MassChallenge, a Boston-based startup accelerator, is launching a second U.S. program in Austin with plans to accept up to 100 nascent companies.

MassChallenge already operates accelerator programs in London, Israel, Switzerland and Mexico. But this is the first new program to launch under the watch of Scott Bailey, the former director of the Boston program who earlier this year took over as executive director for North America.

Image: Scott Bailey, MassChallenge's executive director for North America. W. MARC BERNSAU

When Miko Branch co-founded the curly hair product empire Miss Jessie’s with her sister, she expected it to change her life, but she had no clue it would make her an even better person. I sat down with Branch to get the inside scoop on her entrepreneurial journey and walked away with five interesting nuggets about self-improvement through entrepreneurship.

In an announcement timed with this year’s MWC Americas, the city of Atlanta is receiving an Internet of Things (IoT) boost, in the form of a sensor-enabled data network that monitors traffic, parking, and pedestrian movement.

AT&T, Current by GE, and Georgia Power have collaborated to fit 200 LED streetlights in the North Ave. Corridor, Buckhead Loop, MLK and Northside Drive, Joseph E. Lowery Boulevard and the Atlanta City Government area with sensors that can monitor a whole range of activity.

Investing in entrepreneurs and startups is a fun but different world from investing in conventional stocks, bonds, and commodities. First of all, it’s more of an investment in people than in a business, since the startup is usually an idea barely half-baked when they need your money. Secondly, the risk is very high, since as many as 90% of startups fail in the first five years.

On the plus side, it’s an opportunity to get in early and really help make things happen that will change an industry, or change the world. It’s an opportunity for that “big bang” return of 10X to 100 times your initial investment, like early investors in Google, Microsoft, and Apple. Finally, it’s an opportunity to “give back” what you have learned in your own career for the next generation.

BENGALURU: Miguel McKelvey, co-founder of the New York-based office rental startup WeWork, said entrepreneurs in India have vast similarities with those in the US and other developed economies in Asia, such as Japan and China, when it comes to aspirations and business ideas.

"My experience comes from the team members. I asked my team here if there were differences in entrepreneurs here compared to back in the US and I was told not so much. It is the same aspirations, business ideas, and eagerness to solve problems," the 43 year-old entrepreneur said.

New York University Professor Shlomo Angel and his colleagues (Alejandro M. Blei, Jason Parent, Patrick Lamson-Hall, and Nicolás Galarza Sánchez, with Daniel L. Civco, Rachel Qian Lei, and Kevin Thom) have produced the Atlas of Urban Expansion: 2016 edition, which represents the most detailed available spatial analysis of world urbanization, relying on a sample of 200 urban areas. It was published jointly United Nations Habitat, New York University, and the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy and released in conjunction with the Habitat III conference in Quito. The Atlas follows the publication of Angel's Planet of Cities, published by the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy which was reviewed in New Geography in A Planet of People: Angel's Planet of Cities.

Image: http://www.newgeography.com

Teachers described him as “too stupid to learn anything.” He got fired from two jobs because he was “non-productive.”

Then he tried inventing something completely new. What’s even crazier is that he tried 1,000 times, unsuccessfully. When a reporter asked him how it felt to fail 1,000 times, the story goes, he replied, “I didn’t fail 1,000 times. “[The invention] was an invention with 1,000 steps.”

In January, the incoming Trump administration targeted the DOE for massive budget cuts, but in his confirmation hearings Perry told Senate lawmakers he regrets his earlier proposal to eliminate the agency and said he would protect its basic research and development mission.

While the threat of cuts persists, DOE followed through in September when it said it would expand the SunShot program after hitting its 2020 goals. The program’s aim was to reduce the cost of utility scale solar power to $0.06/kWh, or under $1 per watt.

If you have to rush to the airport at 6 a.m. to catch an early morning flight, the ease of finally settling into your seat might be enough to send you immediately to sleep. However, snoozing during takeoff and landing is not what's best for your health, according to MedlinePlus, a health information site by the National Library of Medicine. Doing so could create a number of health issues, including permanent damage to your ears.

More than 52 percent of people on the planet still don't have Internet access. Men outnumber women as Web users in every region of the world. And there remain massive disparities in connection speeds in different countries. These are just some of the major findings outlined in a new United Nations report about the state of the world's Internet connections.

Pittsburgh Mayor Bill Peduto wants to create a cash stream from the city, corporations and nonprofits that would pump money into growing high-tech industries and startup mom-and-pop businesses in poor neighborhoods.

Peduto, who joined university, corporate and nonprofit leaders Wednesday in discussing Pittsburgh's potential as a top global city for innovation, said he hopes to announce the fund's creation early next year.

In new and challenging situations, some people fold under pressure and some manage to squeak by. And then there are the people who really thrive—blossoming in the face of uncertainty or adversity. Now, researchers say they’ve pinpointed a number of personality traits and external factors that, when combined, can predict a person’s chances of thriving.

Four mind-sets and eight leadership practices distinguish successful leaders of ultralarge projects.

Today, the very largest and most complex projects command budgets exceeding $5 billion and require more than five years for design, planning, and construction. The sheer scale of such projects brings unique complexities: multiple interfaces with stakeholders such as local communities and government bodies, new regulatory and environmental requirements, and often unique technological challenges. We define megaprojects of this scale as ultralarge.

Every generation seems to be lionized by the press with the observation that the values of the new group are not that of their parents, thank goodness. They don’t have the serious hunger for possessions, the terrible acquisitiveness for material things that define their parents’ generation. Rather, as seen by the reporter, they have loftier views of society, generally the views of the reporter or the views that the reporter wishes to have us believe they hold. One recalls how the baby boomers were “not like us”. They were going to live on the land somewhere in the high sierras making sandals and candles. Some years later when it was revealed that the Pentagon was paying two thousand dollars for special toilet seats, the question among boomers was in what colors were they available.

Image: http://www.newgeography.com

Possibly no piece of productivity advice is more well-worn than the adage, “Work smarter, not harder.” Of course, the directive points to the fact that it’s not how many hours you put in at your desk that matters—it’s how you spend your time there. In other words, get results faster and you won’t be spending so many late nights at the office.

The interview process went well, and you were excited to bring on the new employee, but the person who showed up the first week doesn’t seem like the person you thought you hired. It’s possible that a candidate passes your screening process with flying colors and then lands with a thud when they take their desk, but how do you tell the difference between new-job jitters and red flags that you’ve made a mistake?

Image: LucenaMedina via Wikimedia Commons

Most startup founders are mission-driven: their entrepreneurial sense helps them identify a critical need no one’s thought to address, or a potential solution to a problem that no one’s considered . They’re on a mission, and that mission seems to encapsulate everything that they stand for, and by extension, what the company stands for.

There’s a new crop of small venture capital firms in Boston, and while several of them are led by familiar faces from large, traditional firms, they are determined to do things differently this time around.

Image: https://www.bizjournals.com

Multibillionaire Warren Buffett once said, “Of the billionaires I have known, money just brings out the basic traits in them. If they were jerks before they had money, they are simply jerks with a billion dollars.” What the “Oracle from Omaha” meant is that having lots of money intensifies characteristics already there. In this case, the key questions for people aspiring for money and success to ask themselves are: What are the crucial personality traits and characteristics that relate to becoming rich? And do I have them? 

In 1947, Enzo Ferrari founded the company that bears his name in Maranello; today Ferrari is one of the most respected Italian company in the world. Seriousness and creativity, knowledge pools and knowledge clusters: thanks to its mentor and founder Enzo, Ferrari was driven to success