Here we highlight selected innovation related articles from around the world on a daily basis. These articles related to innovation and funding for innovative companies, and best practices for innovation based economic development.
People and computers are coming together in all kinds of interesting ways these days. The right combination of human and digital smarts in chess will beat the top grandmaster, the best chess supercomputer, and the top grandmaster with the best supercomputer. At least one VC firm is giving an algorithm a formal vote on its investments. And robots (which I consider to be computers with a physical presence) are increasingly working side by side with people on factory and warehouse floors.
Someone asked me earlier this year if I had simply gone to a facilitation training class, swiped the content, renamed it Brainzooming, and opened up shop.
My answer was an emphatic, “Definitely not!”
What has become the Brainzooming methodology developed from a wide variety of sources. It evolved into a tested approach for developing strategy that takes full advantage of the diverse inspirations from which its strategic thinking exercises originated.
In 20 Reasons to Start Your Own Business, serial entrepreneur Mike Templeman lists the pros of taking the plunge into entrepreneurship. He notes that it gives anyone regardless of age or education the ability to redefine their career.
"Every time I sell a company, I'm presented with an opportunity to reinvent myself all over again," he writes. "On the flip side, if I had received my law degree, I'd be a lawyer (not a lot of room to recreate myself)."
People often ask me if I have a mentor, someone who has influenced my thinking over my career. I have had many, but over the past thirty years I have learned a great deal about investing from the person I have come to refer to as The Smartest Man in Europe. The most important lessons he taught me were (1) that the primary force behind good performance is recognizing important changes before or just as they are starting to happen, and (2) when something significant is happening, put a lot of money behind it. Concentrate on the big ideas; don't over-diversify.
Image: http://online.barrons.com/
The ingredients of innovation can be found in places you wouldn’t expect. Creativity comes from putting them together in the right way.
Finance is a difficult industry at the best of times but mix in the theoretical and technological changes it has faced in a very short period and you have an unsure industry that appears to be standing at a precipice waiting for a pair of hands to push it over the edge. Steeped in regulation, “history is the business model” mentality and risk aversion as standard it’s hardly surprising how the industry got to where they find themselves yet, the full room at Wired Money 2014 conference (held in the impressive Level 39 at Canary Wharf) was hopeful of real change without destroying things (too much at least).
Image: http://memeburn.com/
A survey of healthcare and life science professionals and investors suggests healthcare M&A activity will surge past 2013 levels when there were 394 deals valued at $97 billion. The report by Bass Berry & Sims and Mergermarket indicates that market disruption, brought on by the Affordable Care Act, will lead to more consolidation deals across healthcare facilities, life science and healthcare IT companies.
Image: http://www.freedigitalphotos.net
Nicholas Woodman and his team at GoPro had every reason to celebrate on their first day as a public company last week. GoPro priced its shares at $24, the high end of its proposed IPO price range, and watched as the stock ticked up by more than 30% that day. GoPro enjoyed similar gains in each of its next few days of trading.
Image: SETH WENIG/ASSOCIATED PRESS
Michael “Luni” Libes thinks he has a great idea for a business but is worried no wealthy investors will help fund his startup.
“It’s a business accelerator for socially conscious companies,” Libes said. “It’s in a space that doesn’t have a lot of investor capital.”
But Libes, an entrepreneur and instructor at the Bainbridge Graduate Institute, a 12-year-old accredited business school, is hopeful a new state law will allow him to try to raise money in small increments from a large group of investors through crowdfunding.
Image: Michael “Luni” Libes is an entrepreneur who plans to raise money for his fledgling business through crowdfunding later this year. He is in front of the members wall at Impact Hub Seattle. - MARK HARRISON / THE SEATTLE TIMES
In that classic of management science, The Wizard of Oz, Dorothy gives the secret to finding a talented team of people who have intellect, passion, and courage when she says: “if I ever go looking for my heart’s desire again, I won’t look any further than my own backyard.”
Image: http://www.freedigitalphotos.net
The Montana State University Innovation Campus will soon be expanding and getting a major facelift at the same time.
"There's 35 spin off optics companies that have started here in Bozeman so that's one of the areas in which we'll cluster and develop buildings around," said Teresa McKnight, executive director of the MSU Innovation Campus. "You can see the grand entrance coming off Garfield Street."
(Updated 7/2/14, 4:10 pm. See below.) The University of Washington spun out 18 startup companies in the fiscal year just ended, a record level that serves as a powerful counterpoint to recent criticism that its commercialization practices have over-emphasized revenue generation at the expense of other priorities.
If you believe selfies should be a constitutional right and that no fireworks show should go un-hashtagged, this edition of Free App Friday (on a Thursday!) is for you.
As always, while they're free now, we can't guarantee how long they'll last--so don't wait too long.
GifBoom (Android and iOS)
Still shots don’t cut it, especially when they’re of the fireworks your neighbors set off in a trashcan on the street or your cousin’s face emerging from a pie-eating contest covered in victory. Create GIFs and add filters, text overlays, and music. One-touch sharing to social networks means you can get that GIF up before your great-aunt can say, "Add me on the face books."
The people want to work from home.
In fact, according to the last census data, the telecommuting workforce increased 80% from 2005 to 2012, even as the total workforce declined. And in the U.K., record numbers of employees work remotely.
Nicholas Bloom, professor of economics at Stanford University, studied the Chinese travel center Ctrip over nine months and found that employees who worked from home put their desk-bound counterparts' productivity to shame:
Image: http://www.freedigitalphotos.net
No matter where you take your summer holiday, if you’re a millennial, then you will likely be packing your inbox.
According to a recent study by HR consulting firm Randstad, 52% of millennial employees reported feeling compelled to respond to emails outside of working hours. Despite their ability to connect with the office while away, 40% of generation Y employees reported feeling guilty about using all of their vacation time, compared to only 18% of baby boomers.
Come one, come all — if your startup idea doesn’t involve just software, that is. That’s the message from Cleveland area bu
siness accelerator LaunchHouse as it seeks 10 up and coming startups for a 16-week program kicking off Sept. 29, 2014. Though the start of the program may be months off, the deadline for submissions isn’t. The accelerator says it must have applications from up and coming startups by July 12, 2014.
Image: http://smallbiztrends.com/
There are so many books to read and so little time. But you can’t afford to miss some of them either. We bring you a list of books that some of the greatest entrepreneurs of India are reading now. Take a look.
Image: http://www.nextbigwhat.com/
Since I’ve moved to USA to build Sourceasy, I’ve had significant learnings about what matters and what doesn’t matter while building a startup, while raising funds from Investors, what is reality and what is perception, especially being part of a larger cohort like 500 Startups.
Image: http://www.nextbigwhat.com/
(July 2, 2014) — Starting your own business can be an exciting and rewarding experience. It can offer numerous advantages such as being your own boss, setting your own schedule and making a living doing something you enjoy. But, becoming a successful entrepreneur requires thorough planning, creativity and hard work.
Image: http://www.freedigitalphotos.net
Entities as diverse as the U.S. Department of Commerce and Forbes magazine have made efforts to quantify what qualities make successful entrepreneurs, especially serial entrepreneurs, different from everyone else. While there is no single answer to this question, certain traits pop up again and again when studying this class of person.
Image: http://www.freedigitalphotos.net
