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| MATR Newsletter - Fri Apr 2, 2010 |
The proper mindset of breakthrough-idea thinking is to be “narrowly insane but not a total whack job,” Nathan Myhrvold of Intellectual Ventures http://matr.net/articl ... .html
City Club Missoula - Sen. Jon Tester, 4/6, Missoula http://www.matr.net/ar ... .html
Glacier Raft and Outdoor Center
Missoula BarCamp
- Park, related businesses hope Glacier’s centennial brings more visitors, money
You can only turn 100 once, and at Glacier National Park – established in 1910 – the celebration will go on for months.
University of Montana Tech Transfer
- Missoula BarCamp, 5/1, Missoula, Montana - Early Bird Registration Ends April 4
YOU are the right people.
City Club Missoula
- The Skaggs School of Pharmacy in University of Montana's College of Health Professions and Biological Sciences Launches The Translational Incubator Core to Enable Increased Tech Transfer of Science and Tech to Market
John Sullivan Jr, MD invites donors to join him in ensuring the Translational Incubator Core will be a success at moving UM science and technology into the Montana marketplace. Donors who invest $5,000 or more will become part of an exclusive group that will be recognized and kept current about research, intellectual property, patents, new companies and investment opportunities.
MEDA -Montana Economic Developers Association
- City Club Missoula - Sen. Jon Tester, 4/6, Missoula
Jon Tester is not a typical Washington, D.C., politician. Whether in the U.S. Senate or on his farm near Big Sandy, Montana, Senator Jon Tester isn't afraid to roll up his sleeves to get work done.
Montana Ambassadors
- Montana Economic Developers Association (MEDA) April News
Interested in sharpening your professional skills as an economic and community development practitioner? Looking for new tools to place in your economic development tool box? Check these out.
Come Home Montana
- Spring 2010 Montana Ambassador Newsletter
Take a few moments and enjoy photos and the latest news from our organization.
Developing a more Entrepreneurial Montana
- Missoula, Montana Included in 8 Great College Towns Honor Roll
Pop quiz: Name eight great towns with an authentic college vibe.... You can start with Missoula, Montana
- Armor All founder and Bozeman resident shares experience with Montana State University students
But he said Bricklin was his inspiration. Working for him made him realize that he didn't need all the accounting and legal advice his father said would help him make it in business. He just needed a good idea and the courage and creativity to make it happen.
Montana Business
- A Kauffman Conversation with Jon Medved on Developing a More Entrepreneurial Environment
Jon Medved, an Israeli venture capitalist turned entrepreneur, discusses the reasons for Israel's economic and entrepreneurial success, including the cultural elements that encourage people to take the entrepreneurial leap and create new companies.
Regional Economic Development
- Montana Chamber Releases 2010 Work Comp Court Review
“The Montana Chamber is the only organization that examines the performance of the Montana Workers’ Compensation Court in this way,” said Webb Brown, President and CEO of the Montana Chamber.
- In Montana, Governor Stirs Ire Over Coal
“People in our county are against being held hostage,” said Jean Curtiss, a member of the Board of Commissioners for Missoula County.
- Western Montana InBusiness - April 2010 - Social media revolutionizes the way business is conducted
More and more Missoula businesses owners – and companies nationwide – are relying on social media platforms to raise their profiles.
Developing Funding Opportunities in Montana
- Can Green Technology Propel Economic Development?
With states looking to kick-start their economic engines, green technology is increasingly viewed as the piston helping drive it.
Funding and Building your Business
- Financial Regulation Overhaul Alarms Private Equity Community
Though a spirited debate is expected over these changes, several groups within the angel and venture capital community have raised concerns about two relatively short sections within the 1,336 page bill.
- Flynn's Harp: Angel-investor alarm grows over provisions in Dodd bill
Cries of alarm went up from angel-investor groups this week as the awareness spread that a bill with potentially disastrous impact on the ranks of angels, and thus on start-up entrepreneurs, had passed out of a U.S. Senate committee without consideration of even one of 400 proposed amendments.
- Angel tax credit reshapes Minnesota’s innovation culture
But the law’s biggest benefit may not be dollars and cents, but rather how outsiders see Minnesota and how Minnesota sees itself.
Montana Education Excellence
- Patent Theft as a Business Strategy
What makes patent theft so attractive is that infringement is not a criminal act and those found guilty face no jail time. Paying up is the worst that can happen to the infringer.
- The Surprising Secret to Breakthrough Customer Service - Turn your employees into expert evangelists
Are your employees product experts? Or do they shrug their shoulders and say, “I just work here?”
- New IBM Strategy: Help Startups Capture More Business
So today is launch day and Drew Clark, Director of Strategy for IBM's Venture Capital Group defined Big Blue's new initiative for startups as a "small crisp set of capabilities that are what startups most want."
- Beware the Perils of Market Research
Some of the most innovative companies on earth, like Apple, refuse to be slaves to a spreadsheet.
- How to Register a Start-Up
Think registering your business sounds like a perfunctory and insignificant task? Think again.
- Don’t Listen To Your Critics, VCs Are Not Enough, and Other Lessons from Breakthrough Idea Forum
Here are five lessons to take away from our Xconomy Forum (“What’s Your Breakthrough Idea”) held at the University of Washington on Monday:
- 9 Ways to Make Your Business More Attractive to Investors
A private equity investor outlines how an entrepreneur can position his or her business to attract potential backers.
- Should managers know how to code?
In short, it depends on what you are managing.
Montana Education/Business Partnerships
- Montana State University students to protest to keep microbiology as a department.
"I feel it could potentially devalue our degree," Brileya said. "Without a home department and people looking out for them, folks will not receive the treatment they should. Who's going to recruit new microbiology students if it dwindles each year?
- Montana's students at the head of the class in "Nation's Report Card"
Montana's fourth graders ranked sixth in the nation, while Montana's eighth graders came in third.
- Montana State University President Waded Cruzado to try again for a Bozeman college of technology
The regents need to understand that it's "not kingdom-building," Miller said, but "a pathway to success for students," especially for students not planning to attend a four-year college.
Regional Business
- Teams of University of Montana business students available to analyze business challenges and implement solutions
The University of Montana has many business students looking for hands-on opportunities to show their skills. The students are young, bright, energetic, and are armed with current business knowledge. One area with which students need help is real-world business experience.
University TechTransfer
- Love Letter To Our Neighbors: Idaho Is Open For Your Business - By Governor C.L. “Butch” Otter
We now are reaching out to hundreds of Oregon businesses, and will do the same with those in Washington if the legislature there follows Oregon’s lead. We aren’t offering many bells and whistles, but what we can offer is a business-friendly State government, a highly qualified and motivated work force, and communities where people understand that while government cannot be the solution to their problems it can and must be a champion for their own solutions.
- Washington to Idaho: 'Bring it'
Idaho Gov. Butch Otter sent an open letter to businesses in Washington and Oregon inviting them to come to Idaho in the face of tax increases. Washington state's Commerce Director Rogers Weed says not so fast and details the business advantages Washington has over Idaho.
Idaho Business
- Brown University using new technologies to create jobs
“A large part of that is working from the ground up … we’re finding the future companies that are going to start here in Rhode Island.”
- Obama Administration Seeking Input On Commercialization of University Research
How best to encourage the commercialization of university research and on whether proof of concept centers are an effective tool in early-stage commercialization.
Education
- 2010 Best Places to Work in Idaho unveiled
Twenty companies doing business in the state will be honored this year as part of the annual Best Places to Work in Idaho program.
Government
- 101 Wacky Ideas for Reclaiming Pre-Graduates
For city leaders endeavoring to achieve greater numbers of college graduates in their city, those people who have some college or began study but did not complete their degree represent an enormous opportunity.
- A Is for App: How Smartphones, Handheld Computers Sparked an Educational Revolution
As smartphones and handheld computers move into classrooms worldwide, we may be witnessing the start of an educational revolution. How technology could unleash childhood creativity -- and transform the role of the teacher.
- The Ride of Their Lives
When you focus on the things that matter you begin to create a movement strong enough to turn long odds in your favor.
- Darpa Chief: Fix America’s Critical Geek Shortage
Or as Dugan herself put it, Darpa needs more troops for its “elite army of futuristic technogeeks.”
- Two Counties and the Difference Education Makes
It comes down to this, at a time in history when the victory will go to those with the best schooling, rural educators across the state (already struggling because of economic constrictions) are trying to sell the importance of education to a populace that increasingly has never shown that they valued it.
Other Economies
- WGA Chair Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer invites you to attend the 2010 WGA Annual Meeting in Whitefish, Montana - 100 Years of Common Ground
The main meeting sessions will be held at the Performing Arts Center in the Whitefish Middle School located in downtown Whitefish.
- Montana Public Asked to Suggest Criteria for Drawing Legislative Districts
A bipartisan group tasked with drawing the political boundaries that are used to determine representation in the state Legislature will hold a series of public hearings across the state in April.
Energy and Climate Change
- New initiative creates authority to improve the climate of technology-based business in the state
If passed, the bill would create an authority dedicated to coordinating between private and public entities, including the University, to secure federal research funding. Additionally, it would attempt to create a comprehensive technology strategy for the state and to help in technology commercialization.
Miscellaneous Ramblings
- Study: Prescribed burns in the West could reduce USA’s carbon footprint
"If we reintroduce fires into our ecosystems, we may be able to protect larger trees and significantly reduce the amount of carbon released into the atmosphere by major wildfires."
- Tallahassee Preps Nation's First Smart Grid That Fuses Electricity, Gas and Water Utilities
Of all the smart electricity grids rolling out locally across the country, Tallahassee's forthcoming advanced metering system might be the smartest.
- Exploring ways to economically reclaim and reuse treated wastewater
In addition to finding low-cost ways to save water, Criddle and his colleagues are pioneering new techniques for generating energy from wastewater, which contains large amounts of ammonia, a by- product of urea and protein wastes. If ammonia gets into the environment, it can produce massive algal blooms capable of rendering lakes, streams and coastal waters uninhabitable for aquatic life.
Cool Stuff That's Coming
- How To Talk To Someone You Can't Stand
Face it: Some people are simply insufferable. With any luck, they can be avoided, but not always. So what do you do when there's just no escape?
- Gallery: Outrageously Complicated Rube Goldberg Videos
A team of aspiring educators won the 2010 National Rube Goldberg Machine Contest on March 27 with a complicated homage to ancient Egypt that took 120 discrete mechanical and electronic steps to accomplish one simple task: Dispensing a bit of hand sanitizer.
- A Treasure Trove of Steve Jobs Stories
And now, for our catalog of Encounters of the Turtleneck Kind:
Legislative Newsletters
- Bionic sight for the blind
Livermore scientists have vision. Now they need cash
Government Technology
- Interactive Online Platform Levels Playing Field of Public Opinion
"How do you get people talking who would otherwise disagree?" he said. "That's our biggest objective: We want people to listen to each other, and this site levels the playing field so you can explore the full range of conversation."
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