Technology : Buzz

In recognition of National Honey Month, Scott Cockerell, director of business development, Wannemacher Total Logistics, will talk about various issues within the honey industry, including production, supply, bee shortage and competition at the monthly Northwest Ohio Ag-Business Breakfast Forum on Thursday, Sept. 19 from 8 to 9:30 a.m. The program is hosted by the Center for Innovative Food Technology at the Agricultural Incubator Foundation, 13737 Middleton Pike (St. Rt. 582) in Bowling Green. Cost is $10.

Get all the details and registration information here.

Youngstown is making a comeback with business-to-business software as one of its pillars for economic growth. To that end, the Youngstown-based software group, Fyrware, LLC, is announcing their new “Blazing the Trail for Technology” campaign. The goal is to assist Youngstown’s economic renaissance as it continues to flourish.

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Notice Software has closed a $350,000 seed round, led by the Rocket Venture Fund. Notice Software’s core technology uses push notifications to engage mobile device users with the web. Notice will use this funding round to expand its product offering to include e­tail and mobile workforce solutions.

Click here for the complete press release.

The giant machine might be anchored to the floor, but program everything right and it can fool a super-sized bearing into believing it’s 300 feet in the air. The equipment occupies one-half of a bay in the Stark State College and Timken Co. Technology and Test Center. Timken researchers can run tests to find out how bearings will stand up under a variety of conditions that the machinery can simulate.

Funding for the project came from: Timken Co., $6 million, Stark State College, $3 million, supported by $500,000 from the Timken Foundation, Ohio’s Third Frontier commission, $2.1 million, Ohio Air Quality Development Authority’s Advanced Energy Jobs Stimulus Program, $1.5 million.
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Two studies released Thursday show the Youngstown Business Incubator has a far-reaching economic impact, which it believes will bolster an already strong reputation and attract more startup companies.

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To its advocates, crowdfunding is a way for capital-starved entrepreneurs to receive financing that neither big investors nor lenders are willing or able to provide. To others, it represents a potential minefield that could help bad businesses get off the ground before they eventually fail, and in some cases could even ensnare unsophisticated investors in outright fraud.

Those fears are partly why the Securities and Exchange Commission has delayed rules allowing crowdfunding that were supposed to take effect this month as part of the JOBS Act (Jump-Start Our Business Start-Ups), signed by President Obama last April. The S.E.C. is wary of loosening investor protections that have been in place since the 1930s.

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Ohio rose to 33rd from 38th and Michigan remained at No. 47 in Forbes’ new list of “Best States for Business.” The rankings, at forbes.com/best-states-for-business, compare the states in six categories.

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Innovation and entrepreneurship are the engines of economic growth. For decades now, cities and communities across the United States have tried to infuse themselves with those two properties by emulating Silicon Valley, a never-ending quest to become the next Silicon Somewhere.

Brad Feld’s terrific new book, Startup Communities, takes us inside the real ecologies of innovation and entrepreneurship. Feld, co-founder of venture capital firm Foundry Group, serves on the boards of numerous high-tech companies. He recently chatted with Cities about his new book.

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A national study on high-tech jobs released Thursday shows that Ohio is quickly establishing itself as a hub of high-tech job activity. The Buckeye State is home to three of the top 25 cities for tech job growth -- more than any other state.

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This fall, entrepreneurs and investors from all over the country gathered in downtown Cleveland for the National Association of Seed and Venture Funds (NASVF) annual conference. During a "fireside chat," AOL founder and Startup America Chair Steve Case touched on his belief that a "broader entrepreneurial ecosystem" with many hubs of innovation is possible. "Many years ago, you couldn't launch a startup in some areas, and now you can," he said. "Costs are down, and the ability to get talent is up."

The Midwest is working hard to make Case's vision a reality sooner rather than later.

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Recently, FirstEnergy Corp. of Akron recommended to the Ohio Legislature changes to Ohio's energy efficiency portfolio that would essentially freeze the energy efficiency mandate found in Senate Bill 221 at current levels. As currently written, Senate Bill 221 calls for Investor Owned Utilities (IOUs) to undertake energy efficiency improvements by 2025 equal to 22% of 2008's energy consumption. FirstEnergy's proposed changes would end the mandate at the less than 3% cumulative reduction required to date.

Ohio's Legislature should consider carefully any request to alter Ohio's course on energy efficiency. For many reasons, a reduction in the energy efficiency goal does not appear to be a good idea at this time.

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Automation, long a way for manufacturers to cut costs and improve efficiency, now is becoming a solution to the problem created by an ever-growing shortage of skilled workers.

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Successful startups have more women in senior positions than unsuccessful ones, according to a new analysis by Dow Jones (NWSA) VentureSource of more than 20,000 venture-backed companies in the U.S. between 1997 and 2011. They had more than twice as many women in top jobs like C-level managers, vice presidents, and board members than their unsuccessful counterparts did.

Read the full article here.

TIME's Rick Stengel talks to successful entrepreneurs about upending the status quo to create truly groundbreaking innovations

Ohio State University has agreed to buy 50 megawatts of wind energy – equivalent to 26 percent of power consumption on the Columbus main campus – from the Blue Creek Wind Farm in northwest Ohio.

The agreement is one of the largest purchases of wind power by a North American entity that is not a utility, the school said.

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