s a reasonable description of 19th century America, according to a new working paper by Daron Acemoglu of MIT, James Robinson of the University of Chicago, and Jacob Moscona of Harvard.

Focus of the Research

I have been conducting research … on innovation, specifically as looked at through the patenting of technological innovations. I published a paper recently with a former doctoral student at the Rotman School, Keyvan Vakili — who’s now at the London Business School — called “The Double-Edged Sword of Recombination in Breakthrough Innovation.”

The six hour flight from Tel Aviv was late so I rushed through Heathrow to catch my connecting flight home to Birchrunville. Facing another nine hours in an airplane, I was happy to have snagged a business class seat. Then I boarded the American Airlines flight and my mood suddenly changed…

Beat up old-style seats. No place to put anything. No fancy privacy pods, no outlets, no cool video. Actually no video at all until the flight attendant came by with her hands full of electronic equipment for me to assemble and create my own video screen. Very weird.

Dictionary.com defines “outlier” as: (1) something that lies outside the main body or group that it is a part of, (2) someone who stands apart from others of his or her group, as by differing behavior, beliefs, or religious practices (Synonyms: nonconformist, maverick, original), (3) Statistics: (a) an observation that is well outside of the expected range of values in a study or experiment, (b) a person whose abilities, achievements, etc., lie outside the range of statistical probability.

Growing opportunities to collect and leverage digital information have led many managers to change how they make decisions – relying less on intuition and more on data. As Jim Barksdale, the former CEO of Netscape quipped, “If we have data, let’s look at data. If all we have are opinions, let’s go with mine.” Following pathbreakers such as Caesar’s CEO Gary Loveman – who attributes his firm’s success to the use of databases and cutting-edge analytical tools – managers at many levels are now consuming data and analytical output in unprecedented ways.

Can the elephant dance again? Twenty years ago, Louis Gerstner transformed IBM by emphasizing consulting and technology services — not just technology — to solve customer problems. Today, as the wave of digitization continues to grow and envelope all the world’s enterprises, IBM is at a crucial juncture once again. CEO Ginni Rometty is leading the company into new areas, betting big on its Watson software and cloud computing. But these new services have yet to grow fast enough to supplant the profit declines in the company’s eroding legacy products.

Image: https://hbr.org 

It’s become increasingly common for startups to raise several seed rounds, and this has led to a bifurcation in the seed stage between what are known as “pre-seed” (or “genesis”) and institutional seed rounds.

There are no strict distinctions between these rounds, but below I’ll try to throw out a few parameters to help set the boundaries. For now, it’s fine to think about pre-seed rounds as relatively small ($750K or less), early (pre-product), and typically followed by a larger round within 12 months ($1M – $3M). This is actually an imperfect definition, but let me first talk about why these are happening in the first place. After all, aren’t seed investors (like us) by definition supposed to be the first and earliest-stage investors?

In the early 20th century, the Pullman Company, manufacturer of the eponymous sleeper train cars, was in trouble. As its president, John Runnells, described it in a business magazine of the era, "During (our) long years of growth wasteful ways had been fostered, losses, inaccuracies, and confusing unrelated systems had been spontaneously developed." Runnells noted that other small manufacturers around the U.S. shared Pullman’s predicament, and many were also beginning to recognize that their "conditions were bad and methods slipshod."

Businesses always seem to take longer to succeed than an entrepreneur expects. Seth Godin once said that overnight success in startups takes about six years, and Seth is an optimist. Thus we all look for shortcuts. Execution shortcuts would be hidden strategies to achieve the endgame sooner, without losing 40 to 60 percent of the financial potential along the way.

There are a lot of data points that one can use to get a sense of the venture capital markets, including the number of startup financings and the level of VC fundraising. They point to some widely known facts: Deal volume and valuations are up massively over the past seven years and non-VC money has entered the system.

But these data points are often lagging indicators. Perhaps a better barometer would be to gather data on VC perceptions in the market right now. Of course sentiment can swing wildly with new information, but I set out to take the pulse of the market as we enter 2016.

It's admittedly rare that I can make it through dinner without spilling anything on myself, but last night I did it on purpose, pouring Sriracha, red wine, and chocolate sauce on a new white T-shirt to see what would happen.

Everything slid off—in the case of the hot sauce, with the help of a napkin—and the shirt looked exactly as clean as it had before. The manufacturer, one of a handful of companies making "hydrophobic" clothing, uses nanotech to repel liquids from the cotton fabric.

Image: http://www.fastcoexist.com 

RICHMOND — A Virginia House panel on Wednesday advanced bills that would allocate about $40 million for grants that some of the state’s most powerful business, education and government interests are touting as a boon to regional economic growth.

The initiative, called GO Virginia, would set up a state board to establish regional councils that can apply for money for projects, such as job training centers. A second program would give cities and counties that work together up to half of the income tax revenue from new jobs they have a hand in creating.

Image: Governor Terry McAuliffe(D) (Evelyn Hockstein/For The Washington Post) 

For the month of February, Scale Up Milwaukee will host an observer from the Danish Business Authority’s Ministry of Business and Growth. Søren Boutrup is a highly regarded administrator and speaker having delivered talks in 13 countries. He has also taught entrepreneurship at The University of Copenhagen and at 25 other schools where he’s been heavily involved in developing curriculum.

Image: http://scaleupmilwaukee.org 

Resources for small companies tend to focus on startups, but businesses that are fully established face their own set of issues as they work to move on to the next phase. Scale Up Milwaukee was created to provide networking opportunities, a unique accelerator program and other resources specifically targeting growing businesses and the external factors that impact them.

Image: Daniel Isenberg speaks about Scale Up Milwaukee during the 2015 MARKETPLACE conference.

The Internet of Things (IoT) has been called the next Industrial Revolution — it will change the way all businesses, governments, and consumers interact with the physical world.

For more than two years, BI Intelligence has closely tracked the growth of the IoT. Specifically, we've analyzed how the IoT ecosystem enables entities (i.e. consumers, businesses, and governments) to connect to, and control, their IoT devices in 16 environments, including manufacturing, the connected home, transportation, and agriculture. 

After 10 years of teaching startups to find product-market fit then grow like crazy, Y Combinator is finally following its own playbook. 

When the famous Silicon Valley accelerator began in 2005, it was just that: a prestigious three month program known for pumping out 100 companies every batch. 

Image: Sam Altman, CEO of Y Combinator 

Merck has expanded its digital health accelerator programme, opening it up in the first country outside its home territory of Germany. The company has picked Kenya for the new programme, which will run for three months and see it look for three digital health startups to support with equity-free funding of $15,000. Merck Innovation Center head Michael Gamber said: “Africa is one of the most promising and dynamic markets for digital health, driven by a vibrant and innovative startup culture. With our accelerator programme, we aim to become part of it. 

Image: http://www.pmlive.com 

Africa. The second most populous continent in the world with 1.1-billion people and almost 2 000 languages are spoken daily. Amongst the languages spoken on our beautiful continent, UNESCO has listed 79 African languages as critically endangered, 66 severely endangered, 51 as definitely endangered and 44 are vulnerable. The nature of the issue crosses all four corners of Africa.

Image: http://memeburn.com