HubSpot CTO Dharmesh Shah describes his solution for finding ways to connect with other entrepreneurs and counter the loneliness of startup life. He suggests entrepreneurs find co-founders or peer groups so they can discuss the challenges and issues that commonly arise in the startup world, as well as socialize.

Chip Heath, professor of organizational behavior at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, describes research where strangers were brought much closer, emotionally, simply by having them ask each other a series of increasingly personal questions. Heath, co-author of the book “The Power of Moments,” says the study shows how “we’re only 45 minutes away from really close connections” with the people around us.

Image: https://ecorner.stanford.edu

Healthcare technology companies have historically gotten less attention from private equity (PE) investors than they might warrant. Admittedly, healthcare tech is complex, making it difficult to understand the industry and identify good assets. Investors are already hesitant to invest in young companies. And many prospective PE targets in healthcare tech offer solutions in unproven markets that are vulnerable to disruption, further dampening investor interest. Investors may be especially dissuaded if deal sourcing and due diligence require substantial cooperation between interdisciplinary teams in healthcare and technology.

If the term “artificial intelligence” conjures up scenes from “The Terminator” or “The Jetsons,” you might be surprised to find out just how much AI now is powering the world—and what’s yet to come. We’ve devoted much of our 2019 Innovation Issue to AI, the industries using it and the questions the technology raises. But there’s more to the issue, including stories about the prominent role Indiana is playing in the creation of next-generation military weaponry, the lessons entrepreneurs learn from failure and how Indy-based The Heritage Group is embracing innovation.

What do you do when you know you’re onto a big idea but can’t make the costs work? If you’re Rachel Carpenter and Joey French, you look for a better spot to build your business.

In 2013, the co-founders of fintech startup Intrinio packed up their boxes in Chicago and set out for St. Petersburg, Florida, where the weather is warm and the costs are low.

Image: Joey French and Rachel Carpenter, co-founders of Intrinio, walk in downtown St. Petersburg, Florida. Photo courtesy of Intrinio

Are people born to be an entrepreneur or can you develop your “building blocks” in the pursuit of becoming an entrepreneur?  Most likely, you can develop them. But learning to be an entrepreneur starts early in life with a high level of curiosity and evolves throughout your early work career. Quite a few of the characteristics that will make you successful in your career will make you successful as an entrepreneur. You absolutely need a growth mindset (meaning you can learn what you need to learn versus being stuck with what you were born with). You also need to be super optimistic and have a high degree of self confidence.

I rewatched The Social Network recently, and between the dramatic pauses and the brooding Andrew Garfield, one Justin Timberlake line really stuck out to me:

“Mark, you have to come to California.” (That’s paraphrased, but if memory serves, it’s basically what he said).

Oh, how times have changed–and I’m not talking about Facebook’s valuation.

Fifteen years ago, it may have been necessary for Zuckerberg to fly out to California to convince VCs to invest. But more often we here at Crunchbase News learn that entrepreneurs don’t need to move to the Bay Area for VC funding.

Change is hard. But these days it’s required and inevitable. Yet, in my daily role as an advisor to entrepreneurs and small business owners, struggling to boost revenues, profits, and earnings, I still see too many managers falling back on command-and-control, a focus on weaknesses, and not enough time for people. The result is lost productivity and a poorly engaged work force.

In a spare bedroom of his family’s house in County Cork, Ireland, Cathal Garvey is repeating the feats that led to the dawn of the biotechnology age. He’s growing bacteria. He’s adding DNA. He’s seeing what happens.

“To transform bacteria was once a huge deal, a new method,” he explains. “Today, you can do it with Epsom salt and an over-the-counter brand of laxatives.”

Image: https://www.technologyreview.com

Newswise — The David Eccles School of Business at the University of Utah is taking its top 10 ranked program for entrepreneurship to new heights with a master’s degree designed for serious entrepreneurs.

The degree is called the Master of Business Creation (MBC), and it’s the first of its kind.

Applicants must be full-time entrepreneurs who want to create, launch and scale a new business, who want more than the 9-to-5 job, who have the drive to overcome the impossible, who want to build their knowledge while doing, and who are willing to put in the hours to make it happen.

Despite its limitations, publicly available data on research and development (R&D) expenditures remains one of the best metrics for measuring state progress in the innovation economy. Defined as the sum of multiple National Science Foundation (NSF) measures – including business and industry R&D, higher education R&D, and R&D at federally funded centers – total R&D has skyrocketed nationwide over the past 15 years, though some states have experienced an outsized portion of this growth. Where has total R&D performance increased the most over the past 15 years? How has the composition of total R&D performance changed over this time? Perhaps most importantly, how has the intensity of R&D performance changed? Over the next three weeks, the Digest will explore the answers to these questions and more.

The BIO International Convention is being held in Philadelphia from June 3-6, with more than 16,000 attendees expected from around the world. The convention draws a list of who’s who in drug discovery, biomanufacturing, genomics, biofuels, nanotechnology and cell therapy, with more than 7,000 companies and 47,000 partnering meetings.

Amsterdam used to be the place where recent grads would spend a gap-year adventure biking between Red Light district tours and coffee-shop visits. Now it’s where entrepreneurs turn for venture capital funding, innovation infrastructure, and a network of like-minded corporate types. According to a new report on the top cities for innovation, Amsterdam has innovated itself to be one of the hubs for global entrepreneurship.

Economic development was the top issue for mayors in their annual State of the City addresses for the sixth year in a row according to State of the Cities 2019, a new report from the National League of Cities. 74% of mayors significantly covered economic development in their speeches, up substantially from 58% in 2018. 

The top economic development subtopics were downtown development, community development, jobs, arts and culture, and tourism. While jobs remain important, all together a preference for place-based initiatives and an emphasis on quality of life continue to outweigh job creation strategies. 

Image: https://smartincentives.org

Manufacturers stand to reap big benefits by digitizing their operations, not only financially through cost reductions but also operationally, to gain such abilities as being able to fast-track production changes in response to market conditions in real, or near-real, time.

Jonathan Van Wyck, partner and managing director at the Boston Consulting Group, says gains from digitization are too substantial for manufacturers to ignore and that over time it will become the de facto way of competing. The real challenge, he says, is to attain the speed and scale of digitization to operate optimally.

In a conversation with Knowledge@Wharton, Van Wyck discusses the opportunities and challenges manufacturers face as they embrace the Internet of Things, advanced robotics, artificial intelligence, data analytics and other technologies. The stakes are high. “If you’re not operating under this new paradigm, you’ll fall behind and ultimately be uncompetitive,” he says.

A new study reveals that millennials aren't actually different from Gen X or Baby Boomers in how they spend their money — they just have less money to spend.

Millennials have been blamed for the murder of industries from golf equipment makers to razor manufacturers, as sales have tumbled in recent years.

"They are often branded as being more narcissistic, more idealistic, more socially-conscious, and more experience-oriented than any of their preceding generations," reads a Deloitte study published this week. "They have even been blamed for ruining everything from movies to marriage!"

Approximately 27 million entrepreneurs start or run businesses in the United States each year, according to the latest available data from Inc., which represents about 14 per cent of the population.

Entrepreneurs have various reasons for starting businesses such as dissatisfaction with their jobs, wanted to create something from scratch, or the opportunity to make important decisions.

But, whatever their reasons for doing it alone, entrepreneurs have dramatically changed the complexion of the workforce.

Image: https://e27.co

For aspiring entrepreneurs, the thought of building a company from scratch can be daunting. What if no one wants to buy what you're selling? Where will the money come from to grow the business? And what will happen if you fail?

To get some answers, we talked to six Johns Hopkins Carey Business School alumni who have seen it all before. These seasoned entrepreneurs told us their stories, from choosing the right business idea to raising venture capital, and shared their best advice for launching a successful startup.

The 3rd Annual NCI and FNLCR Technology Showcase will showcase technologies being developed at the National Cancer Institute (NCI) in Bethesda and Frederick, and Frederick National Laboratory for Cancer Research (FNLCR) to encourage startup formation, technology licensing, and collaborations. It will introduce the local scientific community to the regional technology development stakeholders and highlight available resources.

Image: https://www.eventbrite.com

Tech companies are continuing to garner major investments from venture capitalists.

With major companies like Uber, Lyft and Pinterest going public, there's a new cast of major tech startups that have taken the top spots of most highly valued private companies, PitchBook reports. But recent major investments into burgeoning tech startups — including Juul and Pokémon Go-creator Niantic — have brought new players into the spotlight. At this point, there are almost too many billion-dollar startups to count.