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Articles by Andreas Sundquist
Tetra Discovery Raises $10M Series A, Advances Alzheimer's Drug | Xconomy
Alzheimer’s drug research has been a fraught area of medicine lately. With last week’s failure of Eli Lilly’s high-profile Phase 3 study of solanezumab, an experimental Alzheimer’s drug, arguably the most promising treatment in development for the memory loss disease is no longer headed to market. The trial’s failure also “puts a dent” in the amyloid hypothesis of Alzheimer’s treatment, as our own Ben Fidler reported last week.
Saver Rate Ends Today for Xconomy Intersect: Innovating Where Disciplines Collide | Xconomy
We’re just about two weeks away from Seattle Intersect: Innovating Where Disciplines Collide—and this is your last chance to save $50. This special event takes place on Thursday, December 8th, at 415 Westlake, in the middle of Seattle’s South Lake Union innovation neighborhood. Join us for a unique view of the crossroads from which the next big Seattle idea may emerge. Take a look at our agenda to see the sessions and full speaker list.
M-CAM Seeks to Bolster Michigan’s Advanced Manufacturing Workforce | Xconomy
During the turbulent election season we all recently endured, a big topic of conversation was trade—specifically how certain policies such as the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) have harmed the domestic manufacturing sector and hollowed out the middle class. Among the many campaign promises made by President-elect Donald Trump was a pledge to renegotiate some of these trade agreements to help bring manufacturing jobs back from overseas.
Plymouth Ventures Leads Kinney Group's Growth Funding Round | Xconomy
Indiana has become a hotbed of venture-backed startups developing technology to make businesses run smoother, whether that’s a social network for blue collar workers, or an automated training tool, or cloud optimization software. Last week, cloud software integrator Kinney Group, another Indianapolis-based startup working to improve business processes, announced it had raised a “multi-million growth capital round” led by Ann Arbor, MI-based Plymouth Ventures.
Washington Scientists Forge Ahead Amid Uncertainty | Xconomy
The world is turned on its head, but there are still salmon to monitor as they navigate dams, crops to improve before climate change sets in, and energy grids to protect from cyber attackers. On Thursday evening, as protestors marched through downtown and helicopters hovered in the sky, scientists from Washington’s premiere public research institutions showed off their latest works to the Seattle innovation community.
Texas Roundup: Brainspace, Disruptors, Phunware, Chiron, Fountainhead | Xconomy
Let’s catch up with the latest innovation news in Texas: —Dallas’ Brainspace, a machine-learning software startup, has been acquired by private equity firms Medina Capital and BC Partners to become part of a larger cybersecurity and data services company. The new joint venture will be composed of 57 data centers and four software companies, including Brainspace.
Simplifide Raises $1M for User Authentication Software | Xconomy
Simplifide, a Madison, WI-based startup that’s developing technology to verify identities based on physical characteristics, says it has raised $1 million from investors. The company, launched earlier this year, is on the verge of signing its first customer and is discussing conducting pilot projects with a handful of organizations in the U.S. and Europe, says co-founder and CEO Jeff McAllister. Currently, the number of Simplifide employees is in the single digits, McAllister says.
Xconomy Announces Channel Focused on the Future of Education | Xconomy
Since its inception more than nine years ago, Xconomy has focused its coverage on the business of high technology—across information technology, life sciences, healthcare, energy, robotics, and much more. But underlying all that, in a sense, is education. We have long run stories about STEM education, educational technology, and more—and even put out a special Xconomist report on the future of education.
Chiron Health Adds $1M in Seed Funds for Physician Video Chat System | Xconomy
Austin—Chiron Health, a telemedicine company with a system developed to let doctors and meet and chat with patients over video, has added about $1 million in equity funding to its seed round, according to CEO Andrew O’Hara. The company added the funding in early October, and it brings Chiron’s total seed round to $4.7 million, O’Hara says. Chiron raised its first $2.3 million in December, which it announced along with the launch of apps for the iPhone and iPad. It added an Android app in May.
MIT Raising $150M Venture Fund to Rev “The Engine,” a New Incubator | Xconomy
MIT is investing $25 million in a potentially $150 million venture capital fund and opening a 26,000-square-foot startup space on the edge of its campus. The two investments will jumpstart a broad entrepreneurship initiative, dubbed The Engine, that will provide resources to startups whose technologies typically take lots of time and capital to develop—think biotech, robotics, advanced manufacturing, medical devices, and energy.
Propel Aims to Close Tech Talent Gap by Offering On-Demand IT Gurus | Xconomy
A few years ago, when Nick Birch and Scott Jones co-founded Indianapolis’s Eleven Fifty Academy, a nonprofit coding school, they realized their goal of harnessing Eleven Fifty to “close the nation’s growing technology skills gap” wasn’t going to be realized through classroom instruction alone.
Techstars Decides to Close Cloud Accelerator in San Antonio | Xconomy
Techstars Cloud is closing its San Antonio accelerator program focused on cloud computing startups after four years in the Alamo City, according to managing director Blake Yeager. Yeager is staying with Techstars but moving to the company’s headquarters in Boulder, CO, where he’ll work as vice president of engineering for the national chain of accelerators. He had been the managing director of Techstars Cloud since 2014.
Houston Storefront Chain Q Fifty One Buys Dallas E-Retailer Edition | Xconomy
Dallas—Edition Collective, a men’s e-commerce startup, has been acquired by a brick-and-mortar retail company, Q Fifty One. Terms of the cash and equity deal were not disclosed. The 13-year-old Q Fifty One is based in Houston and owns and operates Q Clothier and Rye 51 stores in four cities nationwide. Q Clothier sells men’s custom clothing, while Rye 51 features more casual menswear.
Led by iRobot, Mass. Robotics Cluster Growing, But Sales Still Small | Xconomy
When it comes to robotics companies in the Boston area, there’s iRobot—and then there’s everyone else. A new study found that there are 122 robotics firms in Massachusetts, which employ around 4,700 people in total. Last year, those companies generated $1.6 billion in revenue from robotics products and related services, according to the report. (Some of the companies included in the study sell more than just robots.) IRobot (NASDAQ: IRBT) makes up a big chunk of that economic activity.
GREE Is Good: How PerBlue Sold Its DragonSoul to Japanese Firm | Xconomy
Earlier this month, PerBlue, a Madison, WI-based developer of games that can be downloaded and played on mobile devices, said that it had sold the rights to one of its games, DragonSoul, for an undisclosed sum. The buyer, San Francisco-based GREE International Entertainment (GIE), is part of GREE, a Japan-based company listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange. According to a press release GIE put out on Oct.
EatStreet Downloads Another $11M for Restaurant Ordering Software | Xconomy
EatStreet has raised nearly $11 million in equity financing, according to a regulatory filing that was made public on Thursday. The Madison, WI-based developer of online food-ordering software has now raised more than $40 million since launching in 2010, says Matt Howard, co-founder and CEO of EatStreet. Howard declined to provide specifics related to what his company plans to do with the money, which according to the filing came from two investors.
Promentis, Kiio, EmOpti, & More: This Week’s Wisconsin Watchlist | Xconomy
Take a break from raking leaves and putting up your Halloween decorations and catch up on the latest news from Wisconsin’s innovation community: —Milwaukee-based Promentis Pharmaceuticals raised nearly $8.8 million in equity financing from eight investors, according to a document filed with federal securities regulators. Reached by phone, Promentis president and CEO Chad Beyer declined to comment on his company’s plans for the money it raised as part of the Series C funding round.
Automation Alley Drives Toward Autonomous Future with New Director | Xconomy
As Automation Alley prepares to host its annual awards gala this week, it’s a good time to look at what the organization is up to and what progress it has made since its founding nearly 20 years ago—and how the recent boom in autonomous technology has affected the organization’s long-term strategy. Automation Alley—a technology trade association with a mission to connect companies and organizations with talent, resources, and funding—also has a new leader (more on that below).
Roundup: Purdue Patents, Knight Challenge, Remy International, More | Xconomy
Here’s a look at innovation news from around Indiana: —Last week, the Purdue Research Foundation announced that in 2016, the number of startups spun out of university-owned intellectual property had grown to a record-breaking 27. This year’s class was bigger than any of the previous years, “contributing to Purdue’s third straight year of record-breaking startup and commercialization activities,” the university said in a press release. Purdue spun out 25 startups in 2015, and 24 the previous year.
Amazon Pledges $10M to Expand UW Computer Science Program | Xconomy
The University of Washington is $10 million closer to its goal of a significantly expanded computer science program thanks to a gift from Amazon announced Thursday. The Seattle-based tech giant’s commitment to the $110 million public-private fundraising campaign for a new computer science building is its largest local contribution yet.
With Epic Ties, HealthX Raises $20M First Fund, Reveals Investments | Xconomy
HealthX Ventures, a Madison, WI-based group that invests in early-stage healthcare technology companies, says that it has closed a $20 million fund. About 75 investors participated, says Dan Blake, a partner at the fund. HealthX, which says it seeks to put money into startups that are getting their “first rounds of funding,” also disclosed the names of some of its portfolio companies.
Boston Tech Watch: Inclusive Tech, Drones, Layoffs, Alcohol, & More | Xconomy
It’s hard to believe October is upon us. Before fall gets into full swing, let’s take a look at some of the late September happenings in Boston’s tech sector: —In a test demonstration, a drone developed by CyPhy Works for UPS successfully delivered a package from Beverly, MA, to an island a few miles away. UPS invested in Danvers, MA-based CyPhy last year.
Avecto Expands in Boston as Endpoint Security Gets More Crowded | Xconomy
Earlier this year, Xconomy compiled a list and map of cybersecurity organizations in the Boston area and found 60-plus companies. One that we missed was Avecto, a U.K.-based endpoint security software firm that opened a Massachusetts outpost in 2009, a year after the company was founded. Now Avecto is drawing more attention, both locally and abroad.
In the Driver’s Seat: Austin Edtech Startup Aceable Brings in $4M | Xconomy
Austin—Aceable has raised $4 million in a Series A round of funding to help it further expand its line of online testing products beyond driver’s education. The round was co-led by earlier investors Silverton Partners in Austin and Floodgate in Palo Alto, CA. In total, the startup has raised $8.7 million, including a $3 million round announced in October last year. Aceable, which was founded in 2013, started by offering driver’s ed testing via phone or tablet.
Ultimaker Pushes 3D Printers in U.S. With Help of Former Z Corp Exec | Xconomy
The dream of putting a desktop 3D printer in every home hasn’t materialized, despite a lot of hype, and it might still be years away—if it comes at all. “I don’t know if it’s dead as an idea,” says John Kawola, a Boston-based executive with Dutch 3D printing company Ultimaker. “But we don’t spend any time on it.” On the other hand, a 3D printer on every desk at manufacturing companies worldwide?
Start Garden Spins Off Venture Fund Focused on Early-Stage Startups | Xconomy
Start Garden, the Grand Rapids, MI-based accelerator working to boost West Michigan’s startup ecosystem, has spun out its investing arm into a private, independent entity called Wakestream Ventures. Wakestream will be led by Amway scion Rick DeVos, Start Garden’s founder, and will make venture investments primarily in technologies with high growth potential, including “hardware-software convergence and e-commerce enablement,” said Joe Landon, Wakestream’s finance director.
The Power of Polymers | Xconomy
Throughout history, innovative humans have developed technology to overcome or adapt to challenges in the natural world. As it turns out, some of our most important advances were actually inspired by a naturally occurring group of materials: polymers. Derived from Greek words meaning “many parts,” the word polymer refers to a large molecule composed of multiple repeating units.
IN Roundup: The Oscars of Invention, State's Top Companies & More | Xconomy
Here’s a look at recent innovation news from around Indiana: —Purdue University researcher Vilas Pol leads a team that has been named a finalist for the 2016 R&D 100 award, which a press release described as “the Oscars of invention.” Pol, who is a chemical engineering professor, helped developed a process to convert used packing peanuts into carbon for battery electrodes and a technology to capture carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to reduce climate change.
Fast Internet Can Lure Businesses, Says TN Entrepreneurship Advocate | Xconomy
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Ultrafast broadband is increasingly a must-have for high-tech companies, especially those in telemedicine, 3D printing, and other emerging industries. But currently, connection speeds vary widely by location—states like Tennessee are home to cities that have built high-speed fiber Internet networks while other states, such as Wisconsin, are trying to play catch-up. An Internet signal can travel a variety of paths to reach your wired or wireless device.
By Andreas Sundquist, Brad Feld, Anne Swift, Bill Mortimore, David Cohen Verified, Aaron Houghton, Joel S. Marcus, Alfred Spector
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BioXconomy
Tableau Names AWS Exec Selipsky CEO; Chabot Remains Board Chair | Xconomy
Nearly 14 years since its founding, Tableau Software (NYSE: DATA) is going through a major leadership transition. Co-founder and CEO Christian Chabot is handing over the top job at the Seattle company to Adam Selipsky, an Amazon Web Services executive.
Why Resilient Teams Are More Important Than Big Ideas | Xconomy
How important is having a “big idea” for startups? Ideas can generate a lot of buzz and capture attention from investors and potential customers, but long-term success really depends on the capabilities of the team. It’s often said that investors typically look for an “A” team with a “B” idea rather than a “B” team with an “A” idea. The reason is that once you start developing an idea, things change, models need to pivot, and teams must be able to adapt.
Redox and Kinvey Team Up, Hoping To Simplify Healthcare App-Making | Xconomy
Creating a software application that can talk to a hospital or clinic’s patient record-keeping system can be messy. As a result, many third-party developers elect to use an application programming interface, like one created by the Madison, WI-based startup Redox, to get data in and out of healthcare organizations’ records systems.
Allergan Pays $95M for ForSight VISION5, Eye Insert for Glaucoma
Allergan, the Dublin-based pharmaceutical company, has agreed to pay $95 million to buy ForSight VISION5 and its in-eye treatment for glaucoma. The Menlo Park, CA-based biotech makes a ring that rests on the surface of the eye beneath the eyelid, to be inserted by an ophthalmologist or optometrist. The ring releases Allergan’s (NYSE: AGN) glaucoma drug bimatoprost (Lumigan) and treats glaucoma over the course of multiple months by reducing pressure in the eye.
Gemphire’s Delayed $30M IPO Will Pay for Trials of Cholesterol Drug
After a series of delays partly caused by Brexit-inspired stock market volatility, Northville, MI-based biotech startup Gemphire Therapeutics (NASDAQ: GEMP) has successfully completed its initial public offering. The good news is the IPO gave Gemphire, which ended the first quarter with just $1.6 million in cash, some needed financial breathing room.
As Monster Gets Eaten by Dutch Firm Randstad, a Dot-Com Pillar Falls
Another dot-com era relic has been acquired for a pittance compared with what it was worth in its heyday. Monster Worldwide (NYSE: MWW), the parent company of job search website Monster.com, has agreed to be snapped up for $429 million by Randstad Holding, an Amsterdam-based firm that provides staffing and other human resources services.
Qualcomm Making Inroads with Wireless EV Charging Technology
If there’s one thing that’s become clear in the five years since Qualcomm (NASDAQ: QCOM) acquired its Halo wireless automotive charging technology, it’s that building a new business—and a new industry—takes time. As the global market for mobile phones has matured, Qualcomm has been seeking new opportunities in the wireless technology business.
Astronautics, WARF, & The Commons: This Week’s Wisconsin Watchlist | Xconomy
Stay current on happenings in Wisconsin’s innovation community with these recent headlines: —A group that includes the Wisconsin Economic Development Corp. (WEDC) and aviation and aerospace businesses, including Milwaukee-based Astronautics Corporation of America, announced it’s considering building “an aviation/aerospace center of excellence” in southeastern Wisconsin.
The Future of Human-Robot Interaction
How will humans and machines work together in the future? Will social robots be nothing more than robotic digital assistants like those on smartphones, or are there new opportunities and challenges when we put an AI brain into a robotic body? What are the risks and ethics around AI systems? Those were some of the topics of a question-and-answer panel held at Xconomy’s Robo Madness West 2016 conference last month.
Markable Downloads $1.9M For App That’s Like Shazam For Fashion | Xconomy
[Corrected 7/28/16 9:59 pm. See below.] Joy Tang knows models—both the algorithmic ones she helped develop while working in high-frequency stock trading for six years, and the human ones who grace magazine pages and strut along runways at fashion shows. Tang is the co-founder and CEO of Markable, a Madison, WI-based startup whose mobile app helps users find and purchase garments and fashion accessories similar to ones they’ve seen in pictures or in person.
For Cengage Exec, Detroit Collective Impact About Hope, Education
Ron Stefanski, Cengage Learning’s executive director of strategic alliances, grew up on the east side of Detroit on Tappan Street.
Boston Tech Watch: Dell-EMC, Codeship, Compete Job Cuts & More
We’ve got lots of Boston tech news to catch up on from the past week, including a crucial step for the Dell-EMC merger, new venture capital deals, job cuts, and executives on the move. Read on for details. —Boston-based Codeship announced Tuesday it raised $7 million in a Series A funding round led by Ascent Venture Partners, with contributions from previous backers Sigma Prime Ventures, Boston Seed Capital, and F-Prime Capital Partners.
Ex-Shell Venture Exec Rozenfeld Founds Firm For Energy Innovation
Houston—The energy industry is still reeling from low oil prices but Alexander Rozenfeld is placing a bet that this is the right time to back innovative ideas in the sector. Rozenfeld left his position last month as president of Shell Technology Venture to form his own venture firm, Climate Impact Capital. The past several years have not been kind to venture investors in cleantech and energy, as well as food, water, and other environmentally focused segments.
A Year Later, Northwestern Mutual, LearnVest Reflect on Acquisition | Xconomy
Northwestern Mutual didn’t have a record of buying many early-stage companies, making the purchase a surprise to some observers. (At the time, CEO John Schlifske told Forbes that the insurer, which manages nearly $90 billion in assets, wasn’t about to go on a shopping spree; so far his words have held true.) Then again, the two groups did have a history: Northwestern Mutual’s private equity arm led a $28 million investment in LearnVest in April 2014.
Agenda: Robo Madness West 2016
6.22.2016 AGENDA .
Amid Coding School Boom, Eleven Fifty Aims to Meet a Local Need | Xconomy
A little over a year ago, John Qualls, a veteran entrepreneur and leader in the Indianapolis area’s business community, decided to try something slightly different for his next career move. At the time Qualls was working as an executive at BlueLock, a company he started in 2006 that develops software to help clients manage data stored on remote servers, and recover it in the event of a disaster.
Ebullient Continues Hot Streak, Snags $2.3M For Computer Cooling Tech | Xconomy
[Updated 1/19/16 12:23 pm. to clarify how Ebullient’s systems work.] Data centers are hot. One of these buildings typically houses thousands of computer servers, some of which may be owned or rented by cloud storage services like Dropbox, Box (NYSE: BOX), and the Web Services division of e-commerce giant Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN). Processing bits nonstop causes these servers to heat up; in order to keep them from overheating and shutting down, data center operators must counter the rise in temperature.
3 Boston VCs Share Investment Themes for 2016 | Xconomy
The early results are in: 2016 will be a year of conversational interfaces (think actually having a back and forth with Siri), on-demand services, new tools for sticking to your healthcare goals (and meds)—and of bringing innovation to the underserved.
Seiva’s Smart Workout Duds Highlight Mini-Accelerator Pitch Event | Xconomy
[Updated 12/17/15, 5:09 p.m. See below.] One of the biggest storylines of the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia was the disappointing performance of the U.S. speedskating team, which some blamed not on the athletes themselves but on the suit many of them wore during races. The so-called Mach 39 suit, touted as “the fastest speedskating suit in the world,” was co-designed by apparel maker Under Armour (NYSE: UA) and defense contractor Lockheed Martin (NYSE: LMT).
With $550K, Beekeeper Gets Buzz for Building “MailChimp for Data” | Xconomy
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Matthew Rathbone left his job at Foursquare, the location-based social network headquartered in New York City, in 2013 after nearly three years of employment. While he didn’t miss his old job enough to return to the company, he says he did long to use some of the tools he had co-developed there. During his time at Foursquare, one project Rathbone worked on was helping to build an internal system that allowed employees to query databases and send the retrieved information to others.
By David Cohen Verified, Aaron Houghton, Bill McKeon, Andreas Sundquist, Joel S. Marcus, Alan Frazier, Gerry Hays, Jeff Buchanan Verified
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BioXconomy
How to Succeed in the Second Digital Era | Xconomy
Blockbuster. Borders. The U.S. Postal Service. These once-dominant entities, and many more, have all been victims of disruptive tech. Although it’s too early to sound the death knell for taxis, it’s also too late to say that ridesharing companies like Uber and Lyft are a flash in the pan. The disruptive change they represent is becoming part of our psyches—how we think about the world around us is framed by digital data’s seemingly endless potential to upend.
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