Entrepreneurship & Innovation

William Lazonick is director of the University of Massachusetts' Center for Industrial Competitiveness reports on How Greedy Corporations Are Destroying America's Status As "Innovation Nation". The problem is that corporations are pleading with the government to invest more money in R&R such as the NNI, but instead investing in R&D themselves, they use their profits for stock buy back programs. From 2001 to 2010, the top six companies wasted $185B for stock buy backs to boost their stock prices. The author argues that this money would be better spent on R&D.

The NSF has introduced an new program to help scientist and engineers get technology out of the lab and into the market place. The program is called i-Corps. Training was develop through the Stanford Technology Ventures program, and is based on the lean launch pad concept.

Entrepreneur magazine list five resources for small business. These include

• SCORE
• US Chamber of commerce
• Industry associations
• Local business owners
• Community colleges

For nanotechnology, two industry associations that might be of interest include Nanobusiness Alliance & Nanobusiness Commercialization Association.

In another Harvard Business Review article, entrepreneur, investor, and senior advisor Anthony Tjan, sees that successful entrepreneurs have the common trait of actively vulnerability. Successful entrepreneurs risk failure, but are also resilient enough to keep risking failure until they find a winning solution. This trait works two ways in that failure does not prevent them from trying again, and success doesn't prevent them from taking on new risks. This reminds me of learning to fly. While you are learning to fly, you are also learning to live and manage your fear crashing, which no one tells you about. It's turns out to be a constant battle.

The Harvard Business Review interviews entrepreneur Steve Blank. In the interview, Steve explains the difference between a business plan and a business model. Startups are searching for a value proposition so they need to iterate a business model until a value proposition is found. Then, the company changes to a business plan and begins to execute the plan. At this point, founders tend to leave their company unless the investors nurture them for the transition along the way.

Geoffrey Moore is a Silicon Valley based high technology consultant, and venture partner at Mohr Davidow Ventures. Geffrey gives a lecture on how to Reach your escape velocity at Stanford. In this lecture, he describes how companies loose their power by focusing on performance, and how to focus on power creation instead to keep the company innovative.

Tony Schwartz describes 10 principles for working in a complex world.

Ernst & Young has produced a report about the traits of entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurs are made not born, many entrepreneurs do it more than once, and can live with risk just to name a few.

Brookhaven is hosting a meeting to discuss funding your technology-based startup on July 25 from 5 to 7:30 PM. The meeting is part of the Entrepreneurs’ Foundation Workshop Series.

Bob Sutton describes 10 ways to determine if your future boss will be a bad boss. Bob is the author of Good Boss Bad Boss and Hard Facts, and Dangerous Half-Truths And Total Nonsense: Profiting From Evidence-Based Management.