There’s no denying that Germany is an innovation powerhouse. But what is it that underpins Germany’s ability to consistently innovate across different industries at a rate much faster than many other parts of the world?

Alex Schlager, the Verizon executive director for security solutions who spent the last decade in Germany before relocating to the United States believes it’s the country’s ability to focus on following processes.

Image: https://www.innovationaus.com

Over the last five years as the CEO of Launch Tennessee, too often I’ve seen founders raise angel or seed funding, develop a product line and a small customer-base, but not gain any real traction.  

First, they’re discouraged, and soon they’re out of cash. The worst part? They’ve convinced themselves, and often their board, that if they just raise that next round of funding, life will be good, and the company will be on track for success.

What are the ingredients that make an entrepreneur successful? Here is a collection of stories and research that shows the way to making a difference in industries as diverse as green technologies, beauty products, and outer space.

About 60 percent of executives and hiring managers think that most college graduates are prepared to succeed in entry-level positions. But only a third of executives, and a quarter of hiring managers, believe graduates have the skills and knowledge to advance or be promoted. Those findings — among the most striking in a new survey of employers released on Tuesday by the Association of American Colleges & Universities — are open to several interpretations.

My ex-boss John Chambers (former executive chairman and CEO of CISCO) once said every company will become a technology company eventually as no business in this world can be successful without adopting technology.

I take that insight to categorise start-ups in three broad classes: start-ups that use technology to create efficiency and better customer experience, start-ups that apply technology to create new use cases, and start-ups that create new technology to address a new market or an existing market differently.

The U.S. has traditionally led the world in manufacturing innovation. However, other countries are closing the gap as investment in R&D spending abroad begins to dwarf R&D spending at home.

Between 2000 and 2015, U.S. private sector R&D spending grew 34%, an impressive increase, but not when compared to Japan (43%); South Korea (256%); and China (1,056%).

What, then, do U.S. manufacturers need to do to stay ahead in today’s increasingly competitive global environment? It starts with cultivating a culture of innovation—one that supports R&D, risk-taking and strategic long-term investments. For the last 40 years, I have worked for USG, a manufacturer that has been on the cutting edge and witnessed firsthand how the combination of the big and small ideas can dramatically transform an industry.

How you present yourself says a lot about you, and much of that comes down to what you do with your hands. That’s especially true when speaking in front of an audience.

According to a recent study, speakers whose TED Talks went viral used an average 465 hand gestures throughout their speeches, compared to the typical 272 hand gestures of speakers whose videos weren’t as popular. However, there’s an art and science behind effective hand gestures. If you really want to get people to listen to you, you’ve got to be using the right ones at the right times.

I wrote this article because I was irritated by reporters calling me and saying, “I’ve heard that a Regulation Crowdfunding campaign is very expensive.” “Really,” I’d say? “Can you tell me who said that and how much is ‘very expensive’?” This was usually followed by an awkward silence and then an “Um, I don’t know. It’s just what I’ve heard.” So, I decided to answer the question myself since I have access to all the successful regulation crowdfunding campaigns.

Despite the fact that the number of IPOs (Initial Public Offerings) for startups have continued to stay low, I still hear it touted often as the preferred exit strategy. I suspect the exuberance for an IPO is still being driven by the highly visible successes of a few companies several years ago, including Facebook, Yelp, and Twitter. Everyone dreams of becoming a billionaire overnight.

muru-D’s untimely exit raises concern about corporate reliance of accelerator models.

Accelerator programmes have steadily become a mainstay in Singapore’s thriving startup ecosystem. But just like the firms they nurture, accelerators also struggle to find their niche and ensure their own sustainability as they grapple with the same risk of going bust just like the most promising startups.

Becoming an entrepreneur is a compelling idea, many ventures this road during their lives as the perks are immeasurable if you succeed. The road is dangerous and unknown, with little success rate by the statistics, but the end result makes up for all that lacks in this way of life.

Its estimated that only about 10 percent of the businesses succeed to be acknowledged. Over 20% close up in their initial 20 months. This failure has many reasons, from a small consumer base to lack of finance, to aim to be at the top, you'd need much more than just motivation.

Image: https://www.digitalinformationworld.com

The road to entrepreneurship is a bumpy one, so for many budding business owners it pays to keep their day jobs while establishing their firms.

While this can present a host of challenges, it can also  give them the freedom to test their ideas while they have some backup income if times get lean.

In fact, entrepreneurs who kept their day jobs had a 33 percent higher survival rate than those who didn’t, according to researchers Joseph Raffiee and Jie Feng.

Blitzscaling — pursuing rapid growth by prioritizing speed over efficiency in the face of uncertainty—is the primary way to turn startups into world-changing companies like Amazon, Facebook, and Google. Blitzscaling is risky because it involves committing massive resources while the outcome is far from certain. But in winner-take-most or winner-take-all markets, the biggest risk is allowing a competitor to reach market-dominant scale first. I explore these themes in the “Technology-enabled Blitzscaling” class at Stanford University, in my Masters of Scale podcast, and in my upcoming book, Blitzscaling, coauthored by Chris Yeh.

Image: GES Photo/Public Domain

Every day a lot of people cycle to and from work or visit the gym to lift heavy weights. Regardless of the form of training they choose, almost everyone does it to improve their health. But we actually know surprisingly little about exactly how different forms of training affect our health.

Sometimes overlooked in public discussions of the value of higher education are the economic and societal impacts of university-based research. To do so in Ohio would be shortsighted.

Ohio’s 14 public universities have a compelling research story to tell. University-based research leads directly to innovation, disruptive technologies, economic growth, company and job creation, and life-changing, life-improving scientific breakthroughs.

The human mind is a masterpiece of evolution, not only because of its intelligence but even more so because of the ability of its owners to rewire themselves through conscious discipline. Despite our predisposition (genetic, environmental, or otherwise), the human brain has amazing plasticity. That simply means we can rewire ourselves if we put in the effort to do so. That’s the good news. The bad news is that as our neural pathways become trained to do things one way we find it increasingly harder to change these pathways. You can still learn to play piano or speak Mandarin at 50, but it may take you 10 times as long as a 5-year-old.

On a balmy Caribbean evening in August, crew members aboard the 184-foot exploration vessel the Alucia tied dead fish to the front of a small yellow submarine. 

They tightly wound the fish to a metal pole extending out from the undersea craft to tempt whatever might be lurking, three thousand feet below.

Image: A sixgill shark caught on a line for research purposes.IMAGE: DEAN GRUBBS

Right now, Greater Cleveland is doing some very appropriate economic soul-searching. We're asking ourselves some hard questions about what it's really going to take to "win the future."

This soul-searching extends to our startup ecosystem, which is why our absence from the list of rising startup hubs in a recent Center for American Entrepreneurship study made headlines in Crain's Cleveland Business.

A lot of people swear by New Year’s resolutions — in fact, 40 percent of Americans set new goals on January 1. The unfortunate part is that only 8 percent are successful in achieving their goals; four-fifths of New Year’s resolutions are done by Valentine’s Day, meaning less than 20 percent even make it to the end of the first quarter.

Many entrepreneurs I know prefer to set goals for themselves at the beginning of their fiscal year, whenever that might be. I’ve heard multiple say they regretted this later — adding hardcore goals to the stress of a new fiscal year and new benefits plans, provider transitions, etc., led them to ultimately abandon their goals to ensure their new relationships went well.

The answer lies in the tiny shifts we see in a star's position as Earth revolves around the sun.