By Nancy Dahlberg - This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

At eMerge Americas on Monday, The Institute for Commercialization of Public Research announced the launch of the Florida Patent Pro Bono Program in partnership with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

The program links qualified inventors and small businesses with volunteer patent agents and attorneys who provide pro bono legal assistance on specific aspects of the patent process, and with Florida’s launch it is now active in nearly all 50 states. In 2011, Congress passed the America Invents Act, which called for the USPTO to establish the regional patent programs.

So you’re finally ready to start that business of yours, but you’re not sure where to actually start, right? Don’t worry, you’re covered.

By the time you’re finished reading this post, you’ll be ready to walk out into the world a new CEO.

The most important first step, of course, is actually having the idea and capital for that startup, or at least a solid plan to make it work. After that, though, where you physically start that business is almost as important. There’s a lot more to consider than just what a list says is the best state for a startup.

There are lots of kids’ toys that are also meant to teach.

Puzzles can teach children about shapes. Blocks often include letters, colors or animals. There are even plenty of tablet and smartphone apps aimed at teaching kids everything from reading to motor skills.

But now there’s another option that’s teaching a new skill. Dash Robotics is a company that creates small robots aimed at teaching kids how to code.

An Australian surfer took his life into his own hands, by punching a shark that was attacking him.

47-year-old Bruce Lucas was paddling in the murky waters off Saltwater Beach on the mid-north coast of New South Wales on Sunday afternoon, but he didn't know there was a shark lurking underneath the water, Seven News reported.

Eating healthy has never been so confusing. Low-fat, sugar-free, all natural — what's the deal?

Fancy packaging and convincing advertising makes it tricky for hungry customers when it comes to eating well (and who doesn't want to be healthy?). In fact, 64% of customers are influenced by healthy food products, according to the Institute of Food Technologists. And eight out of 10 adults have made some effort to eat healthier within the last year. But with so many options and so little time, it's hard to tell what's actually good for you and what's just a health fad.

Whether you’re pitching an idea to the board inside a corporation, to a VC or to your manager, these tips should help increase your odds.

When you are pitching investors, your business/business case is your product. Like all products, they require selling. You need to sell yourself, your team and your ideas. Selling ideas requires relating to your audience. The best salespeople take their prospects on their prospect’s own deeply personal emotional journey. This starts by helping them understand and empathize with your target customers.

While it's really hard to immediately win over a crowd, as a speaker it's really easy to lose the room within the first minutes of your presentation.

To make sure you don't lose your audience I asked Boris Veldhuijzen van Zanten, accomplished speaker and founder of TwitterCounter and The Next Web, for some of the things you should never say during your presentations.

Some people are naturally confident and self assured. 

Unfortunately, I'm not one of them -- and possibly neither are you. Small talk doesn't come easily to us, and those first five minutes are tough because we're a little shy and a little insecure.

Yet we want to make a good impression. We want people to genuinely like us... but we want them to like the real us.

One of the big global technology stories this year is the expanding divide between the digital haves and have-nots. As the World Economic Forum’s new Global Information Technology Report 2015 highlights, the full benefits of technology are only available in countries that have embraced digital technology for the vast majority of their citizens. There’s a similar digital dichotomy playing out in the corporate world too. The companies that are viewed as digital leaders are outperforming their peers in terms of growth, profits, and market valuation. It’s increasingly clear that digital has become core to driving growth and transformation. You no longer have a choice. To lead in your industry you must be a leader in digital. And if you don’t lead, you lose.

Metro areas with strong startup ecosystems depend on success stories and market conditions that converge over time. In the best of circumstances, a regional community can become stronger than the sum of its parts, moving the needle for industries nationally – or even worldwide.

On Wednesday, big names from D.C.'s tech and business circles will come together at DC Inno's State of Innovation event at Artisphere to discuss the area's future for young startups. One of the hot topics for the evening will be exactly how an innovation ecosystem comes together. Tackling the question will be local leaders from Eastern Foundry, Video Blocks, Arlington Economic Development and Springboard Enterprises.

Starting and growing a business feels overwhelming at times. You have a million things on your to-do list, and there doesn't seem to be enough hours in the day to get everything accomplished. 

There may also be some reading this who aren't entrepreneurs, yet. You want to be and are working on making the transition. When you are building your business on the side, there is even less time and a longer to-do list. 

When I was 16-years-old, my idol was a guy by the name of Scott Olson.

He wasn't a rockstar, nor was he a professional athlete. He was an entrepreneur. More specifically, he was the founder/inventor of a product that became a global phenomenon -- Rollerblade.

Growing up in Minnesota, where Rollerblade started, made Scott even more of a hero to me. Not just because he understood the pain of Minnesota winters, but because I actually had a shot at spending time with him.

When you’re thinking about taking the plunge and becoming and entrepreneur, for the first few weeks and months of your entrepreneurial journey, the prospect of being your own boss and investing in your own enterprise is exhilarating. You read stories about overnight successes and other business leaders finally feeling fulfilled in their work and think that you’ll experience the same level of success or fulfillment as soon as you get started.

Solar energy holds the best potential for meeting humanity’s future long-term energy needs while cutting greenhouse gas emissions – but to realize this potential will require increased emphasis on developing lower-cost technologies and more effective deployment policy, says a comprehensive new study on The Future of Solar Energy released today by The MIT Energy Initiative (MITEI).

Image: http://scienceblog.com

Driving growth in evolving industries has never been easy. But companies today are being challenged as never before not just to adapt but to adapt at speed in the face of relentless innovation. In this interview with McKinsey’s Barr Seitz, Marc Singer, a leader of the McKinsey Digital Practice, discusses the importance of adopting a strategy of rapidly implementing and testing ideas in order to maintain and accelerate growth. An edited transcript of his remarks follows.

DES MOINES | Sarah McDonald Hasken has been elected to the top leadership post on the Board of Directors for the Iowa Innovation Corp.

Hasken, of Dubuque, was appointed to the board by Gov. Terry Branstad when the corporation was formed in 2011.

She replaces outgoing board chair Bob Riley, who will continue to serve as an ex-officio member of the board

By BRANDON BAILEY AP Technology Writer

Each time 81-year-old Bill Dworsky or his 80-year-old wife Dorothy opens the refrigerator, closes the bathroom door or lifts the lid on a pill container, tiny sensors in their San Francisco home make notes on a digital logbook.

The couple's 53-year-old son, Phil, checks it daily on his smartphone. If there's no activity during a designated time, the younger Dworsky gets an automated email, so he can decide whether to call or stop by. "This is peace of mind, really," he says of the system he installed last year.

D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser has launched a string of small-ticket initiatives for the month of May focused on the District’s technology sector, calling the bundle of policy items “InnoMAYtion.” A spokesman for Bowser’s office says the larger purpose is connecting underserved communities to the District’s innovation economy. Though the technology sector plays a role in most items on the list, the primary focus is on small business and government.

Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong has some big ideas in healthcare, like a vision of a fully connected ecosystem that truly empowers patients to make informed choices about their own care, aided by supercomputers to crunch all the data, including highly complex genomic information. And he’s not afraid to toot his own horn every once in a while.

“We’ve created the Google of genome mapping,” Soon-Shiong, the multibillionaire entrepreneur behind the still-somewhat-mysterious NantHealth and parent company NantWorks, said Monday at the American Telemedicine Association annual meeting in Los Angeles.

Image: http://medcitynews.com

BY LYDIA DISHMAN Despite a plethora of apps, corporate initiatives, and advice, it’s never been harder to achieve a work-life balance.

According to its latest survey of nearly 9,700 full-time workers, EY, the global assurance, tax, transaction, and advisory services firm, found that one-third of employees report that managing their personal and professional lives has become more difficult.