Greg Cangialosi’s new business accelerator will soon be looking for Baltimore’s next crop of startup tech firms.

Cangialosi, who sold Baltimore’s Blue Sky Factory    last year, plans to launch his Locust Point accelerator with business partner Sean Lane, CEO of BTS Corp., by mid-April. Cangialosi said he will then start selecting startup companies for the accelerator.

We Canadians tend to get our backs up when people assume we’re exactly the same as Americans, but with different accents, eh?

For proof of just how different we are, take a look at how the two countries are using legislation to support startups.

In the U.S., President Barack Obama is making his Startup America initiative a centerpiece of his campaign. Hit with charges that he hasn’t done enough to get the U.S. out of its economic sinkhole, he’s flogging the following legislative changes under the Startup America banner in the hope of winning a second term:

Crowdfunding: National securities laws would be changed to allow startups to raise equity capital through high volumes of private investors via online social networks without filing IPO papers with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

In Italy, the startup movement suffers from lack of governance and unfavorable taxation framework. With one of a few Italian Intentac Fellows, Prof Vincenzo Nicolò, I have published an article in the second (first ranks the Financial Times) most prestigious economic newspaper in Europe, IL SOLE 24 ORE. The article is focused on a VAT incentive for the Startups.

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Il governo Monti libera dalle catene i giovani fondatori di start up. Le loro imprese potranno decollare non appesantite da un eccessivo carico di capitale e di struttura giuridica. Basterà un euro e un leggero vestito giuridico. Ne guadagnerà quel grande vogatore che è il Made in Italy. Ma, ancora più importante, altri nuovi vogatori potranno gareggiare meglio.

Tra questi, i giovani internauti - aspiranti e baby imprenditori dell'età digitale - che vivono il tempo dell'infanzia e dell'adolescenza quando si trovano nel pieno della maturità i loro genitori, imprenditori e lavoratori dell'età industriale. Con costoro volge al tramonto l'economia che ha ben funzionato come macchina muscolare, la cui potenza ha prodotto posti di lavoro in gran quantità. L'impresa che ieri occupava mille addetti, oggi può essere ancor più produttiva impiegandone solo cento.

Brian Arthur del Santa Fè Institute, famoso per gli studi e le ricerche sulle scienze della complessità, sostiene che la digitalizzazione sta creando una seconda economia così vasta, automatica e invisibile da produrre un cambiamento di portata secolare, paragonabile alla Rivoluzione industriale.

Support NYU's Center for Urban Science and Progress at 370 Jay St. in Downtown Brooklyn!

To read the full, original article click on this link: Brooklyn's on the CUSP of something big - YouTube

TechNet, the bipartisan policy and political network of technology CEOs that promotes the growth of the innovation economy, today released a new study showing that there are now roughly 466,000 jobs in the "App Economy" in the United States, up from zero in 2007.

The study, sponsored by TechNet and conducted by Dr. Michael Mandel of South Mountain Economics LLC, also found that App Economy jobs are spread throughout the nation. The top metro area for App Economy jobs is New York City and its surrounding suburban counties, although together San Francisco and San Jose together substantially exceed New York.  And while California tops the list of App Economy states with nearly one in four jobs, states such as Georgia, Florida, and Illinois get their share as well.  In fact, more than two-thirds of App Economy employment is outside of California and New York.  The results also suggest that the App Economy is growing quickly and that the location and number of app-related jobs are likely to shift greatly in the years ahead.

With campaign season in full swing and the economy far from strong, Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation interim president and CEO Benno C. Schmidt, along with National Governors Association (NGA) leaders Nebraska Governor Dave Heineman and Delaware Governor Jack Markell, today called for state and local government policy changes to foster entrepreneurship and accelerate economic growth. During the third annual Kauffman State of Entrepreneurship Address, titled "A Roadmap for State Growth," Schmidt focused on reducing state and local legal and regulatory barriers to startups and young companies, which play a significant role in U.S. new job creation.

In conjunction with this address, the Kauffman Foundation released two reports: "State Startup Act," which lays out an agenda for state-level policymakers to foster entrepreneurship, and "License to Grow," which showcases barriers to entrepreneurship imposed by state and local governments.

If you’re considering entrepreneurship, think about it like this: you can spend the next ten years working for a corporation, or you can spend the next five or ten years learning how to start and build companies. The latter may be harder, but also that much more rewarding and valuable for the rest of your life. At a young age, with nothing to lose, it’s the perfect time to give it a shot. Here are five key things that catapulted my company, Jackthreads, from a one-man operation out of my bedroom to a multimillion-dollar company with over a million members:

Passion Early on, I realized the importance of choosing an idea that I’m passionate about. When I graduated from Ohio State in 2003, I knew I wasn’t headed toward corporate America; I wanted to start something. I launched a small business with a friend, selling promotional merchandise to college athletic departments. It was successful, but nothing huge, and I decided to walk away because I wasn’t excited by my work. I’ve always been into men’s fashion and online shopping, and when I began to parlay this interest into a business, it never felt like work. I was spending more time on hobbies I already enjoyed, making it much easier to wake up and push myself harder everyday.

There are those who believe that social technology presents significant opportunities for improving business dynamics and  relations. Then there are those who are skeptics and don’t believe nor see any value in this thing we call social media.

The difference between the two beliefs represents the “social chasm“. The “social chasm” represents the pronounced difference of opinion, interests, and loyalty to an idea or belief. The challenge is helping leaders “cross the social chasm” is to convince them to believe in something they don’t understand.

General Electric, the industrial goods to financial services group, is enhancing its approach to innovation, particularly by exploiting technologies such as mobile apps and social media.

Beth Comstock, GE's chief marketing officer, told Innovation Excellence that the firm has increased in-house R&D expenditure by 31% in four years and spent $50bn on product technology since 2000.

"Things are changing so rapidly that you're always looking around the corner," she said. "At the same time, we have this challenging dynamic where half of the world is growing and advancing rapidly while the other half is in recovery."

Let's start with today's reality. The world has changed but corporate boards haven't kept pace. How do you know? Ask most boards what they monitor and measure at their organizations. There's a big chance that most of them will say they are monitoring and measuring financial results, compliance and legal risks. Then ask them if they monitor and measure the impact of new technologies on their operations, including the social communications between their customers, employees and shareholders, and the answer will most likely be no. And finally, ask them if they know what the risks and costs are of not using these technologies to communicate and collaborate with stakeholders, or having the insight they provide. Once again, the answer will often be no.

What's surprising about such responses is that boards know that solid decision-making is essential to mitigating risks and ensuring the viability of their enterprises. How is it, then, that most of them don't have a grip on the operational value these technologies offer, or the critical "big data" -- about customer sentiment, employee engagement and investor insights -- that they produce? The answer: They're still using corporate governance tools and strategies that were developed in an age that was neither social nor mobile, or ever considered that the "cloud" would exist.

Silicon Valley's venture capitalists make their money by funding ideas that disrupt established industries. But these gatekeepers of the technology business are now being challenged themselves.

A fast and furious new funding model is funneling money to young company founders, asking relatively little in return. Startup-incubator programs—Y Combinator is the most prominent—now put founders through a kind of tech-industry boot camp in exchange for a small stake in their company. For many, the next stop is ­AngelList, a social network for angel investors and entrepreneurs where young people can shop for financing without spending years developing contacts in the old-boy network of venture capital. AngelList's cofounder Naval Ravikant explained to Technology Review's IT editor Tom Simonite how the next generation of Silicon Valley CEOs is getting a business education on the fly.

Laura Deming was studying for finals in a crowded MIT reading room last April when her phone rang. That's when she learned she may never again take another exam.

Deming, only 17, had just been chosen by Silicon Valley billionaire Peter Thiel for a high-profile experiment: Put $100,000 apiece in the hands of 24 entrepreneurial teenagers and give them free rein to pursue innovative ideas.

The condition? Deming had to leave her studies and classmates, and vow to stay out of college during the two-year fellowship.

With two fifths of the world’s population now living within 100 km of the shoreline, keeping our oceans healthy is not just an extraordinarily important environmental issue — it’s also a human development one.

This is the core case of the new UNEP Report, “Green Economy in a Blue World,” which urges protecting the oceans from pollution, overfishing, and climate change, while fueling economic growth through developing new marine industries.

Among other immeasurable benefits, the ocean provides coastal populations food, millions of jobs, a thriving tourism industry, transportation, sites for renewable energy development, and vast carbon sinks.  The implications of mismanaging such a bountiful resource are clear and coastal communities cannot afford to do it.

The Canadian Government has begun a new initiative to foster innovation and commercialization for the Canadian business sector. The initiative is a $40 million dollar Canadian Government procurement and acquisition program called the Canadian Innovation and Commercialization Program (CICP).  This program will not act directly as a business funding grant; instead, it provides Canadian entrepreneurs with their first contracts  and commercialization testing for their innovative and pre-commercialized products or services.

Finland has a thriving startup culture with an impressive level of vision and ingenuity. Plus, it’s a great party town.

Silicon Valley better watch out.

A few weeks ago I was invited to Helsinki as a guest of Finnish investment fund Vision+. Soon after landing, word spread that a scion of Sean “Diddy” Combs had arrived in town, and I was shown the red carpet. (I used to work with Diddy.) I spent seven whirlwind days taking meetings and partying hearty with some of the best and brightest tech companies and startups that Finland had to offer, including folks from leading game publisher Rovio.

The Dutch are bicycle fanatics. Almost half of daily travel in the Netherlands is by bicycle, while the country’s bike fleet comfortably outnumbers its 16 million people. Devotees of the national obsession have taken the next logical step by launching what is likely the first bicycle school bus.

Built by Tolkamp Metaalspecials, and sold by the De Cafe Racer company, the bicycle school bus (BCO in Dutch) is powered entirely by children and the one adult driver (although there is an electric motor for tough hills). Its simple design has eight sets of pedals for the kids (ages 4 to 12), a driver seat for the adult, and three bench seats for freeloaders. The top speed is about 10 miles per hour, and features a sound system and canvas awning to ward off rainy days.

I was doing a radio interview recently when the host asked a most interesting question:

“Can anybody become an entrepreneur?”

Great question, and one that I had to think about for a second before answering. The short answer is that anybody can, but quite honestly, not everybody should. I responded that way because I have learned that becoming an entrepreneur has less to do with what you know and what your experiences are, and everything to do with what you are willing to do to succeed.

The InvestMaryland program will be investing approximately $47-55M into several venture capital firms by mid-2012.  The Maryland Venture Fund Authority (MVFA) will be hiring a consultant to assist in the evaluation and selection of venture firms based on the selection criteria detailed in the InvestMaryland Program annotated code 6-518 – Selecting Applicants.

To be certified

For venture capital firms seeking to apply for investment funds from the Invest/Maryland Program, you must be Certified.

Gov. Brian Sandoval said he wants to create 50,000 jobs by 2014, a challenge he issued Tuesday in unveiling a statewide economic development strategy that focuses on regionalizing development efforts and broader marketing of Nevada's business attributes.

The plan is "a blueprint for building a vibrant, sustainable economy for all Nevadans," Sandoval said at a news conference at the University of Nevada, Reno. "It puts us in a better position to succeed in the hyper-competitive push to champion a strong economy that creates good jobs."

At least one critic called the plan a "roadmap for crony capitalism" that will give industries political power to manipulate where taxpayer money is spent.

New York is home to several organizations that are uniting the city’s disparate academic institutions in pursuit of common goals. This month will mark the opening of the New York Genome Center, an effort among 11 colleges to collaborate on genomics research. In November, the New York eHealth Collaborative held its first conference, which was designed to bring together top players in the field of health IT. And just yesterday, the Academy for Medical Development and Collaboration (AMDeC) rolled out a set of enhancements to its year-old online registry—the only resource in the region that provides real-time access to technology and resources for biomedical researchers around the city who want to work together.

Maria Mitchell is the president of AMDeC, a 14-year-old consortium of nearly 20 medical research institutions, including Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, and Weill Cornell Medical College. The group’s online registry is called FIRST (for Facilities Instrumentation Resources Technologies), and, says Mitchell, it’s one of the biggest undertakings AMDeC has ever tackled.