It is part of the American dream, the notion that if you have a good idea and a fire in your belly, you can turn an idea into a successful business. It's that entrepreneurial spirit that drives the global economy.

That message is everywhere in our culture. President Obama echoed it last week, at a summit on entrepreneurship at the White House.

"We have a lot of brainpower here," he said. "We've got innovators and investors, business leaders, entrepreneurs. We've even got a few Sharks."

How is it that only a few business leaders and entrepreneurs seem to drive exceptional results and disruptive innovation in this rapidly changing market economy (marketquake)? These few seem more adept at executing market and technology turns, not just incremental evolution. They consistently take bold steps to stay ahead of the curve, often contrary to conventional wisdom.

SPECIAL REPORT / European specialist media companies are offering contrasting strategies for coverage of European affairs against a backdrop of crisis, executives said at an event staged on World Press Freedom Day (3 May) in Brussels.

In a session at the event called Difference Day on European media – titled “A Europe section in every newspaper” – VRT Europe correspondent Rob Heirbaut asked media commentators how they thought European specialist media was faring.

Image: Rob Heirbaut - flickr

Though higher education is constantly changing, commencement ceremonies have largely stayed the same. A graduating student at Stanford Law School is trying to change that.

Marta F. Belcher is crowdsourcing the speech she will give next month at the law school’s precommencement diploma ceremony, offering her classmates an opportunity to share in crafting that final message.

In 2011, MIT and Russian institutions including the Skolkovo Foundation launched a multi-year collaboration to facilitate the conception of the Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology—dubbed Skoltech— a private graduate research university in a suburb of Moscow that was designed to stimulate the Russian entrepreneurial ecosystem and address a number of pressing global issues.

Since my company’s launch, dozens of people, ranging from childhood friends to those I’ve never met, have reached out to express enthusiasm for our mission.

More than a few of these folks are aspiring social entrepreneurs, who share our desire to do well by doing good. Many don’t have a nest egg to bootstrap their startup, and they want to know about fundraising for a mission-driven business. How did you balance your mission with investors’ financial expectations? Where did you meet your investors? What traction did you have when you raised?

Even in this age of globalization and virtualization, the geographic area where you choose to live and work can still make or break your startup business. I still have to tell some entrepreneurs that even with the best idea, they have to move to Silicon Valley to find the investors they need, or they need to move to the U.S. get the attention of the market they choose.

There are startups, and there are startups. Venture capitalists, particularly in Silicon Valley, want to identify startups of the rarest kind. Not those seeking a quick exit or cloning another business, but startups with a shot of becoming the next Facebook, Apple or Google.

A common trait among many of these startup ideas is how audacious, stupid or crazy they sound. They're trying to create a market where none existed. Instead of taking competitors head on, they're sidestepping them altogether by doing something entirely different.

The UAE will achieve a significant milestone in its year of innovation with the graduation of its first doctorate of advanced and sustainable technology. The Masdar Institute of Science and Technology Class of 2015 will include the university’s first PhD graduate – who is an Emirati – an achievement of particular value given the impact of doctorate holders on advanced knowledge economies.

Graduate education is known to play a significant role in prosperous economies.

Image: Faisal Al Marzooqi is an ambitious young Emirati who intends to use his doctorate to help his country reach the next level of its prosperity. Courtesy Masdar

For entrepreneurs and small businesses, taking an idea from concept to reality can be an incredibly exciting, albeit stressful, adventure. You developed a prototype, crafted your business plan and your project is starting to come to life. You're on the verge of the next big thing. There's only one major problem: How do you pay for it?

For small businesses seeking to establish a presence online, there is probably no more important decision than choosing a domain name. No pressure, right? But seriously, it’s very possible your success in building an audience — or being found at all, for that matter — may depend upon this crucial selection. Beyond the question of any existing business name you may already be using, there are at least four major considerations when making your pick.

WASHINGTON, May 15, 2015—Internet2 has announced the establishment of a new award, honoring the lifelong contributions of the chancellor of the University System of Maryland (USM). The Internet2 William “Brit” Kirwan Mentorship Award will be presented annually, beginning in 2016, to a member of the Internet2 community who embodies the spirit of Kirwan’s role as a mentor to countless professionals in the research and education (R&E) community. He is well known for his ability to connect people in higher education and inspire others, and for giving his time to serve the community. Kirwan, a long-time Internet2 supporter and member of its Board of Trustees, will step down from his USM chancellorship next month.

Image: William “Brit” Kirwan at the Internet2 2015 Global Summit. Credit: Internet2/Jocelyn Augustino.

The military has long recognized that machine guns are force multipliers for rifles, but businesses have been slow to capitalize on this concept. Sometimes all the planning in the world isn’t enough for business survival, when things change as fast as they do today. Every business, especially startups, needs all guns blazing quickly on every opportunity or insight into the market.

In just three months, demand for lab and office space at the Johns Hopkins innovation hub, FastForward East, has exceeded supply. The FastForward program, designed to move academic findings through translational research into the commercial marketplace, was introduced to East Baltimore earlier this year in an interim facility in the Rangos Building at 855 N. Wolfe St. In that time, all of its offices and lab benches have been rented.

Image: http://hub.jhu.edu

In a recent post, I debated the merits of our company, VerbalizeIt, joining an accelerator program and questioned what types of entrepreneurs and businesses are right for incubators.

Ultimately, we made the right decision to join the ranks of the TechStars Class of 2012 in Boulder, Colorado.

Image: http://www.forbes.com

The 21st Century Cures bill advanced Thursday when The House Energy and Commerce health subcommittee sent the unanimously passed bill onto the full committee, which will address it next week.

The bill could potentially be enacted into law later this year.

The legislation is designed to boost biomedical innovation through additional funding for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and lowering the barriers for FDA approval. Although the measure was a bipartisan effort, some are still expressing concern – mostly about where the additional money will come from.

Drug costs are astronomical – this we know.

But we don’t have a transparent, informed way of calculating – or understanding – the true costs of drug development, argued Dr. Jerry Avorn, a professor of pharmacoeconomics at Harvard University, in this week’s New England Journal of Medicine. 

And this ignorance may be helping big pharma inflate the price of drugs.

Awful patient experience, poor communication, increasing out-of-pocket costs. Investors assembled for a panel discussion of the future of investing in aging technology at the AARP Innovation@50+ focused more on pain points that could apply to healthcare generally not specifically to senior care.

Jody Holtzman, senior vice president of thought leadership at the AARP, moderated the panel.

Image: http://medcitynews.com

When we we talk about innovation in business, or economic development, or in regions or countries, we are talking about doing work in the actual, real world.  That is, we think of innovation as being about business, and capital and commerce, and growth.  And, of course, that is how we find mutual ground to talk about innovation:  We wish to do something new, or better, or different in such a way as to create — generally speaking — economic value.

VAN WERT —Is a key to economic development in Van Wert County to be found in a middle school classroom through the study of physics? The county may soon find out, depending on decisions made by three local school districts.

Mark Lautman, the man who led discussion at the recently-held Stakeholder Summit in Van Wert, was back in the county on Friday and with Lautman was Ukrainian physicist Anatoliy Glushchenko. The two were accompanied by Van Wert County Economic Development Director Sarah Smith in meetings with science teachers, curriculum directors, and principals at Crestview and at Lincolnview about the idea of introducing middle school students to physics as part of their science curriculum.

Image: http://www.timesbulletin.com