An economic impact study from The Center for Economic Development at Cleveland State University’s Levin College of Urban Affairs shows that young, high-potential companies receiving capital and/or technical assistance from Greater Cleveland entrepreneurial support organizations are generating impact in Ohio. Last year, 245 startups supported by Northeast Ohio seed funds, accelerators, incubators, or mentoring, recruitment and education programs collectively generated $424 million in economic benefits for the state. The growth and activity of these entrepreneurial companies and their suppliers resulted in $16 million in state and local taxes, a $142 million increase in household earnings and a total employment impact of 2,383 jobs.

Entrepreneurs are nothing if not a trailblazing bunch, and they know firsthand that many rules were made to be broken. From hiring to time management, email etiquette to funding, today's business owners are tossing the guidebooks. More and more businesses these days are even breaking the (former) cardinal rule of business — don't start a venture with friends — and seeing success.

Summer internship season is in full swing. Whether it's at a startup or a corporation, all students dive into an internship with similar goals — to acquire skills, spice up their resumes with work experience and, ideally, land a full-time position.

In today's competitive job market, internships have become the norm and are considered one of the best ways to get your foot in the door. But when you find yourself fetching coffee or tidying up a storage room, you start to question whether it'll pay off or not.

Last year, I wrote a post that used data from the Center for Venture Research (CVR) at the University of New Hampshire to explore how angel investments have changed since the financial crisis and Great Recession.

Now that the CVR has released its 2013 estimates of angel investing activity in the United States, I am updating that analysis. The twitter length message is this: The number of angels and angel-backed companies has risen, but investment dollars have fallen, driving down the size of the average investment.

Small business owners frequently do not have the capital to pursue new venues, and they can find it difficult to secure loans from banks. Startups and entrepreneurs may find many lending doors closed to them when they need it most. Crowdfunding is one way to obtain needed funds to bring your innovative business ideas from dream to reality. Below you will find 30 crowdfunding sites, organized by specialty, to get you off the ground. Commissions, fees, and terms vary or change from time to time, so always double check the “fine print,” as the saying goes.

It’s increasingly rare for every team member to work the same hours in the same location. In many ways this is beneficial – developers can work on projects they’re passionate about when and wherever they want, while employers can hire talented, driven developers regardless of geographic limitations. With these benefits, however, come new and unexpected challenges. Lack of physical proximity means everyone isn’t always on the same page. Some even find they’re expending extra time and energy making sure projects are completed promptly and correctly.

Wisconsin entrepreneurs often lament the state’s relative lack of venture capital, but lately they’ve had plenty to smile about.

In the past two weeks, there have been five major funding announcements by Badger State startups: $8.5 million for Green Bay-based Aver Informatics, $6 million for Delafield-based Montage Talent, $3.4 million for Madison-based FluGen, $3 million for Madison-based PerBlue, and $1.5 million for Madison-based Fishidy.

Madison-based Wellbe has also raised $425,000 for a possible $1.25 million funding round, according to an SEC filing.

A few years ago in this very publication I read a piece by Amity Shlaes (who was writing about the dour nature of her family) called Family Affair that stopped me in my tracks. She said:

(My father) gave the best career advice I’ve ever heard: There will come a moment when you are bored with an area of study and will want to try something new. But that boredom is the signal you’ve achieved mastery. You’ll be quitting at the moment when it’s most costly to do so. Only a mastered trade can be properly monetized.

For many of us student entrepreneurs, graduation marks an exciting time—the finish line of academia and the beginning of a full-time career in entrepreneurship. Without the time limitations of academic commitments and physical limitations of university, postgraduate life offers the freedom to fully and freely invest our time.

That said, the months leading up to graduation were a great source of anxiety for me, as I imagine they are for many other graduating student entrepreneurs. My fear was that graduation marked the end of access to invaluable on-campus resources—losing the support system of faculty members and peers, networking opportunities, and university funding.

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What is the Indiana Venture Capital Investment Tax Credit?

Indiana provides a significant incentive to investors in early stage Indiana companies through the Indiana Venture Capital Investment Tax Credit (VCI Credit). The VCI Credit was established to facilitate capital access for emerging Indiana companies by providing state tax credits to investors in qualified Indiana businesses. If an Indiana company qualifies, its investors can receive Indiana state tax credits in an amount equal to 20% of their qualifying investment.

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The most successful, visionary entrepreneurs dream not of millions of dollars, but of a world where their products change culture. But in technology startups, particularly venture-backed technology startups, the current investment climate does not always support that vision. Conventional wisdom suggests that there are only two ways to exit a company: either it grows such that it can hold an initial public offering, or it gets acquired by or merges with a strategic partner. For as long as it has been an industry, these have been the only two ways for a venture capital-backed company to succeed. There has to be a better way.

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Being a successful strategic negotiator requires calculated self-interest, along with a heavy dose of dissembling. Or so go the usual assumptions about negotiating. People sense that to win, they must play a certain role— like good cop/bad cop — or simply be the title after their name (manager, entrepreneur, salesperson). But, what if you could create better results, increase value, and strengthen relationships just by being yourself?

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ARE YOU STILL SEARCHING FOR A JOB YOU LOVE, SO YOU WILL NEVER HAVE TO WORK A DAY IN YOUR LIFE? WHILE AN EGO-DRIVEN CAREER MAY RESULT IN SUCCESS, STAYING TRUE TO YOURSELF MEANS LISTENING TO YOUR CALLING.

When I left a career in marketing to pursue freelance writing, I explained to my boss and my coworkers that I was simply following my true calling. A writer since childhood, I always imagined how amazing it would be to make money pursuing a hobby I enjoyed most.

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John Howkins is a filmmaker, businessman and author of the book, "The Creative Economy: How People Make Money from Ideas," a work which is very relevant to modern day China.

John Howkins wrote "The Creative Economy" back in 2001. It explored the importance of creativity in a modern economy and in modern life. Understanding the role that innovation and creativity play in a modern economy would be useful not just for the career prospects of individuals that might read the book; it also has implications for education, copyright law, technology and economic policy.

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Fundraising is arguably the most important issue for any entrepreneur. Without financial backing, even the most brilliant idea will never see the light of day. This is a daily fight for start-ups as they delicately balance cultivating their billion dollar idea while struggling to come up with the next hundred dollars to keep the lights on. The reason this is so difficult is because wooing investors is an art and not a science.

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Most young technology companies in the Boston area that raise seed rounds of funding have local investors involved in the round — 70 percent of them, in fact, according to new data from CB Insights.

It suggests Massachusetts startups are not suffering from a lack of local early-stage investor support, CB Insights said in a blog post.

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The epicenter of the technology industry in northern California is more visible than ever, with Newsweek profiling venture capitalists and HBO running “Silicon Valley,” a fictional series that was just picked up for a second season.

What these representations of Silicon Valley lack are women. And it's a longstanding problem: From sitcoms like The Big Bang Theory to big movies like The Social Network, women in technology are portrayed as accessories.

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The Academy of Radiology Research reported in the current issue of Nature Biotechnology (Volume 32, Issue 6) that patent output from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) is vital to understanding which various areas of science are contributing most to America's innovation economy. The report, "Patents as Proxies: NIH Hubs of Innovation," confirms an increased economic value of NIH patents as compared to private sector patents, as well as meaningful differences in the rate and quality of invention across different research and development (R&D) investments.

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A highly personalized medical technique is allowing patients with advanced kidney cancer to live nearly three times as long as they normally do. In an experiment involving 21 patients, around half lived more than two and half years after diagnosis with kidney cancer that had begun to spread. Five patients are alive after more than five years.

Massive open online course providers are collecting troves of data about their students, but what good is it if researchers can't use the information? The MOOC Research Initiative formally released its results on Monday, six months after researchers met in Arlington, Texas, to brief one another on initial findings. The body of research -- 22 projects examining everything from how social networks form in MOOCs to how the courses can be used for remedial education -- can perhaps best be described as the first chapter of MOOC research, confirming some widely held beliefs about the medium while casting doubt on others.