More venture capital or disruptive ideas? What does Milwaukee and Wisconsin’s startup ecosystem need to get to the next level?

Perhaps it is a chicken-or-the-egg scenario, but does the state need more venture capital, or more disruptive ideas to jump start a budding ecosystem?

Badger Fund of Funds partner Ken Johnson says Wisconsin would find more value in additional human capital more so than venture capital. For Johnson, this means entrepreneurs building more unique products that not only address an untouched market but also sell high so investors make a larger return of their investment.

Image: Local and regional leaders in the startup space sat on a panel Tuesday night at Marquette University Law School for “On The Issues: Creating A Healthy Innovation Economy,” a Startup Milwaukee week event.

Entrepreneurs have a habit of blaming their lack of enthusiasm or increased fatigue on burnout. While burnout certainly isn’t uncommon among founders, the condition is often self-misdiagnosed, which can derail attempts to address the real problem. As psychiatrist Richard Friedman points out in the New York Times, overgeneralizing burnout diminishes the credibility of the syndrome (which has been defined by the World Health Organization).

While some fields of study, like engineering or finance, can reliably lead to highly remunerative careers, other majors may not guarantee great wealth, even if they're still associated with socially useful and emotionally satisfying jobs.

Using individual-level data from the US Census Bureau's 2017 American Community Survey compiled by the Minnesota Population Center's Integrated Public Use Microdata Series program, we looked at average total annual personal incomes for different fields of study among college degree holders.

Imagine a dynamic economy. Businesses compete for customers under the constant threat of new competitors entering the market. If firms want to survive, they need to constantly innovate and upgrade the quality of their products while keeping their prices low. If they cannot, they may be replaced by those that can. Resources keep flowing to the firms that use them best.

Looking to the realms of science fiction, robots get a pretty bad rep. Endless examples of robot uprisings and plots for world domination haven’t assisted the technology’s efforts to be welcomed by humans in the workplace. Here, Mark Howard, U.S. country manager of industrial parts supplier, EU Automation, gives his three crucial steps to alleviating human resistance to robot deployment:

According to a report published by Reuters, U.S companies installed more robots than ever before in 2018. Shipments of robotic machinery hit a colossal 28,478 deliveries — that’s a 16 percent increase compared to the previous year. Deployment increased in almost every sector, including life sciences, food and consumer goods, and semiconductors and electronics.

Seven of the state's 10 most destructive fires have occurred in the past decade. From 2011 to 2015, it endured a major drought that forced families in the Central Valley to bathe from buckets and drink water from plastic jugs to avoid contamination. And California's homeless population has increased so much that it now makes up a quarter of the national total.

To be a successful entrepreneur you have to identify a problem you feel passionate about. That certainly was the case for Galen Karlan Mason who, as a graduate student, was passionate about making healthy, ethical, and sustainable food choices at the supermarket, but couldn’t find a tool to help solve this problem. And that’s exactly why he decided to take the entrepreneurial leap and start his own company.

Image: Galen Karlan-Mason

Connect with program managers representing America's Seed Fund of over $3.5 billion annually.   Learn how to compete for funding, and create successful commercialization strategies and partnerships.   Network with global industry scouts, early-stage investors, and key federal agency buyers and funders.

Startups and small businesses across Arkansas soon will have more support to win federal funding that promotes innovative research and development efforts.

Support is being delivered by the Arkansas Small Business and Technology Development Center, which is starting a new business accelerator to open access to federal funding for early-stage companies. The initiative, called the Lab2Launch Accelerator, begins in January with a six-week program focused on grants provided by the National Institutes of Health.

Businesses based anywhere in Arkansas can participate in the accelerator and they may attend sessions virtually or in person. The program is free though participation will be limited in the initial cohort.

China’s technology firms are stepping up their efforts to expand into Southeast Asian markets with home-grown capital, even as funding from private equity and venture capital giants has plunged this year amid uncertainties caused by the US-China trade war. They are bringing their industry know-how and experience to seize untapped businesses in the region while opportunities at home diminish, according to Michael Zhu, a Shanghai-based managing partner at Gobi Partners, which manages about US$1.1 billion of assets.

An initial public offering (IPO) is an exciting step in the life of a company. Preparation for an IPO starts about 18 to 24 months before you plan to take your organization public, but entrepreneurs should make early decisions about the business’s structure, team and how they manage their own financial picture well before that journey begins.

The nature of work is undergoing tremendous changes, influenced by aging populations, the digital revolution, and a paradigm shift away from Fordism. Laetitia Vitaud, author of “Du Labeur à l’ouvrage (From Labour to Work),” and Azeem Azhar discuss how the reinvention of craftsmanship is creating a new deal to ensure more equitable, sustainable, and fulfilling jobs.

The startup craze is far from over. Just take a look at Y Combinator’s Summer 2019 class, which welcomed 197 startups into its ranks. Participants gained access to $150,000 in capital in exchange for around 7 percent of equity, as well as the opportunity to pitch prominent venture capital firms and investors on Demo Day.

Anna Mason, a partner for the AOL founder Steve Case's Rise of the Rest seed fund, refers to herself as the "human social network."

Mason meets with 400 to 500 people in every city within the Revolution network and vets about just as many companies. Business Insider recently named Mason one of 100 people transforming business for her work taking the $150 million seed fund to the next level.

Psychologists who study creative accomplishments throughout the life cycle generally find that creativity peaks between the ages of mid- to late 30s or early 40s. They tend to view creativity from the perspective of creative and innovative disciplines, rather than individual accomplishment. And they find little variation across different professions and disciplines of creativity and innovation, such as the arts and sciences.

Colleges ranking highly after 10 years aren't necessarily the same ones at the top after 40 years, report says. The middle tier is a perhaps surprising mix of public, nonprofit and for-profit institutions.

What kind of a return on investment can a student expect to get on his or her college education?

The answer depends on any number of factors. Cost of attendance, choice of college and type of degree attained are just a few of the major ones.

4 August 2018. A continuing and popular topic at Science & Enterprise is venture capital, a key source of financing for science-based start-ups and other new companies in the tech industries. Our reporting on venture capital, much like other business media, tells about the companies investing in early-stage enterprises, but what about the people in the industry?

Image: https://sciencebusiness.technewslit.com

If you’re in business, perhaps the most important question you can ask yourself is, “What’s your story?”

Stories are how we make sense of the world and understand one another, and asking questions is how we begin to construct our stories. It’s hard to imagine any business leader — or enterprise — could last very long without being able to answer such questions as, “Who are we? What business are we in? How do we want to the world to see us?”

The Cleveland Clinic, Duke University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and the University of Southern California have each received an equal share through a group of foundations set up by Tom Lord, a businessman who died in 1989.

Through the years, William Gartner has met thousands of entrepreneurs. With very few exceptions, he finds them to be positive, upbeat people.

“I can’t think of any other group of people I’d rather be with,” says Babson’s Bertarelli Foundation Distinguished Professor of Family Entrepreneurship. “They are the happiest people I’ve ever been around.”

Perhaps that shouldn’t be surprising. Entrepreneurs can’t help but be joyful and optimistic. Through their ideas and ventures, they’re hoping to remake how we live. “They have some say on how the future will be created,” says Gartner.

Image: https://entrepreneurship.babson.edu