Innovation funding has become a reality in Iowa. House File 615 was approved by the Iowa Legislature and signed into law by Gov. Terry Branstad.

H.F. 615, originally the Iowa Innovation Fund, fills the critical gap between angel and venture capital funding for emerging Iowa businesses. It is often referred to as “next stage” funding because it provides capital for businesses to evolve and move forward.

The Iowa Innovation Corp. believes H.F. 615 will help strengthen early stage funding in Iowa’s financing continuum by leveraging up to $32 million per year in new seed stage capital investments for Iowa-based businesses with high-growth potential.

The political, social, and economic problems of tomorrow aren’t going to be solved using the methods honed by Baby Boomers and their parents (no offense to either generation). That message took center stage at this year’s World Innovation Forum, which took place on June 12th and 13th.  But no matter how old you are, progress and prosperity are dependent on innovation. Here are five takeaways I took from more than a dozen speakers during the two-day idea-fest. The takeaways are for those of all ages:

Summer camp brings visions of singing around a campfire, roasting marshmallows and riding zip lines. Summer camp at UVU is a bit different.

The university's YES Camp leaders spent five days teaching teenagers the addictive fire of entrepreneurship, the excitement of an idea and how to build that idea into a successful business.

"It was fun, because I learned a lot," Conner Olson, a 16-year-old Utah Academy of Science student, said, adding that the best part was the speakers they had each day.

The state would seek to boost start-up companies by creating a venture capital fund with $25 million in state money and $50 million from private sources, under a bipartisan bill unveiled Wednesday.

In the last legislative session, lawmakers failed to agree on a proposal to boost investment in young state companies despite support from Gov. Scott Walker. Although sponsors of the new bill such as Rep. Mike Kuglitsch (R-New Berlin) believe it can pass the Legislature, the proposal was criticized by two Democrats who said it was not large or bold enough to improve the economy.

According to a multi-center study led by Johns Hopkins researchers, there is a significant link between lifestyle factors and heart health, adding even more evidence in support of regular exercise, eating a Mediterranean-style diet, keeping a normal weight and -- most importantly -- not smoking.

Adopting those four lifestyle behaviors, researchers say, provide protection against coronary heart disease as well as the early buildup of calcium deposits in heart arteries, and reduce the chance of death from all causes by 80 percent over an eight-year period.

Results of the study are described in an online article posted June 3, 2013 by the American Journal of Epidemiology.

I have recently read two posts that point to lack of innovation in Silicon Valley. Sam Altman (a founder of Loopt) wrote a pretty persuasive essay on his blog called, “What happened to innovation”. He looks at the venture investment trends and points to declining risk tolerance among Silicon Valley investors.

Here is a tiny excerpt, but read the original in its entirety:

A recent study done by University of Maryland (UMD) researchers suggests wood could be an answer to cheap and sustainable energy in the future.

In a press release posted to the school's website Wednesday said a sliver of wood coated with tin could act as a small, eco-friendly battery that would work effectively for an extended period of time.

"The inspiration behind the idea comes from the trees," Liangbing Hu, an assistant professor of materials science said. "Wood fibers that make up a tree once held mineral-rich water, and so are ideal for storing liquid electrolytes, making them not only the base but an active part of the battery."

Boston Children’s Hospital stirred up some buzz this week when it said its researchers had made a breakthrough that could change the face of diabetes treatment.

On its Vector blog, the hospital called attention to a study published earlier this year in the journal Diabetes that identified a certain pathway in the body as the cause of type 1 diabetes. A team led by Dr. Paolo Fiorina from the hospital’s nephrology department studied hundreds of pathways in animals with diabetes and isolated one, ATP/P2X7R, as a trigger of T-cell attacks on the pancreas that inhibit its ability to produce insulin.

At The Economist magazine’s Ideas Conference this year, they invited me to examine the various lists of “the world’s most innovative companies,” and to give a brief presentation comparing and contrasting their approaches and the firms they ranked in the top ten.

It turned out to be an illuminating project. For one thing, there are a lot of companies out there, and lest one limit oneself to only ranking companies in a certain geography (the United States, say), you’ve got a lot of work on your plate. But the real challenge, it turns out, is deciding the criteria and the methodology by which you’ll rank the innovators, and we found some interesting criteria:

The government of Singapore has decided that it wants to ramp up innovation in the country.  Therefore, it’s going to share more data sets with both public and private sectors to increase efficiency, improve the way services are delivered, and drive social innovation.

The government has adopted a new “Open Data” mindset to get even more from the power of data.

One of its projects is a new data service named PopulationQuery.  This has been launched on OneMap and allows users to get various forms of data about Singapore’s population and display the results on a map.  This can be overlaid with other sorts of information such as stats about schools, restaurants and properties in an area.  This can help someone who is thinking about relocating.

I’m not sure I agree with the premise of the question. I will give you my perspective as Vice President of the Samsung Open Innovation Center. Yes, we are a large corporation but we, and many companies like ours, are pushing very hard on making new ideas come to life in the world of technology. Samsung spends over $10 billion annually on research and development, and employs 50,000 talented and driven individuals to accelerate the pace of innovation. You might have seen in the news that Samsung is developing 5G technology – which is hundreds of times faster than 4G. Samsung is also working to release flexible displays. Lots of other cool products in the works. In addition, at the Samsung Accelerator (Samsung Accelerator), we will be unlocking innovation in apps and tools from promising entrepreneurial minds.

Does it really take a few flaws to make a great entrepreneur, or are the rest of us just confused about what a perfect business person is all about? In the past I’ve written about the positive attributes of great entrepreneurs, so this time I thought I would focus on the negatives that I see often, and I challenge you to find someone that has all the positives and none of the negatives.

We’ve all heard the old adage that “nice guys finish last,” so I would quickly concede that positive and negative are relative terms, depending on the context.To read the full, original article click on this link: The 10 Worst Traits Of The Best Entrepreneurs - Business Insider

1. RESPECT THE WEEKEND.

"I'm a natural introvert, as many entrepreneurs (and especially social software entrepreneurs) are. Keeping the weekends quiet is critical. I disconnect and read, watch a movie, or just remember that I am a person outside of my mission." --Gina Bianchini, founder, Mightybell

I’ve never been an amazing cook.  Sure, I could dabble in my go-to stir fry or roasted tilapia, but that’s about it.

Somehow, I ended up starting a food company.  Funny how life works out.

As I’ve been working on building a company from the ground up for the first time, while also learning how to cook, I’ve seen some parallels between cooking and entrepreneurship.

You may be an ambitious and energetic person planning to start on your own. But ambition and energy alone aren’t sufficient to take you to the next level. I have met, observed and studied several entrepreneurs. I have found that they possess some specific traits that played a key role in the eventual success or failure of their businesses.

You must know which traits can help you succeed, and which ones can lead you to failure. So, here is the list of the best and worst traits of an entrepreneur.

Chances are, you’re reading this article on your way to a meeting, coming out of a meeting or (don’t look so guilty, now) during a meeting.

How did I know? The numbers were in my favor: according to the National Statistics Council, on average, 37% of employee time is spent in meetings. Other data indicates there are between 11-17 million business meetings each and every day.

Yes, the numbers may have been in my favor--but if you are constantly running to a meeting or from a meeting, they’re not in yours.

Not separating your weekend from your week can unravel your relationships, stymie your stress recovery, and ultimately ruin your productivity, research suggests.

We can avert these disasters, scholars say, but only if we learn to detach our grinds from our lives. Kansas State organizational psychologist YoungAh Park explained as much in an interview:

"If you have a strong technological boundary and self-restricted rules for using email, laptops or cellphones for work during off-work times, then you are more likely to experience psychological detachment from work"

The emerging tech town of St. Louis has also become fertile ground for a community of life sciences companies that are ready to bloom — if they can find early stage funding.

“We’ve got a lot of engineers here who have been working for companies like Sigma-Aldrich and Monsanto that have decided to spin off, so we have some great entrepreneurial ventures in the life sciences,” said Kasey Joyce, the director of investor relations for Cultivation Capital.

Since sprints get us to focus in and finish our tasks with crisp consciousness, we know they're the most effective way of working. But what's fascinating is why they make us work so well.

For Leo Widrich at Buffer, it's in human nature: while we often imagine ourselves as machines--which move linearly--we're actually organisms, which move cyclically. And to do our most creative, productive work, we need to step to that rhythm.

Veteran creative directors Evan Fry and Dave Swartz are charged with managing, inspiring, and organizing the creative staff at agency CPB. Here, they outline some of what they’ve learned about getting the best from the people we call "creatives."

When the Harvard Business Review published a post called Seven Rules For Managing Creative People a few months back, the reaction was an almost universal, Oh, please! This was due to the fact that most of the advice in the piece was bizarrely off base ("surround them with semi-boring people." What?), but also because of the patronizing tone and the assumption that "creatives" are a breed of brats demanding a different set of operating instructions.