In a 10-minute video interview I did with Robert while we were having coffee and rolls before the general session started Thursday morning, we covered a range of topics — including the recent announcement that Best Buy is acquiring managed services provider MindShift for $167 million. I also got a sneak preview of other topics Robert was going to talk about in his opening keynote:

All the videos I shot at Defrag 2011, including three other interviews, are posted on my YouTube channel.  In addition, I have a photo set of the Defrag event on Flickr (213 pix) that documents my view of the proceedings over the three days. In some of the photos, you’ll be able to pick out several Minnesotans who attended this 5th edition of Defrag.  Startups represented included AsystMe, enStratus (a sponsor), FanChatter, KidBlog, Rifr, TST Media, and Zingstring.

Here are those screenshots showing a selection the tweets during Robert Stephens’ keynote:

Robert Stephens Rocks the #DefragCon Crowd is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Our pals at Workface have rolled out yet another great innovation: their chat platform now boasts an integration with Facebook that ensures that your Facebook Page is connected directly with those in your company you want customers and prospects to have access to in an instant. (disclosure: Workface was a client of my Innov8Press group).

One of the keys to Facebook engagement with customers is being there for them. Since the social media “community management” discipline is typically focused on watching, listening and waiting for a customer to post, send a tweet or otherwise go out of their way to connect, often prospects and customers don’t take the time to reach out. Since the Workface platform is embedded directly in your Facebook Page and with one click the engagement happens.

Take a look at the press release below and, especially, the companies who have already jumped on this platform to ensure they receive meaningful results from their Facebook efforts. 

SOFTWARE DEVELOPER WORKFACE BESTS CHAT PLATFORMS

FOR ONLINE ENGAGEMENT AGAIN WITH FIRST-EVER FACEBOOK INTEGRATION

Technology places field sales and services personnel across the Facebook ecosystem where customers spend time online; for new business potential through largest social media channel

 Minneapolis—Nov. 1, 2011—Workface^® Inc., (www.workface.com) a pioneer in online customer-interaction technology continues to raise the bar on online customer-engagement experiences with integration of its portable profile-based customer-engagement platform into the Facebook ecosystem. The only online company with the ability to integrate with Facebook,Workface enables companies to live “virtually” where their prospects and customers are, elevating the online engagement and driving new business through the world’s largest social media platform.

“Companies want to be ‘liked’ on Facebook, but the real issue is how does that develop meaningful relationships with prospects and, more importantly, generate leads,” said Lief Larson, president and product strategist, Workface, Inc. “Workface’s portable Profiles uniquely mobilize field sales and service teams across Facebook to engage at the moment of interest with online prospects, providing an experience that most closely replicates a face-to-face meeting—literally bringing a company’s social media presence to life.”

Integrated into a company’s Facebook page, Workface profiles enable prospects and customers to connect and converse with sales and service representatives while remaining within the confines of the social network. The ability to engage with customers in this manner creates opportunities that traditional online chat solutions are unable to cultivate and nurture.

Unlike online chat solutions, Workface literally gives a “face” to a company and its representatives, and empowers customers and prospects to find and select the right sales or customer service person on their terms. Through Workface, customers can quickly and easily interact with companies in a manner and at a time when they are interested and engaged.

Early customers of Workface using the Facebook application include: Atomic Data Centers, The Foundation, NE Minneapolis Homes, Red Ribbon Realtors, Titan Outlet Store and Travel Leaders of Fargo.

“In Facebook, you can chat with individuals who are your friends, but you can’t chat with a company,” explained Larson. “With Workface in Facebook, prospects can select an individual from an organization and engage in a conversation without having to make the commitment of ‘liking’ them. The added bonus is that the prospect can learn about the background and expertise of the company rep they’re interfacing with in a way that’s much more personal and rewarding than traditional, faceless online chat.”

In addition to the virtual interaction with customers, Workface integration enables Facebook users to share and refer sales and service personnel profiles with among their personal networks. Unlike static Facebook posts, a referral using Workface embeds the sales or service representative’s profile onto the individual’s wall without losing the functionality of the online customer-interaction technology.

Ideally suited for companies with field sales and service organizations/agents that rely on personal interaction to sell and support products and/or services, the Workface platform improves how they react and interact with online customers and prospects that prefer online communication but are turned off by the impersonal nature of most online communications experiences like chat.

About Workface (www.workface.com)

Workface Inc., headquartered in Minneapolis, Minn., is a pioneer in developing online customer-interaction technologies that humanize the Web. The company’s first-of-its-kind product, the Customer-Engagement Platform (CEP), enables organizations to mobilize their field sales and service teams throughout the Web, and to replace the impersonal, dehumanizing, and frustrating interactions of legacy chat platforms.

Workface puts customers or prospects in control of the interaction by letting them choose whom they want to interact with, in what manner, and in which web venue. It uses groundbreaking interactive, searchable, and portable content web-containers called “profiles” (the “Workface”) that are personalized by individuals to help online customers and prospects at the moment of need. These profiles can reside anywhere on the Web, so they can be placed anywhere someone might go on the Web to look for help or ask questions, including being available on company websites, search engines, high-traffic websites, and social media.

More than 75,000 professionals in over 2,500 different companies are now using Workface technology.

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Workface Integrates Real-Time Engagement with Facebook is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

It turns out, of the 10 startups that were selected to present at the event, none even comes close to the level of adoption these guys have achieved to date, which they announced at the in their presentation at #EduTechMN: 1,000,000 students using the platform, in more than 80,000 classrooms. And all that from a startup that began as just a sideline for Matt to use in his own classroom!

Here’s my interview:

The founders describe their creation this way:  Kidblog is a platform that provides students with an authentic, engaging, and interactive learning experience. It’s designed for elementary and middle school teachers who want to provide each student with his or her own, unique blog. It has simple but powerful tools that allow students to publish posts and participate in discussions within a secure classroom blogging community. Teachers maintain complete control over their students’ blogs. And a teacher can set up a class with no student email addresses. 

Matt likes to say it’s “built by a teacher, for teachers, so students can get the most out of the blogging process.” He also points out that teachers who’ve tried other blogging platforms (perhaps with limited success), such as Blogger, Edublogs, or WordPress.com, “will notice the Kidblog difference immediately.”

Best of luck to this emerging, homegrown Minnesota edutech company!

[This post first appeared yesterday on Tech~Surf~Blog.]

Minnesota EduTech Startup KidBlog Now Reaching One Million Users is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

I’ve been *so* wanting these folks to come to our town, and was delighted to represent Minnov8 at the event, along with my colleague Steve Borsch.  Tech Cocktail’s events have the stated purpose of “helping connect, amplify, and showcase the local technology scene” — and it’s now held such events in more than 20 cities, founder Frank Gruber told me.  The local sponsors who made this one happen were W3i and Ovative Group — kudos to them! (And a special shout-out to our friend Kim Garretson.)

Tech Cocktail Mixes It Up In Minneapolis is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

This interconnectivity creates an instant conduit for information, which allows businesses to rapidly share updated product images, descriptions, customer specific pricing, purchase order details, and more all in a secured environment. Perhaps more interestingly, these small and midsized businesses can easily exchange messages and fully engage in purchase order and invoice transactions between businesses, without EDI.

The three-member team behind Rocware brings a unique combination of personal experience running product-based businesses, the vision and technical expertise to build a novel solution, and the business knowledge necessary to bring this solution to market. Together their talents represent a complimentary skillset at Rocware. 

John Erck founded and ran a toy company called Extreme Bubbles in 2005. He then spent two years in IT Solutions at Cargill. Today, John is fully dedicated to his new venture Rocware. His brother James Erck, who is also a serial entrepreneur, started and ran a screen printing company called MPLS Ink in 2007, before cofounding Rocware. The last founder is their sister, Sarah Erck Welle. Prior to cofounding Rocware, Sarah worked in database strategy at Microsoft for four years, and then worked as the Director of Business Development at a business intelligence consultancy. All three siblings graduated from the University of Minnesota.

By delivering this solution with SaaS, Rocware is inherently providing many of the benefits associated with this technology, such as a lowered cost of ownership, availability, and accessibility. They have not only leveraged this technology, in the case of transforming viral tendencies into B2B relationships, but they have also built a scalable technology infrastructure to support it. The open source solution stack LAMP resides at the foundation, which provides a necessary relational data management structure for the data. This sits on top of a cloud-based hosting solution designed to handle both present and growing volumes of product data.

Through this enhanced B2B service platform, which now accommodates such a large spectrum of small and medium manufacturers, distributors, wholesalers, and sales representatives, Rocware is poised to scale.

Scalable B2B Platform through Rocware is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

One he made certain to focus on is a new Minnesota-based offering that includes a guy who also gave us a heads-up on their DEMO debut: serial entrepreneur, Alex Huff, who is with this new Minneapolis headquartered startup as Chief Technology Officer. Me&MyMoney launched this week at DEMO and it promises to let you live the life you want and have money left over.

As many of us know when it comes to launching a startup, timing is everything. Borne in a time of incredible global economic flux and uncertainty, Me&MyMoney is certain to get attention, especially when the U.S. Census Bureau releases data like this that, “…in 2010, median household income declined, the poverty rate increased and the percentage without health insurance coverage was not statistically different from the previous year.”

Alongside that historical data is an ongoing bleak jobs outlook, fears of a double-dip recession and deep concerns about the future of Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. As such, there is NO question that the masses are ready for a tool they can use to get a handle on where they are financially, where they’re headed, how to get out (and stay out) of debt, and to ensure they have money around in their old age (even more important now that we’re all living longer as well). Me&MyMoney couldn’t ask for more perfect timing, but there’s no question getting the word out and building buzz will be the key to adoption and gaining traction with the millions of potential users for their web application.

In their press release they succinctly lay out their value proposition which is, “Me&MyMoney is not another budgeting tool – it is a transformational approach to forecast where your money and your life are going. It uses diverse data sources, proprietary algorithms, and an easy-to-use web application to give members real, instant insight into their money. Those insights will allow them to create, understand, and execute a projection of their money throughout their lifetime.”

Read the full release after the jump (click “more…”) and then check ‘em out…

Me&MyMoney Debuts at DEMO Fall 2011 Conference

Minnesota-based startup enables people to take control of their money and their future

Santa Clara, California, September 13, 2011 – Six of every 10 Americans are on course to outlive their money – and the rest need to make sure they don’t. Me&MyMoney™ is an innovative web-based program that will enable its members to live the life they want – and have money left over. The Minneapolis-based company unveiled its revolutionary program at the DEMO Fall 2011 Conference today.

“I’ve worked for more than 30 years in financial services and can tell you that, unless you have substantial assets, ‘services’ is a misnomer,” said Mike Kozlak, CEO and founder of Me&MyMoney. “Most of the 40 million households that make up the working backbone of America do not have substantial assets. Unless there is a financial product to be sold, most institutions just don’t care about those consumer’s outcomes.”

Me&MyMoney (www.meandmymoney.com) is not another budgeting tool – it is a transformational approach to forecast where your money and your life are going. It uses diverse data sources, proprietary algorithms, and an easy-to-use web application to give members real, instant insight into their money. Those insights will allow them to create, understand, and execute a projection of their money throughout their lifetime.

As a member of the Me&MyMoney community, members will be able to share advice and assistance with other members. The community is built on its own microsite platform developed by LoudClick, Inc.(www.loudclick.net).

Kozlak is passionate about giving all Americans access to the tools they need to be successful. “The last 10 years have had a devastating effect on Americans’ confidence in their financial future,” he said. “Me&MyMoney differs from other online financial websites in that we help our customers look to the future, as well as their present situation. Unlike other companies, we are not trying to help our customers become better bookkeepers, but to help them make better decisions about their money.”

“We’re excited that Me&MyMoney chose our conference to launch their groundbreaking approach to the way we think about money,” said Matt Marshall, executive producer, DEMO. “The technology and concept behind this type of forecasting for personal finance is really exciting to see. It’s different from anything else out there.”

Members will see a graphical representation of their current reality, explore the future money impact of additional actions called “Sims” (simulations) and create their own plan based on strategies they choose.  All of this will be done on their secure Me&MyMoney microsite. Members can decide to fill out simple worksheets, or allow Me&MyMoney to securely access bank and investment accounts for additional insight.

The beta version of the Me&MyMoney application will be released in Fall 2011. Sign up atwww.meandmymoney.com to be one of the first to be invited to try this groundbreaking program. Welcome to the revolution.

Contact: Erin Anzalone
(952) 829-9091
erin@storytellermn.com

About Me&MyMoney
Me&MyMoney (www.meandmymoney.com) is a Minneapolis-based company founded in 2010. Its goal is to provide the majority of Americans the insight they need to become confident about their financial future. The web-based program uses a unique and secure micro-site platform, diverse data sources and proprietary algorithms to enable members to take control of their financial futures. Me&MyMoney wants members to be the CEOs of their lives – not the head bookkeepers.  Join the revolution on Facebook atwww.facebook.com/meandmymoney and on Twitter at www.twitter.com/meandmymoney.

About DEMO
Produced by the IDG Enterprise events group, the worldwide DEMO conferences focus on emerging technologies and new products innovations, which are hand selected from across the spectrum of the technology marketplace. The DEMO conferences have earned their reputation for consistently identifying cutting-edge technologies and helping entrepreneurs secure venture funding and establish critical business.  For more information about the DEMO conferences, visit www.demo.com.

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DEMO: Me & My Money is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

QONQR is the first in a line of geosocial games from the Minnesota-based company of the same name. The six QONQR team-members have been working together for years. In addition to being friends, and passionate gamers, they are experienced designers, deelopers, and entrepreneurs.

I interview Justin Peck and Andy Pickett from QONQR, the Minnesota Cup competition High Tech Division Runner-Up, at the final awards event on September 8th:

Interview of startup QONQR (MN Cup Runner-Up, High Tech Division) is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Neandertal man image created from a discovered skull

If you’ve paid any attention to the acceleration in human and animal genomics research, the revelations and scientific discoveries are amazing. As someone who has had his DNA analyzed at 23andMe (whose co-founder Anne Wojcicki is married to Google co-founder Sergey Brin), I can tell you first-hand about the absolutely delightful discoveries I’ve made about my own DNA, its implications, how I’m connected geographically to other humans, and that it’s unlikely I’ll ever run a 4 minute mile (that last one is just my conjecture!).

Lynn Fellman

The most recent profound discovery was the identification of Neandertal DNA in modern humans! From reading the articles which have come out this month, it appears that modern humans heading out of Africa “co-mingled” with Neandertals in Eurasia and now humans with “1-4%” Neandertal DNA have been identified.

Fortunately we have an independent artist bridging science and the humanities through art and narrative right here in our midst in Minneapolis, Lynn Fellman, who does a beautiful job communicating what has taken place and its implications.

Give it a view and then head on over to her website. Sometimes the science of DNA can get pretty esoteric and boring. Having someone like Lynn—a woman who is steeped in the science but can see and interpret the beauty within it—deliver some of THE most beautiful interpretations of any science-related discipline I’ve ever been interested in is incredibly pleasing and useful. What I didn’t realize, until I saw this video, is how effectively (and beautifully with her own visuals) she can communicate an incredibly complex topic.

(As an aside, NPR’s Science Friday host, Ira Flatow, is a big fan of Lynn’s work and she’s been on the show. You can check one out in her “Stories/Podcasts” section of her website here).

The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) commissioned Lynn to develop this presentation for their AAAS Member Central web site:

At the Crossroads Neandertals Hooked Up With Us is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

The Gang has used Workface’ profiles since the beginning and have watched this startup closely as they’ve continued to execute on their vision.

From their press release:

More than 75,000 professionals and over 2,500 different companies are now using Workface technology to enable their sales and customer service staffs to engage with prospects and customers online and in real time.

“Our ‘profile’ technology helps companies shorten sales cycles, connect with prospects at the moment of interest, and increase the level of engagement and intimacy with customers,” said Lief Larson, Workface founder and CEO. “This new round of capital will help us grow revenue from existing customers, add new customers and focus on several key platform enhancements.”

Congrats Lief and crew! See the full press release below…

WORKFACE LANDS ROUND OF VENTURE CAPITAL,
EXPANDS ON EFFORTS TO HUMANIZE INTERNET COMMERCE
Series A-1 financing brings total funds raised to more than $2.5 million to date

Minneapolis, July 26, 2011—Workface®, a pioneer in innovative online customer-interaction technology that helps companies market, sell and support their products and services, today announced it has raised more than $900,000 in new financing. Participating investors in the Series A-1 financing include Arthur Ventures and Omphalos Ventures.

Since its incorporation in 2007, Workface has raised over $2.5 million from its founders, private equity funds, angel investors and venture capital.

More than 75,000 professionals and over 2,500 different companies are now using Workface technology to enable their sales and customer service staffs to engage with prospects and customers online and in real time.

“Our ‘profile’ technology helps companies shorten sales cycles, connect with prospects at the moment of interest, and increase the level of engagement and intimacy with customers,” said Lief Larson, Workface founder and CEO. “This new round of capital will help us grow revenue from existing customers, add new customers and focus on several key platform enhancements.”

In 2007, Workface first launched its customer-engagement technology, one of the first examples how the Web can be used to interface with customers in real time. Sales staff and other customer-facing professionals create a Workface web profile that is readily visible and accessible by potential customers.

Through search engines, social media networks, rich social ads and corporate websites, prospects find these interactive profiles. Here, they can engage in a live text, audio and video chat with sales and service staff. Companies that want to promote their products and services outfit their sales staff with Workface profiles because a meaningful online interaction is more likely to lead to a face-to-face sales meeting.

About Workface
Workface Inc., headquartered in Minneapolis, Minn., is a technology company that helps other companies market their products and services by promoting their employees’ expertise and helping their staff engage with prospects online and in real time. Its customer-engagement platform enables sales and service professionals to create interactive profiles wherein they can chat with sales prospects and move them to the next stage in the buying process. More than 75,000 professionals in over 2,500 different companies are now using Workface technology.

About Arthur Ventures
Arthur Ventures is a venture capital fund that seeks investment opportunities in seed and early stage technology companies in the upper midwest region. The firm was co-founded by Doug Burgum, former senior VP of Microsoft Business Solutions and CEO of Great Plains Software. For more information, go to www.arthurventures.com.

About Omphalos Venture Partners
Omphalos Venture Partners works with founders and entrepreneurial management teams who aspire to achieve excellence. The firm is actively seeking investment opportunities in privately held, U.S.-based, early stage consumer, health care and information technology companies. For more information, visit www.omphalosventures.com.

Workface Lands $900k in Venture Capital is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

After an opening reception in the atrium, a series of speakers and presentations followed in an adjoining auditorium. The main focus of these talks was to inform and instruct the 47 semifinalist teams (across six categories, called “divisions”) about how they can best prepare for the ongoing judging.  That includes the opportunity for each these startups to work with their choice of “Mentors” chosen by the Minnesota Cup and the Carlson School (a major sponsor).  A list of 47 such mentors, with their bios, was handed out, and John Stavig of the Carlson School is coordinating the choice of mentors by the semifinalists.  Most all the mentors are graduates of the U of M, the majority with degrees from the Carlson School, and they represent a wealth of business-building experience.

What’s next for the Minnesota Cup semifinalists?  Here’s what we learned last evening about the upcoming schedule:

• Each semifinalist submits a 20-page business plan by midnight July 22nd.

• The division finalists are announced on August 19th

• The division finalists present and winners are selected on Augusts 30th

• The division winners present to the Grand Prize Review Board the afternoon of September 8th

• The Minnesota Cup awards event is held the evening of September 8th at the U’s McNamara Alumni Center

Congratulations and good luck to all the semifinalists! And thanks to the many sponsors and partners of the Minnesota Cup, as well as to Scott and his cofounder, Dan Mallin, for helping another great crop of our state’s startups go through their excellent program.  I really believe all the entrants (1000+ this year) are winners, because they get an opportunity to learn so much from the process. Go, Minnesota startups!

Minnesota Cup Honors ‘High Quality’ Crop of Semifinalists is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

If you don’t know Project Skyway, it is, “…Minnesota’s first tech accelerator program for motivated entrepreneurs. The program will build connections among entrepreneurs, mentors, investors, and other innovation hubs, and bring them together both online and in physical space. The vision places emphasis on building companies with long-term, sustainable value, ethical practices, mentorship, and strong networks.”

The Project Skyway founder, Cem Erdem, set up this weekend adventure to enable startups to be involved in multiple sessions and venues for learning, honing their value propositions, and learning from one another. Clearly it also would provide investors with those value propositions ready to grow and would separate the “separate the wheat from the chaff“.

I met all the finalists invited in for the weekend and many of them blew me away with the maturity of their vision and beginnings of executing on their value proposition. As a “judge”, I was asked to rank the top ten and it was probably the toughest force ranking I’ve done yet. Too many good ones!

If you have any doubt or concern that innovation is dead in this time of economic uncertainty, a few hours with this group of folks would wipe that right out of your mind.

Project Skyway Boot-Camp Weekend…Wow! is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

These semi-finalists were selected and announced this morning out of more than 1,000 aspiring entrepreneurs who participated in the 2011 competition. Judging the first round entries was challenging as the overall quality of entries was excellent. 47 of the best and most innovative business ideas will now compete in the second round of the contest. Congratulations to all semi-finalists and good luck in the next round of the competition!

More than 1,000 aspiring entrepreneurs participated and 47 (plus 4 finalists from the Social Entrepreneur division) of the best and most innovative business ideas will now compete in the second round of the contest. Congratulations to all semifinalists and good luck in the next round of the competition!

High Tech Division

The full press release is after the jump…

2011 Minnesota Cup Semi-finalist News Release

NEARLY 50 SEMI-FINALISTS CHOSEN IN SEVENTH ANNUAL MINNESOTA CUP COMPETITION

Local enterprises continue to get behind statewide search for breakthrough business ideas
Competition eclipses 1,000 participants vying for more than $185,000 in seed capital and valuable professional services

MINNEAPOLIS – June 13, 2011 – A high-tech interactive geo-social game that allows players to virtually conquer real world locations. A health-conscious honey product made without the help of bees. A virtual exchange that connects buyers and sellers of biologic products such as blood. These are among the 47 semi-finalists who were today named in the seventh annual Minnesota Cup, a statewide contest supported by a growing number of local corporations to seek out Minnesota’s newest and most innovative business ideas. Visit www.minnesotacup.org for the complete list of semi-finalists.

The contest began accepting breakthrough business ideas in late March 2011. When the entry period closed, more than 1,000 aspiring entrepreneurs, inventors, small businesses and other individuals with potentially breakthrough ideas had participated; 47 of these business ideas will now compete in the second round of the contest.

“In our seventh year, it’s exciting to see the Minnesota Cup continuing to gain momentum in our community,” said Scott Litman, co-founder of the Minnesota Cup. “As a testament to this momentum, leading Minnesota companies continue to get behind the competition and this year we are extremely pleased to welcome Carlson, General Mills and Digital River as the newest lead partners.”

One significant benefit semi-finalists receive in the Minnesota Cup is exposure to a review board comprised of nearly 50 prominent investors, successful entrepreneurs and other leaders in the Minnesota business community. Semi-finalists are also paired with mentors who assist the semi-finalists as they write their business plans. “Connections like these are invaluable to aspiring entrepreneurs,” adds Litman.

The 2011 semi-finalists will be honored with a reception at the University of Minnesota’s Carlson School of Management on Tuesday, June 21 from 5:00 – 7:30 p.m. Joining the 47 semi-finalist teams will be contest organizers, including co-chairpersons Scott Litman and Dan Mallin, review board members, sponsors and supporters as well as past Minnesota Cup finalists and winners.

During the next phase of the competition – June 21 through July 22 – the semi-finalists will be asked to refine their business plans. During this time period and into August, semi-finalists will have opportunities to attend a number of workshops and events organized by Minnesota Cup supporters in an effort to help them further develop their business plans.

Sponsored events include:

• June 12: Fredrikson & Byron, BioBusiness Alliance of MN and The Consulate General of Canada’s Minneapolis office host an event for Clean Tech and BioScience semi-finalists, providing an opportunity to pitch their ideas to an experienced group of professionals.
• July 29: Gray Plant Mooty and Lurie Besikof host a panel discussing competition strategy and give veteran advice to all semi-finalists.
• August 10: Messerli & Kramer hosts an event for all semi-finalists featuring notable local investors and business advisors, who will give valuable advice on how to approach finances during the early stages of business.

After July 22, the review boards will narrow the field to three finalists in each of the five divisions – High Tech, BioSciences, Clean Technology & Renewable Energy, Student and General. One finalist from each division will be awarded the top prize of $25,000 ($10,000 for the Student division winner). New in 2011, capital from new sponsors allows the Minnesota Cup to add a $5,000 cash award for the second place finalist in each division.

The competition’s sixth division, Social Entrepreneur, is managed by Social Venture Partners Minnesota(SVPMN). Given a new partnership between SVPMN and The Mosaic Company, the Minnesota Cup’s Social Division competition is now known as the Mosaic Social Entrepreneurs Cup. The Mosaic Social Entrepreneurs Cup selected four finalists in mid-May: Mind Body Solutions, GiveMN, HourCar andDesignWise Medical. These finalists will present at EPCON: The Engaged Philanthropy Conference on June 16 where the audience will choose the winner. The winner goes on to compete against the other five Minnesota Cup division winners for the grand prize of $25,000 and the Minnesota Cup, presented by Dave and Carolyn Cleveland. The grand prize winner will be named at the 2011 Minnesota Cup awards event on September 8 at the McNamara Alumni Center.

By the numbers

• $185,000 in prize money
• $30 million+ capital raised by ’09 and ’10 finalists alone
• 6,000+ participants in the first seven years

About the Minnesota Cup
The 7th annual Minnesota Cup is a statewide competition that seeks out inspiring entrepreneurs with the next breakthrough idea. High-tech or no-tech, this competition brings together innovative business ideas from a wide range of industries including automotive, health care services, telecommunications, technology, leisure, outdoor recreation, energy conservation, education and many others. Contest judges select the top entrants – 8-10 from each division – to participate in the semi-final round of competition, from which judges will determine the top three finalists in each division. Each finalist will then present their ideas to a prestigious panel of executives, investors and notable entrepreneurs who will choose this year’s division winners and award them $25,000 – with the exception of the student division ($10,000) and the Mosaic Social Entrepreneur Cup winner ($20,000). The winner from each division, including the social division, will then compete for the grand prize of an additional $25,000 on Sept. 8, 2011, at the 7th Annual Minnesota Cup awards event at the University of Minnesota McNamara Alumni Center.

Key Minnesota Cup Web Links
• Minnesota Cup General Information
• Minnesota Cup Judging Process
• Minnesota Cup Review Board
• Minnesota Cup Sponsors and Supporters

Stay Connected with the Minnesota Cup
• Minnesota Cup Email Notification List
• Minnesota Cup Twitter Feed
• Minnesota Cup on Facebook

CONTACT
Jessica Snell
Haberman
612.372.6452
jessica@habermainc.com

Tags
Minnesota Cup, business competitions, business plans, business plan assistance, small business tools, entrepreneur resources, job growth, innovative business ideas, University of Minnesota, Wells Fargo, State of Minnesota, Carlson, General Mills, Scott Litman, Digital River

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Minnesota Cup Semi-Finalists Announced is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Imagine you were a hiring manager or HR person in a company in need of one or more people for key jobs. Companies that post jobs today are absolutely inundated with resumes. Finding qualified candidates, vs. those just desperate for a job, is harder than ever.

Consider the recent announcement by McDonalds that they would be filling roughly 50,000 positions. They ended up with nearly 1 million people applying for those jobs! While that is an extreme case, it is indicative of the hiring challenges companies face trying to fill positions that require people actually matched to the job requirements.

Enter a new Minnesota startup, still in beta, called Hyier (pronounced “Hire”). This online web application is perfectly suited toward organizations needing to qualify their candidate pool in a fast, easy, and cost-effective way.

The way it works is like this: The companies create questions each candidate will be asked and the applicants will have a set time to answer. The twist is that these candidates respond to job specific questions by recording online videos using a webcam.

Wondering how Hyier differentiated itself from a company just using YouTube or some other video platform for candidate interviews, I talked with founder Derek Buschow (LinkedIn; Twitter) about how and why he started his company, what their competitive differentiators are and where they’re headed.

The key value proposition of Hyier is that it provides:

• A secure environment for both companies and respondent data to be held in confidence
• An ability for organizations to have a consistency in evaluations. Since each candidate is asked the same set of questions and has the same amount of time to respond, a hiring manager or HR evaluator can quickly size up a candidate and compare them with consistency
• Since organizations typically have multiple people involved in cutting down a volume of applicants to a manageable few, Hyier enables evaluators to rate, tag and forward candidate videos to approved others within their company.

When asked how the idea behind Hyier became an actual company, Derek responded by telling me the story. He’d graduated from University of St. Thomas’ entrepreneurship program and, like so many college graduates today, couldn’t get any interviews AND those he did get wouldn’t get back to him. Since he’d created the idea behind Hyier for his senior project (and won the class competition) he decided to take it out in to the marketplace and make the idea a reality.

There is no question that in today’s environment—high unemployment; few companies yet to begin hiring in earnest; an accelerating virtual workforce; coupled with a technological infrastructure where a Hyier could succeed—the timing is very good and as we all know in the tech game…timing is everything!

Whether Hyier will be able to convince enough companies to leverage their application remains to be seen. But it’s the right idea at the right time and Derek has the vision to make it succeed.

Hiring with Hyier is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

The entry deadline of 11:59pm on May 20th is fast approaching so begin your entry ASAP. At last year’s event, co-founder Scott Litman joked that numerous entries came in just before midnight on the last day several years in a row! Don’t procrastinate and make Scott stay up late…this competition is just too valuable to ignore and you’ve got your value proposition nailed down anyway, right?

The best part is the chance to win big money to fund your idea, right? Well get this: the competition’s total prize money just increased to $185,000. But it’s just not the dough: prizes include a bunch of other valuable awards, access to mentors and other entrepreneurial resources.

The Minnesota Cup is once again looking to support and develop the next generation of breakthrough ideas and yours could be one of them.  Entries may be submitted in the following divisions: Clean Tech & Renewable Energy, BioSciences, High Tech, General and Student.  More information and entry instructions can be found at www.minnesotacup.org.

Minnesota Cup Deadline Fast Approaching is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

The major Amazon Web Services outage that began this past Thursday morning was unlike anything before it.  Countless AWS customers, big and small, went down, many for days. Surprisingly, other biggies like Netflix, SmugMug, and Twilio had little or no disruption.  One hungers to know why…

Over the weekend, George Reese, a cloud expert and author (and CTO of cloud-management tools company enStratus), wrote a fascinating post on O’Reilly about what some would call a cloud disaster — entitling it, ironically enough, “The Cloud’s Shining Moment.” George has a unique perspective on the cloud, and a large following. His post got huge play, and that continues — so I decided to message him on Twitter and set up a coffee so I could interview him Monday morning. I was anxious for him to elaborate on his post and share more of his thoughts, now that the outage is (mostly) behind us. 

Click on the link below to hear the whole chat. What follows here are some snippets from that 30-minute conversation (it was recorded in a busy coffee shop, so there’s background noise, but you can hear us fine):

• Thursday at 3:00 am: “We knew something significant was going down.”
• What happened, who was affected, and why.
• What about SLAs? “They’re not an insurance policy, they’re a refund policy… SLAs are a joke.”
• The “Design for Failure” approach vs. traditional application architecture gives you “control over your own destiny.”
• Why the AWS outage was a shining moment: it’s about learning what you can do in the face of an event like this. “So many survived.”
• The “cloud haters” came out after the O’Reilly post. Flame wars erupted in the comments. George pre-empted what they thought was, ahem, their shining moment!
• In large corporations, the “Department of No” is the real problem.
• George guarantees that CIOs who say their companies are not in the cloud actually are, and just don’t know it. Many others realize the cloud “genie is out of the bottle,” and are now coming to his firm, to be their window into what’s really going on in the cloud.
• George’s company now makes it possible to do “cross-cloud” backup and disaster recovery. Not only can customers do automated DR, but automated DR testing, too.
• He says his company is at “the most important point” in its life and the evolution of the cloud. In the last six months, “enterprise has gotten it.” He noted that he’s never spoken to so many Fortune 100 companies as he has in the past week.

• Download or listen to my interview of George Reese, CTO of enStratus … (MP3)

Two other excellent blog posts we touched on that came out over the weekend:
• “How SmugMug survived the Amazonpocalypse,” by Don MacAskill, Cofounder & Chief Geek
• “Seven lessons to learn from Amazon’s outage,” by Phil Wainewright, ZDnet

(Here’s more about my interview subject: George Reese has been delivering software as a service since 2003 when he founded Valtira, a suite of web-based marketing tools. Prior to Valtira, George held a variety of technology leadership roles with J. Walter Thompson, Carlson Marketing Group, and startups Ancept and Imaginet. George is the author of several O’Reilly books on Internet and enterprise technologies, including Java Database Best Practices and Managing and Using MySQL and the recently released Cloud Application Architectures. He has an MBA from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University and a B.A. in Philosophy from Bates College in Lewiston, ME. Follow him on Twitter @georgereese.)

Full Disclosure: As mentioned during the recorded interview, the writer had a consulting relationship with enStratus in 2009.

George Reese on “The Cloud’s Shining Moment,” Four Days Later is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

That old black and white photo above of the woman holding some sort of portable videophone is from this surprisingly prescient Modern Mechanix article from 1956 that starts out with this:

“ON SOME night in the future a young man walking along Market Street in San Francisco may suddenly think of a friend in Rome. Reaching into his pocket, he will pull out a watch-size disc with a set of buttons on one side. He will punch ten times. Turning the device over, he will hear his friend’s voice and see his face on a tiny screen, in color and 3-D. At the same moment his friend in Rome will see and hear him.“

We can now laugh at how quaint this seems coming from a 1956 perspective, but when you think of the collision of technologies available to us today (e.g., GPS; fast wireless networks; Wifi; voice apps w/video; tools to develop and create apps) and the huge numbers of people rapidly acquiring mobile devices that are ‘always on and always connected’, you can understand why so many ‘marchers’ were marching forward at Mobile March. See the full 1956 Modern Mechanix article, scanned and on their blog, here.

Hosts: Steve Borsch, Tim Elliott, Graeme Thickins and Phil Wilson.
Music: David Bennett Cohen is the artist & the song is “Blues for a Summer’s Dream” via the podsafe Music Alley.

Discussed during the show:

• QR Code definition and 50 Creative Uses of QR Codes
• Lisa Foote MixMobi
• Mobile 3D presenters and specific mentions of Locate my Deal and Scrimmage
• Apple XCode & Appcelerator Titanium
• WordPress plugin: WPTouch (free/pro); TurboCSV & MapPress Free/Pro
• From 2006: Borsch’s Rise of the Participation Culture (PDF)

Minnov8 Gang 115 – Mobile March Marchers Marching is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

As for the presenters and demos at the event, the evening highlighted applications, services, and hardware that catered to a wide range of interests. From gamers to writers, security to slap shots the evening moved along at a brisk pace leaving plenty of time for socializing and networking out side the presentation space at the St. Thomas’ Schultz Hall.

Some of the standouts included…

Inveni-I’ve followed the development of Aaron Weber’s discovery and recommendation engine for quite some time and it didn’t fail to impress. Entertainment (Movies, TV) is the sweet spot for Inveni right now and offers the ability to share your highly personalized Inveni picks with your network. Now if Aaron could only get Netflix to secure a better class of streaming selections…

Zipnosis-With the promise of a diagnosis in minutes for just $25, Zipnosis was perhaps the most polished demo of the evening. We’ve showcased Zipnosis and are big fans. I also found the theme of the demo, providing low-cost healthcare, interesting. Zipnosis clearly wants to move past the tech and on to the benefits.

LitLift-This demo was the darling of the event. Providing tools to help writers in the areas of character, settings, and plot, LitLift helps authors organize their literary efforts. Presenter Brad Marsh, a writer himself won over the crowd with his humor as well as his assertion that he has invested all of $10 in LitLift and already has hundreds of authors using it. Showing off the character name generator didn’t hurt either.

Passy-Pass-I would be remiss if I didn’t highlight sigflup and her password generator. This piece of hardware does away with the need to constantly think of, and remember, new passwords. Paraphrasing sigflup’s words, humans shouldn’t have to deal with such things. Her demo and the incredibly raw nature of her working prototype really drove home the essence of what demos are all about.

The complete list of presenters, compliment of Minnedemo, is below.

One last word, while the surroundings for Minnedemo were really top-shelf (I believe this is the first time with actual carpeting.), the real standout of the evening was the caliber of presenters. The passion, enthusiasm and polish of most of the demos was exceptional. There is no doubt we have much of which to be proud from our tech community.

Presenters

• Inveni: a discovery engine where users receive highly personalized recommendations based on their custom taste profile and facilitates effortless sharing and socializing with friends (Aaron Weber).
• Qonqr: an augmented reality combat game, winner of Startup Weekend Twin Cities (Scott Davis, Justin Peck)
• Passy-Pass: a is password generator and storage device, written up by the Make blog (sigflup).
• Zipnosis: Doctor e-diagnosis tool with mobile component. Winner of Minnesota Cup Student Division in 2008. (Ben Peirce & Jon Pearce)
• Daybreak Heroes: a new social game for the iPhone, integrating some revolutionary ideas into the blossoming social game genre (Evan McMahon)
• Evolve-Stop playing with yourself. A social network catering to gamers.
• Event Burn: an online service that makes social media more useful by finding and summarizing the good stuff (Dan Frankowski)
• LitLift.com: a free novel writing application that’s helping hundreds of authors make the most of their limited writing time (Brad Marsh)
• Sophia: makes knowledge easier to share, easier to find, and easier to organize. Sophia lets you teach what you know and learn what you don’t (Steve Anastasi).
• Minnesota Hockey Hub: Bringing pro level functionality to the masses via the SPORT NGIN platform (Carson Kipfer)

Minnedemo Screams Diverse Developer Community is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Daren Klum

CRAM™ Worldwide is the company and Daren Klum that entrepreneur. To say that this is one of the most exciting and potentially biggest innovations to come out of Minnesota in a long time (or maybe ever) is an understatement. The more I’ve thought about the space, experienced the alternatives and felt incredible disappointment at the lack of quality in internet-only HD video & audio delivery (e.g., Boxee, XBMC, PlexApp, Kyte, AppleTV, Comcast OnDemand, et al), the stronger my level of enthusiasm has become for what CRAM promises to deliver. That, coupled with my belief that Klum will pull this off and overcome the formidable challenges ahead, means that a Minnesota company will be at the forefront of the TV revolution.

Even though we barely scratch the surface of the features, functionality, possible revenue streams and all the goodness that comprises the CRAM value proposition, I interview Daren to talk about his background, how he got the idea for CRAM, what drove him to enter this space, and why he thinks CRAM will be successful.

Discussed during the interview:

+ Hardcore Computer
+ HDCP has been cracked which places all, true HD content (e.g., movies on BluRay) at risk
+ Full Disk Encryption (FDE)

CRAM™ to Deliver TV, Movies & Music in *Actual* HD is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

Founded in March 2009, EarthClean develops innovative, game-changing technologies and high performing products that are safe for plants, animals, fish and people. The start-up’s first product, TetraKO®, is a biodegradable and non-toxic water additive that helps firefighters knock down and suppress fires far more effectively than currently available suppressants. The product is pumped through standard fire equipment and adheres to any surface, in any attitude, of its targeted structure. Exposed to heat, TetraKO immediately attacks the fire tetrahedron (the chemical chain reaction of fuel, oxygen and heat) resulting in a dense, white steam that is cooler than the fire itself, thus further suffocating the blaze. The result is exceedingly fast and thorough extinguishment with far less fire destruction and water damage, and reduced risk for fire fighter professionals.

Congratulations to the EarthClean team! If you have a moment, check out this video on the fire retardant at WCCO.com and head on over to the MN Cup website and view the press release which is here.

EarthClean Takes the MN Cup! is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.

But, this day, I thought it would be a great opportunity to let Robert tell us about the new role I knew he’d recently been promoted to — that of Chief Technology Officer, reporting the CEO of Best Buy.  I knew something was coming, because he hinted so in a meeting with me and my colleague Steve Borsch during the summer.  There was no Best Buy press release announcing his appointment, which I guess is common for them, but I actually confirmed it a few weeks ago when I hit Robert’s LinkedIn page. (He told me he didn’t want any hoopla around being named to his new role, that he’ll be happy to get recognition when he has some results to talk about.)

We recorded a 21-minute interview, where Robert touched on an array of topics.  He talked about technology trends, and how his job is translating those into actionable intelligence for Best Buy.  He spoke about his developing relationships and partnerships with companies like Google and Facebook, and how he really finds Best Buy a dynamic place to work, giving him a “palette, and a canvas.” He also tells the inside story about how was first asked to be CTO, involving a trip to New York with CEO Brian Dunn on the company jet to meet with Eric Schmidt of Google. Robert also talks about what motivates him, how he thinks more like a startup guy, but has the unique advantage of such big resources at Best Buy — and the abilily to open doors anywhere. “I have the best job,” he says. “I get to travel the world and visit all these companies.” He said over the next five to ten years, “we’ll be exploiting the four screens.” In that regard, he talks in particular about how one of those, TV, is coming into an new exciting phase. “I like sitting on the main chess board,” he said.

But let’s get to it…

Robert Stephens Talks About New Role as CTO of Best Buy is a post from: Minnov8 and published under a Creative Commons license.