Irish startups, high tech firms and life science companies are attracting €19m per week in venture capital funding as investment sums into the sectors continue to surge. SHARE According to new industry figures, venture capital funding in Ireland in the first nine months of the year rose by three quarters compared the same period last year with €734m raised here.

The world of medical philanthropy got a big shot in the arm when Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Priscilla Chan, announced in September that they were committing $3 billion to “cure, prevent or manage all disease” by the end of the century.

While that is a benefit to researchers, a tantalizing tidbit of information that Dr. Eric Topol shared at the Techonomy Health conference at Half Moon Bay, California on Wednesday, shows that Zuckerberg has more than medical philanthropy in mind. He appears to be also interested in investing in novel technology and, indeed, also be an early adopter himself.

State and local leaders continue to call for better information on how well their economic development and tax incentive programs are performing. In response, an increasing number of states are conducting formal program evaluations. 

A new database from the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) created with the support of The Pew Charitable Trusts compiles these state tax incentive evaluations in one place for easy access and searchability.  The database currently contains over 30 state evaluation reports and more will be added over time. 

Many executives ask me what artificial intelligence can do. They want to know how it will disrupt their industry and how they can use it to reinvent their own companies. But lately the media has sometimes painted an unrealistic picture of the powers of AI. (Perhaps soon it will take over the world!) AI is already transforming web search, advertising, e-commerce, finance, logistics, media, and more.

Donald Trump will be the nation’s next president, the shocking conclusion to a long and divisive campaign in which science was barely mentioned.

Now, many people in the research community are contemplating what a Trump administration will mean for their work — and they don't like the outlook.

When connecting with an audience, Hillary Clinton leads with the head while Donald Trump comes from the heart: both hold lessons for today leaders.

Watching Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump during the U.S. presidential debates, it is striking to observe the difference in communication styles between the candidates; indeed they seem to use two diametrically opposing ways of connecting with their audience. The question is which style works best for a would-be world leader? And what can leaders in other walks of life learn from these two very different communicators?

A call for innovators to design, develop and supply a robust, low cost water quality sensor to improve water quality on the Great Barrier Reef has attracted 27 "quality" submissions.

Minister for the Great Barrier Reef, Dr Steven Miles said the call out, which was part of Advance Queensland’s Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) pilot initiative launched earlier this year, has been met with an enthusiastic response.

Everyone experiences disappointment at one point or another in their lives. Sometimes, it is over something as trivial as a missed business opportunity. Other times, it’s over something more meaningful, like an election.

Watching Hillary Clinton’s concession speech today reminded me of of just how challenging managing feelings of disappointment can be. I can only imagine how she feels; to lose an election after a lifetime of service, hundreds of millions of dollars of investment, and a grueling nomination and campaign must be devastating.

(Nanowerk News) StartupNano opens its doors to entrepreneurs around the world working with nanotechnology based solutions. From the North of Portugal, startups have access to support to go from idea to global markets, to unique laboratories and expertise in nanotechnology, and to incubation in a unique international infrastructure for nanotechnology built by Portugal and Spain governments. Besides access to a specialized nanotech network of mentors and experts, startups have access to awards and up to €100k direct investment. The deadline for submission of ideas is Nov 20 at www.startupnano.eu.

With the launch of The Engine, MIT joins other major technology players investing in entrepreneurial incubators and accelerators across the Northeast. Autodesk opened its BUILD Space on Oct. 5, 2016, in Boston. The 70,000-square-foot facility includes a 34,000-square-foot fabrication lab, an AEC tech startup incubator and the company's flagship East Coast office. Meanwhile, the 84,000-square-foot New Lab, a public-private partnership in Brooklyn, NY's Navy Yard, opened its doors in September, offering a fabrication facilities to 50 small and midsize growth-stage companies.

There’s a big push in Philadelphia to help researchers and entrepreneurs move their tech to the marketplace. Tech transfer isn’t a new concept, but with the amount of innovation spaces popping up around universities and companies, the energy around the concept feels urgent now.

While Philly may have gotten a late start, initiatives like the University City Science Center’s QED Proof-of-Concept program, which helps academic researchers from 21 local institutions move their technology ideas from the “discovery” phase to development, prove that there’s an opportunity to keep growing.

Starting later this month, NASA plans to launch a group of very tiny satellites into space.

These cutting-edge devices will orbit the Earth, taking atmospheric measurements, monitoring storms, and studying factors associated with climate change. They will also serve as tiny stepping stones toward NASA's new focus on small satellites, or "smallsats," as an alternative to bulkier traditional satellites....

Many years ago, I was working at a software startup geared to helping salespeople set the best prices to charge customers. For a rep with a few dozen accounts, each of which purchased dozens of items at a time, the incremental profits added up to big money quickly. Since our tool was built to help sales reps optimize pricing, we felt we had a strong product and a proven user base—but there was a problem.

On November 2, 2016 the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) issued a memo to Examiners on its stance on subject matter eligibility in response to the McRO and BASCOM Federal Circuit decisions. The USPTO will be updating its subject matter eligibility guidance in view of these decisions and also the Amdocs decision, which issued the day before the USPTO published its memo and thus is not addressed therein.  

DHAKA – We live in an age of tragic health paradoxes. Mass immunization campaigns have eliminated entire diseases, but children in countries like Haiti and Bangladesh continue to die of easily treatable diseases caused by common pathogens. Globalization has lifted millions of people out of extreme poverty, but has left them exposed to the non-communicable diseases of the post-industrial age – from diabetes to heart disease – in countries that lack the resources to treat them.

The number of new corporate venture capital firms making first-time investments is on track for a record year, according to CB Insights Corporate Venture Capital Report.

More than 50 corporate venture capital firms globally made their first investment in the first half of 2016.

ROCKVILLE, Md.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Immunomic Therapeutics, Inc. (ITI), a privately-held, Maryland-based biotechnology company, today announced they are now accepting applications for their Cancer Discovery Incubator Award.

After experiencing partnering success and a $315 million deal with Japan-based Astellas Pharma Inc. for their LAMP-Vax platform technology in allergy, Immunomic Therapeutics, in concert with BioHealth Innovation, is giving back to the region's growing scientific community with the Cancer Discovery Incubator Award. The incubator will enable and accelerate beginning ventures aimed at offering measurable change in oncological health.

Brussels, Belgium – 8 November 2016 The European Commission’s launch today of a new Venture Capital Fund of Funds programme has the potential to attract over €1.6 billion to support the growth of Europe’s small businesses, says Invest Europe.

Space ventures, tech start-ups and budding engineering firms could all benefit from this investment, according to the trade association, in the Commission’s latest initiative in its Capital Markets Union action plan to promote European innovation and economic growth.

While the importance of innovation is crystal clear for many organizations, daily execution usually remains challenging. When renewing products, services or business processes, companies often encounter the same obstacles. But what if companies could learn from each other? Can innovation be streamlined by sharing successes and failures? That’s precisely what the first CREAX innovation roundtable was determined to find out. In collaboration with Oracle, we gathered a diverse group of innovation professionals for a lively debate on how to move from theorizing to getting things done. This is what we learned.

The Princeton Review and Entrepreneur magazine today announced the results of The Princeton Review's 10th annual survey that names the 25 undergraduate and 25 graduate schools best for entrepreneurship studies. Harvard University finished #1 on the graduate entrepreneurship programs list for the 2nd consecutive year. Out of more than 300 schools offering entrepreneurship studies that The Princeton Review surveyed, 36 institutions' undergraduate and/or graduate programs made the roster of top schools for 2016. Four schools are new on the graduate list: the University of Maryland – College Park (#18), Saint Louis University (#19), the  University of Rochester (#22), and Oklahoma State University (#23)