Minnov8

Showcasing Minnesota Technology Innovation

Twin Cities Startup Vets Launch Buzz360™

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Buzz360 logoLocal serial entrepreneurs Lisa Schneegans and Klaus Schneegans have announced a new company, Buzz360 LLC, which provides a marketing platform connecting large companies with small business. The Buzz360™ platform automatically generates an online profile for a small business based upon Facebook posts and also provides automated marketing email updates to customers.

“I’ve devoted most of my career to building companies with software products that are useful for, and usable by, small business people, and I’ve never been more excited than I am about Buzz360,” said Klaus Schneegans, CFO and cofounder. Added Lisa Schneegans, CEO: “My passion is building effective partner channels to bring a product to market. The large firms we’re targeting with Buzz360 will get the technology into the hands of a very broad small business market.”

Previously the founders built Praxis Software Solutions which they sold to SAP AG in 2006.

Kathy Grayson at the Minneapolis-St. Paul Business Journal has a nice write-up on the announcement here. Full PR after the break.

…  [Read More…]

CoCo to Open in Uptown

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CoCo, our favorite coworking and collaborative space (both myself and my colleague Phil Wilson are members), has just announced it will open a new location this September in Uptown-BlueSky“the booming Uptown neighborhood of Minneapolis“… and I would add the adjectives “extremely” and “hip” to that. The news was announced late this afternoon at a special happy hour gathering of members — just called this morning — at CoCo in downtown Minneapolis. The Uptown location will be the third for the three-year-old CoCo organization. [Wait, let me get the calculator — that’s one per year! ] The other sites are the original one in Lowertown St. Paul and the second on the trading floor at the historic Minneapolis Grain Exchange, which opened in late 2011.  And, if you’re a member, you can frequent any of the sites.

CoCo Uptown will be located at 1010 West Lake Street, between Hennepin and Lyndale Avenues, and at the junction of Lake Street, Lagoon Street, and the Greenway bike path. “This is an ideal location for many reasons,” said CoCo founding partner Kyle Coolbroth. “We’re close to public transportation and within four blocks of dozens of restaurants, pubs, and coffee shops.”

Artist rendering of the main room at CoCo Uptown.

Artist rendering of the main room at CoCo Uptown.

Formerly an auto repair shop, the 15,000-square-foot space is being completely renovated over the summer. ”We get to start with a blank slate, so we’re taking the opportunity to create surprising new features and valuable amenities for our members,” said CoCo founding partner Don Ball.

Some of those features include:

• The “Garage” – a 3,500-square-foot open space devoted to ideation, prototyping, and presentations for groups up to 100
• A small tap room with craft brews (hold your cheers!)
• A small movie theater, for presentations and pitches
• A billiard room that doubles as a meeting room
• A walkout patio, located within a beautiful green space
• Two large conference rooms
• Seven private booths for phone calls and demos
• A commons area that can be used for 100-person events and meetups

With 160 seats, the new CoCo location will also provide plenty of room for coworking, as well as 24 dedicated desks and nine “campsites,” which seat four to six people each. We know a big question for those of you who drive these things called “cars” (like me, call me crazy) will be parking at the new location, so watch for more information on that forthcoming.

Artist rendering of the Lounge, one of the six meeting spaces at CoCo Uptown.

Artist rendering of the Lounge, one of the six meeting spaces at CoCo Uptown.

Although construction is just getting underway, CoCo is already taking reservations for campsites, with preference given to current CoCo members.

About “The Garage”
The Garage is a large open space designed for groups that want to do deep work in strategic planning, ideation, and product or service development. It will be available for fully hosted and facilitated experiences of one-day, three-day or one-week durations. The Garage can also be reserved for self-led groups. In addition to an inspiring environment, basic amenities at the Garage will include work tables and seating, a stage with projection and sound systems, as well as extensive ideation and prototyping supplies.

CoCo Uptown will feature a private patio, located amidst a larger greenspace.

CoCo Uptown will feature a private patio, located amidst a larger greenspace.

About CoCo
CoCo is a place where entrepreneurs, freelance professionals, small businesses, and corporate workgroups can gather to work, share ideas and team up on projects. For our members, CoCo is an alternative to working from home or meeting at the local coffee shop. CoCo has locations in Lowertown St. Paul and in downtown Minneapolis, on the former trading floor of the Minneapolis Grain Exchange.  For more information, see the web site.

Congratulations to Don, Kyle, and the entire CoCo team on an amazing three years so far! We look forward to the opening of the Uptown site.  See you there!

Is Minnesota successful in entrepreneurship?

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minnesota-sealGood story at MinnPost by Scott Litman, co-founder and Managing Partner of Magnet 360 (@scottmagnet) and co-founder of Minnesota Cup, and John Stavig, Director of the Gary S. Holmes Center for Entrepreneurship, Carlson School of Management (@gooddrjds).

Minnesota has consistently been at or near the bottom among all states in the formation of new business entities per capita and the headline from the latest Kauffman Foundation report reinforces this. Business formation rates per capita are one measure of entrepreneurial activity, and since 2007 our state has not placed above 40th. Many have voiced concern over this data, but business formation rates per capita can be a misleading measure, as it does not distinguish between high growth ventures, lifestyle businesses and sole proprietorships.

Read the rest here…

via @MNHeadhunter

Internet of Things Academy

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world-plugged-inIn collaboration with Sony U.K. and the Forum for the Future‘s project FutureScapes, London-based consultancy Superflux Ltd. has created an Internet of Things Academy (IoTA: Phase 1 and Phase 2). IoTA is “An open, educational internet-of-things platform to encourage creativity, collaboration and technological literacy.”

It’s a bold approach to connect with, and nurture, the makers and builders of tomorrow.

Unless you’ve been living under a rock and have little knowledge of what’s happening right now with the Internet of Things (IoT)—and how the U.K. and all of Europe are far beyond the U.S. in knowledge of machine-to-machine (M2M) and IoT—then hold on to your hat: The predicted explosion of internet-connected devices is about to transform our world and the economies within it. To suggest you should learn everything you can about IoT NOW and figure out how you can participate—along with helping to drive awareness and encourage teaching and mentoring of our next generation—is an understatement. This IoTA is a phenomenal step on the road to doing just that for the next round of makers and doers.

mckinsey-may2013The global consultancy, McKinsey & Company, released a report in May entitled, “Disruptive technologies: Advances that will transform life, business, and the global economy” that is receiving ALOT of buzz since they, “…estimate that, together, applications of the 12 technologies discussed in the report could have a potential economic impact between $14 trillion and $33 trillion a year in 2025.”

That’s a pretty big swing and McKinsey does state that their report is “neither predictive nor comprehensive” but after reading it you will begin to understand why Cisco, IBM, HP, Siemens, Sony, Philips and just about every other technology company you can think of is all over IoT like-a-bad-suit. You can download PDFs of either the executive summary (PDF) or the full report (PDF) and see for yourself.

WarningWhy is this Internet of Things Academy moving forward in the U.K. and not here in the U.S.? Why isn’t the Minnesota High Tech Association (MHTA) spearheading something like this IoTA—which promises to get people involved in this new technology marketplace nearly immediately—instead of MHTA’s current focus on a longer-term Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) set of initiatives that might have a payoff a decade or so down the road?

It’s all about awareness. With SmartThings, Digi (and their Etherios company) and Spark Devices here in Minnesota, our state has the opportunity to be one of THE primary hubs for IoT if we embrace it, drive awareness, and teach it. If we wait until a cashier at Office Depot knows about IoT (and this month’s cover story in Wired magazine on the Programmable World is helping to put IoT on everyone’s radar screen) it will be too late and Minnesota will, once again, be an also-ran in the biggest market opportunity since the internet itself went commercial in the mid-1990s.

Here is a video done for Superflux’s Phase 2 of the IoTA for your viewing pleasure:

3M ‘Quantum Dots’ Add 50% More Color to LCDs

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3m-logoQuantum dots, discovered in the early 1980s, are semiconductors whose characteristics produce more luminance and chroma (i.e., brighter and more color). While discoveries like this are always an interesting academic breakthrough, none of us get too excited about technology until it’s close to being leveraged by a startup, established company or close to shipping.

3M is close to delivering a new quantum dot film solution to make smartphones, TVs, tablets and other devices with LCD displays “…lighter, brighter and more energy efficient.” Up to 50% more, in fact!

Here is their press release:

 

3M to Bring More Color to Consumer Electronic Devices

3M and Nanosys offer stunning visual enhancements to LCD devices

Tuesday, May 21, 2013 7:00 am CDT, ST. PAUL, Minn.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–3M announced today it is in the final stages of scale-up for its new 3M™ Quantum Dot Enhancement Film (QDEF). The new film allows up to 50 percent more color than current levels in liquid crystal display (LCD) devices. 3M has teamed with Nanosys, Inc., to produce the 3M QDEF solution specifically to deliver more color, and to make devices such as smart phones, tablets and televisions, lighter, brighter and more energy efficient.

Current LCDs typically are limited to displaying 35 percent or less of the visible color spectrum. This means the viewing experience on an LCD can be vastly different than what a person sees in the real world. Wide color gamut displays will allow consumers to enjoy more visceral, more immersive and truer-to-life color.

“One of the many advantages of the new 3M QDEF solution is the film’s ability to deliver richly-saturated colors, while minimizing power consumption – a difference you can clearly see,” said Ty Silberhorn, vice president and general manager, 3M Optical Systems Division. “We will have qualification material available to customers for design cycles starting late second quarter this year.”

Over the years, 3M light management technologies have made LCDs thinner, lighter and more energy efficient. Color performance of LCDs industry-wide has gone largely unchanged until now. 3M research data shows that devices with 3M QDEF-enabled wide color gamut will be noticeably different from other standard LCD devices, prompting the human eye to dwell on the display longer than less-saturated displays.

QDEF utilizes the light emitting properties of quantum dots to create an ideal backlight for LCDs, which is one of the most critical factors in the color and efficiency performance of LCDs. A quantum dot, which is 10,000 times narrower than a human hair, can be tuned to emit light at very precise wavelengths. This means display makers can create a highly-optimized backlight that only produces the exact wavelengths of red, green and blue light needed by an LCD for optimal color and energy performance. Trillions of these quantum dots protected by barrier film fit inside an LCD backlight unit. The new film replaces one already found inside LCD backlights, which means the manufacturing process requires no new equipment or process changes for the LCD manufacturer.

“Improving color performance for LCDs with simple, drop-in manufacturing solutions will create a stunning new visual experience for consumers,” said Jason Hartlove, president and CEO, Nanosys, Inc. “Working together with 3M and utilizing their outstanding design and supply chain capabilities will allow our quantum dot technology to be widely deployed across all product segments, ensuring availability to all customers.”

Both 3M and Nanosys, Inc., will attend Society of Information Display’s DisplayWeek, May 21 – 23, 2013, in Vancouver, British Columbia. For more information: www.displayweek.org.

SmartThings in Wired

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IoT_Wired-MagazineYou will be hearing A LOT about “The Internet of Things” or “The Internet of Everything” or “Industrial Internet” this year and next. But it was this month’s Wired magazine who devoted the issue’s cover story to “Welcome to the Programmable World.” It starts off with a focus on SmartThings‘ CEO Alex Hawkinson and his ‘smarthome’:

On a 5-acre plot in Great Falls, Virginia, less than a mile’s stroll through ex­urban scrub from the wide Potomac River, Alex Hawkinson has breathed life into a lifeless object. He has given his house, a sprawling six-bedroom Tudor, what you might describe as a nervous system: a network linking together the home’s very sinews, its walls and ceilings and windows and doors. He has made these parts move, let them coalesce as a bodily whole, by giving them a way to talk among themselves. Open a telnet session in the house’s digital hub and you can actually spy on his chattering stuff, hear what it says when no one’s listening.

There are few more appropriate guides to this impending future than Hawkinson, whose DC-based startup, SmartThings, has built what’s arguably the most advanced hub to tie connected objects together. At his house, more than 200 objects, from the garage door to the coffeemaker to his daughter’s trampoline, are all connected to his SmartThings system. His office can automatically text his wife when he leaves and tell his home A/C system to start powering up.

Great article and it is one you need to read, not only for SmartThings, but because many people (including me) believe strongly that the connected, programmable world will be the biggest thing to hit our world since the internet itself.

Deloitte’s “TMT” Predictions for 2013

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deloitteThought you might be interested in a report by Deloitte, LLP, the U.S. branch of  Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Limited (DTTL), a UK private company. This global organization (57,000 people just here in the States) sends out an annual predictions report covering the Technology, Media & Telecommunications sectors. Good stuff in here including:

  • The PC is not dead
  • The end of password-only security
  • Enterprise Social Networks
  • Crowdfunding
  • Connected TV
  • LTE adoption
  • Smartphones ship a billion
  • Looming spectrum shortage

Download the report here: Deloitte_TMT_Predictions_2013 (PDF)

SOPHIA and Bill Nye “The Science Guy” Launch Operation College Success

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sophia-logoSOPHIA.org, the “social education platform that empowers students to learn in their own way, helps teachers to innovate and puts college students on a path to a lower-cost degree” just announced that they have partnered with Bill Nye, “The Science Guy,” to address the issue of college readiness and affordability with free resources and low-cost online courses for college credit.

From their press release: “It’s startling to think that two-thirds of high school students don’t have the academic skills they need to succeed in college and with the added cost of remediation, which collectively costs student billions, the goal of earning a college degree becomes that much harder to attain financially,” said Allison Gage, President of SOPHIA. “With Operation College Success, students now have more free resources at their fingertips that can help them get prepared. In addition, we also offer affordable college courses in several high-demand general education subjects that will start them on the path to a degree.”

The Bill Nye connection will certainly help with awareness and marketing. This offering will also help prospective students defray preparatory course costs at their chosen institution of higher learning since they are always expensive. With soaring student debt (see  Student Debt and the Crushing of the American Dream by the economist Joseph Stiglitz) the timing of this offering is perfect.

What Hospitals Charge – Some $8k, Others $38k

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coinsOne of the reasons healthcare costs have spun out of control is that most consumers are blind to those costs. There isn’t an easy method of shopping for price and little-to-no incentive for doing so since most consumers only care about their small co-pay.

That all changes today with a “big data” play.

“Consumers on Wednesday will finally get some answers about one of modern life’s most persistent mysteries: how much medical care actually costs.

For the first time, the federal government will release the prices that hospitals charge for the 100 most common inpatient procedures. Until now, these charges have been closely held by facilities that see a competitive advantage in shielding their fees from competitors. What the numbers reveal is a health-care system with tremendous, seemingly random variation in the costs of services.”

— From the Washington Post

An interactive table at the Washington Post allowing a quick scan of each State's cost ranges for various procedures

An interactive table allowing a quick scan of each State’s cost ranges for various
procedures, this data display is one of cost ranges in Minnesota – Washington Post

As an owner of multiple small businesses there is no question that I keep a close eye on medical costs and have had personal experiences with the virtual impossibility of being able to shop for medical procedures by cost and efficacy. This is a fabulous first step in bringing a much-needed level of transparency to a healthcare industry which the U.S. spends more on than any other country in the world (and over 15% of our GDP too).

Fargo Roadtrip: Midwest Mobile Summit

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midwest-mobile-summit-15There are very few reasons for me (a 6′ 5″ guy) to want to drive for four hours. Family is usually the only reason…with Iowa and (gulp) Kansas frequent destinations. With destinations like that, I’m never looking to see more flat terrain like that found heading to Fargo from Minneapolis. However, the lure of the first ever Midwest Mobile Summit was strong enough for me to caffeine up and set out Sunday for the 2 day event.

I was excited to be heading to an event with a very grassroots vibe.  Jake Joraanstad and Ryan Raguse of Myriad Devices were responsible for putting this event together that attracted some 150-200 to downtown Fargo and it appears to have been a resounding success.

The multi-site format showcased mobile technology, strategy and industry tracks and three different downtown locations. The Fargo Theater, with it’s nostalgic feel, including an organ front and center, provided homebase for keynotes as well as the setting for the strategy track. The event even started  with the organ rising to the stage. After some brief remarks we were all treated to ‘feats of yo’ from John Narum, Yo-Yo World Champion at 11 years old. It was a nice way to get everyone engaged.

The Sunday keynote from Ryan Raguse set the tone with a dramatic smashing of the “box” that represented pre-mobile technology. The rest of the day and , for that matter, the rest of conference presented an array of topics. Some presentations were ok at best but most were above average and some simply crushed it. (Johnathon Rademacher of Sundog and Livefront‘s Mike Bollinger were the clear standouts.)

Screen Shot 2013-05-03 at 1.12.55 PMMany real world mobile experiences were shared throughout the Industry track. While finance and heavy equipment may not be sexy industries that represent a category that has plenty of need and opportunity for mobile solutions.

For a first-time event this was huge. Not only was there plenty of local talent  in attendance but plenty made the trip from outside the state. The chance to enjoy strolling from the historic theater to more modern and artistic spaces provided a nice transition. There was a clear passion for mobile and plenty of opportunity to learn. I look forward to next year. I can even visit my son since is heading off to NDSU in the fall. (See, family is once again I drive for hours across the plains of the heartland.)

*Many of you know I’m co-founder of Mobile March and am happy to see the birth of another mobile event with such a community focus.