I recently turned 30 years old, which is a scary time financially. You're old enough to feel like you should have made more progress financially, but young enough that realistically you are still battling the challenges of a modern young adult, like paying back student loans and an increasing cost of living.

Image: Camilo Maldonado. - Camilo Maldonado

The headlines coming out of the 2019 World Economic Forum meeting at Davos dwelled on the mood of pessimism and gloom. But there were also signs of optimism and action. The initial steps of a more inclusive path to global prosperity are becoming clearer. PwC’s own Annual Global CEO Survey, unveiled on the eve of the World Economic Forum for the past 22 years, is one source of this new understanding. On the basis of this research, and other research we have conducted, we know this:

Image: Illustration by Lars Leetaru - https://www.strategy-business.com

There’s an awful lot of awful in the just-released summary of a new U.N. report on biodiversity and ecosystem. There’s the tenfold increase in plastic pollution since 1980, for example. There’s the 400 million tons of heavy metals, toxic sludge and fertilizer runoff poured into the world’s water each year too. There’s the doubling of greenhouse gas emissions since 1980; the growth of industrial fishing, now sprawling across 55% of the world’s oceans, the 85% loss of the wetlands since the dawn of the industrial era, and the 70% increase in invasive species in 21 countries.

Image: "UN visit" by okreitz is licensed under CC BY-ND 2.0 

The sun’s final rays filter through the leaves as night falls in the dense, muggy rain forest. The descending gloam over Panama’s Barro Colorado Island obscures the towering, spiky kapok trees, the palms and the shrubs until human eyes can’t see much more than the small patches of starlit sky through the canopy above. Crickets commence their chorus as the howler monkeys hush for the night.

Economic growth and the creation of good jobs for Canadians rely on innovation. That is why, in addition to investing in innovative businesses, the Government of Canada works in synergy with business incubators and accelerators. These incubators and accelerators offer crucial support to young innovative startups with high growth potential, at all stages of their existence. They are also nurseries of talent and innovation.

The backlash against the dreaded open office plan has been brewing for many years. Not without good reason: Many employees struggle to focus amid the endless distractions and noise that are inevitable when you put everyone in a giant room together, and people feel constantly watched without any private space to retreat to. One survey found that 70% of workers report feeling distracted when they’re working.

I was recently part of the Entrepreneur Live, Singapore, a platform, which also marked the launch of Entrepreneur Asia pacific. Here I met several top-notch Asian entrepreneurs, startups and investors and they give some very interesting insights on the architecture of tech innovation.

Seed stage venture capital fund and accelerator, Motus, wants to to advance society and standards of living through AI, robotics and the IoT and is targeting a total size of $30m for the fund.

So much has been said about design thinking, lean startup and agile as the way innovation should be practised. However, the organizations that have employed these strategies, including former companies I was a part of, are in a state of denial that doing these things will actually make your company more innovative.

It can be difficult to imagine that entrepreneurship takes a psychological toll, thanks in large part to the media’s tendency to show the luxurious and exciting lifestyles of high-profile, successful entrepreneurs. However, those entrepreneurs are a very small percentage. Most successful entrepreneurs don’t have private jets or islands. Most don’t rub shoulders with diplomats or well-known celebrities. Most of us entrepreneurs live well, but not extravagantly by any means.

As dyed-in-the wool STEM professional women of all stripes know, much to our surprise a funny thing’s been happening on the way to the patent office: Women are going missing as inventors. According to a February report by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (PTO), women are today’s “lost Einsteins.” Indeed, one of the report’s findings is particularly damning: “Gains in female participation in science and engineering occupations and entrepreneurship are not leading to broad increases in female patent inventors (emphasis added).”

While working in both Silicon Valley and European entrepreneurial ecosystem, we discovered our share of contrasts between the two. Let's debunk: Why Europe is behind Silicon Valey?

We all have habits that help us work more productively. These rituals can act as a road map, helping you stay focused and keeping you on track throughout your day. The more time and effort you save, the more productive you will be.

Your workday rituals consist of your habits, routine and schedule. They either help you to work smarter or hinder your productivity. By adopting these eight daily rituals, you will enable yourself to stay hyper-focused and productive all day long.

The concept of the startup may feel like a modern one, but pioneers in science and technology have been paving the path for innovation since long before the dotcom era. In fact, the same can be said about the startup incubator.

Case in point: Philly’s own University City Science Center. The nonprofit innovation hub — and one of Philly Tech Week’s first and longest-running sponsors — has been helping the region’s innovators and entrepreneurs build businesses across the commercialization continuum since 1963.

Image: The University City Science Center is a hub of startup activity. (Courtesy photo)

The annual Milken Institute Global Conference is perhaps the largest assembly of the world's greatest financial minds. Heavy hitters from across the business, investing, and economic landscapes descend upon Beverly Hills for three days and set the agenda for the rest of the year.

Business Insider was there, and, in the process, got the scoop on the themes that will define 2019.

If the core thesis of Milken 2019 had to be distilled into an easily-digestible phrase, it would be "challenging convention." That's what many of the panelists and experts interviewed by Business Insider attempted to do throughout.

In my decade-long journey as an angel investor, first with Info Edge where we invested in several start-ups - duds, failures and rare successes and later my own,  Choosing the right start-up was as much about the idea as about the team. How does one choose, from the pool of innovative and disruptive ideas spearheaded by enthusiastic entrepreneurs?

Here are the top traits to look for - in the entrepreneurs and start-ups.

As head of a startup, I always want to make sure everyone on my team understands the vision for what we’re trying to achieve. I also want to make sure we’re hearing, considering, and incorporating everyone’s ideas, and acting quickly to iron out problems along the way. So we have a lot of group conversations. A lot.

What sparks paradigm-shifting innovation in any business? It’s a special mix of entrepreneur and company, regular in every respect except for having the courage and foresight to make an idea happen that was supposed to be impossible. As an entrepreneur in a startup, how do you know if you have this potential, and what are the steps to get from an innovation to a revolution?

Image: Image via Flickr by UC Davis 

2019 is your year. You’re finally going to open that business of your dreams ― in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.

No, that wasn’t a mistake. It turns out Portsmouth is just one of several surprisingly ideal launching pads for new businesses in 2019 — many which are far cries from startup meccas like San Francisco and New York City. The reason is simple: The best cities for entrepreneurs are not based on sheer population but a number of location-specific elements like access to startup funding, an educated workforce, business support, and low cost of living.

SAN FRANCISCO, CA / ACCESSWIRE / May 3, 2019 / Business districts are expanding into new locations all across the country in places that weren't on the radar of today's large organizations and the investors until recently. The cause focuses around location diversification, the ability to access new market opportunities and desaturate those locations that have made competing in them challenging at best for all corporations.