The UW-Madison College of Engineering received a $32 million donation pledge from The Grainger Foundation of Lake Forest, Illinois — the largest donation in the College’s history.
A new venture capital fund will start investing in Wisconsin’s university and college entrepreneurs this fall after closing on $6 million in fundraising.
Quoted: “We are in pretty uncharted economic territory,” said Laura Dresser, associate director of the Center on Wisconsin Strategy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Noted: Hart Posen interviewed in video beginning at 3:13 mark.
Noted: Developed by University of Wisconsin students in 2018, the music discovery streaming app launched for Apple’s iOS In July 2019, growing to about 100,000 users, 200,000 song uploads and 15 full-time employees in the year since.
Quoted: Menzie Chinn, an economist at the University of Madison-Wisconsin, said the July jobs report only confirmed his suspicion that the economic recovery was starting to plateau. Now, he thinks a W-shaped recovery — where the economy improves somewhat, only to crash again — is still possible, and “a stall is more and more likely.”
But this is not the first time in recent years that the dollar’s dominance has been questioned. In 2008, an academic study by Mr Frankel and Menzie Chinn, a professor at University of Wisconsin – Madison, predicted that by 2022 the euro would surpass the dollar as the world’s leading reserve currency.
Hart Posen, a professor who specializes in retail strategy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s School of Business, said Kwik Trip’s expansion in the Midwest can be attributed in part to its unique model. The company owns many parts of its own supply chain, like dairy facilities and bakeries. Posen said while this model has been part of the chain’s success, it also means that when the company expands, it’s likely to happen locally.
Quoted: Tessa Conroy, an assistant professor in the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Agricultural and Applied Economics Department who specializes in regional economic development, said it’s encouraging to see unemployment improving across the state. However, she said the numbers show that the economy has not gotten back to normal for a lot of people in Wisconsin.
“Even though things are better, we’re still quite a ways from where we were before the pandemic hit,” Conroy said. “So if we were to compare to say a year ago, we have a ways to go in terms of improving things again.”
Quoted: “I’m acknowledged for who I am, and I’m supported to do my best and to contribute at my best. That is the culture that we want to strive for,” Binnu Palta Hill, the associate dean for diversity and inclusion at the Wisconsin School of Business, said.
Palta Hill is also a consultant, workshopping with companies around the nation on different aspects of inclusion. She turns to research suggesting employees perform better when they feel like they belong and says the topic matters at every industry.
UW-Madison economist Noah Williams said it would be inaccurate to blame government regulation for the economic slowdown that’s accompanied the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Economic activity started falling early in March, before there were any restrictions in place,” Williams said. “What the lockdowns essentially did was keep that activity at a very low level. Things deteriorated much more quickly than people expected.”
The COVID-19 pandemic imposed significant new hardships on American workers — and it’s exposed just how much hardship many of them have been enduring for years.
That’s a central conclusion of a report published today, the 2020 edition of the State of Working Wisconsin. The report is published by COWS — formerly the Center on Wisconsin Strategy — a policy research and analysis organization at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Modern wearables like the Apple Watch use sensors like gyros and accelerometers to detect hand movements. Those components allow them to turn on their displays when you lift your wrist, as well as to ensure you’ve properly washed your hand. But thanks to the work of a joint team of researchers at Cornell Unversity and the University of Wisconsin-Madison, future wearables could offer more nuanced hand detection.
“It’s for cases where people want to be able to see faces,” said Lennon Rodgers, director of the Grainger Engineering Design Innovation Lab at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “It could be a teacher talking to their students, seeing smiles, things like this that are important, some people say, for developmental reasons.”
Each chew contains 30 mg of caffeine, so three chews has about the same amount of caffeine as a cup of coffee.
Young Ella wanted to become a farmer. However, he took up a job in Bayer to support his family economically. Scholarships enabled him to pursue his master’s at the University of Hawai’i and his PhD at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He also had a stint at the Medical University of South Carolina, Charleston, as a teacher and researcher.
The University of Wisconsin-Madison’s business school decided to extend its test-waiver policy through next year after initially waiving GMAT requirements ahead of the coming fall semester, said Blair Sanford, assistant dean for full-time M.B.A. and master’s programs. The policy pertains to M.B.A. candidates who apply with at least five years work experience and at least a 3.3 GPA in undergraduate studies or applicants who have a terminal degree.
Noted: James graduated in May from the University of Wisconsin-Madison with a degree in finance and economics. Chris graduates in December with a degree in statistics. The Kardatzkes grew up in Spring Green. James scored a perfect 36 on the ACT. Chris scored a 35.
In March, Ellison partnered with Lennon Rodger, director of the Engineering Design Innovation Lab at UW–Madison, and Jesse Darley, a mechanical engineer at Madison design firm Delve, to create a face shield prototype using easily accessible materials. The team named the open source design the Badger Shield.
Quoted: “The sharp drop in May was the result of the COVID-19 virus shutting down schools, universities, restaurants and food-service which caused a big drop in the sales of milk, cheese and butter,” Bob Cropp, a University of Wisconsin Cooperative Extension professor emeritus, wrote in a recent column.
Some companies, including Midwest Prototyping, that already provide shields to hospitals are also starting to sell to consumers. Additionally, the University of Wisconsin-Madison offers open-source shield design for its Badger Shield, which is being used both in hospitals and nonmedical settings, says Lennon Rodgers, director of the university’s Grainger Engineering Design Innovation Lab.
Only about 40% of small firms have business interruption coverage, according to the Insurance Information Institute, and most of the policies explicitly exclude pandemics, according to Tyler Leverty and Lawrence Powell, professors who specialize in insurance at the University of Wisconsin and the University of Alabama, respectively.
Noted: A three-day short course in ice cream making has been taught for decades at the University of Wisconsin’s Department of Dairy Science in Madison. Students travel from as far away as Asia, often with a goal to make ice cream with indigenous ingredients and flavors.
“Certain ingredients behave differently when added to ice cream,” explains Scott Rankin, who heads the UW program. “Alcoholic beverages are one example. You can’t just add them” without consequences.
Don and Traci both attended Kaukauna High School. Don received a degree in Economics from University of Wisconsin – Madison as well as a Master’s in Business Administration from the University of Wisconsin – Oshkosh and Traci earned a degree in Family & Consumer Relations from University of Wisconsin – Madison. Prior to their new venture together, Don worked in the financial services sector for a Fortune 500 company and Traci worked in the health insurance industry as a business analyst.
Quoted: Dr. Jon Temte, an associate dean in the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health and a former chairman of the U.S. Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, and Dr. James Conway, also at UW-Madison, is a leader over time in the American Academy of Pediatrics for immunization and infectious disease strategies.
Earlier this month the department store JCPenney filed for bankruptcy. Department stores make up 30 percent of total mall square-footage. We examine the ripple effects large retailers’ bankruptcy can have on America’s shopping malls. Guest(s): Jerry O’Brien
Quoted: Kristen Krokowski, a commercial horticulture educator at the University of Wisconsin-Extension in Waukesha, wrote the guidelines and recommendations for farmers markets in Wisconsin during the coronavirus pandemic.
Farmers markets were never prohibited under Evers’ safer-at-home order because the sale of food is considered an essential business. Regardless, that order is no longer in place.
“It’s all guidance now because there are no rules,” Krokowski said.
Quoted: University of Wisconsin-Madison economist Noah Williams said the economic downturn would likely be sustained. He said lawmakers should consider ways to bring people back to work, such as by offering cash bonuses to those who quickly find jobs and are taken off the unemployment rolls.
April’s 14% unemployment rate is likely an underestimate, Williams said. It could be closer to 18%.
“We’re seeing very high levels of unemployment,” he said. “It doesn’t seem out of line with national averages, although other states have certainly done better.
A new smartphone app from the University of Wisconsin-Madison is helping the state’s fruit and vegetable growers understand bee populations on their farm.
Born and brought up in Patna, Bihar, Ranjan earned his degree in engineering from Regional Engineering College, Trichy followed by Masters and PhD from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and has been teaching at Georgia Tech for the last six years.
Brian Pinkerton, a 1986 UW-Madison graduate with a bachelor’s degree in computer science, will digitally return to Madison as the keynote speaker at the Wisconsin Entrepreneurs’ Conference early next month.
From Rebecca M. Blank is chancellor of the University of Wisconsin-Madison and chair of the Council of Presidents of the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities, a research, policy, and advocacy organization. Peter McPherson is president of APLU and former president of Michigan State University.
Noted: Around 40% of all workers could theoretically earn more while unemployed than going back to work, according to an analysis by Noah Williams, director of the Center for Research on the Wisconsin Economy at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Noted: To get started, McGinnis turned to the website of the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s face shield project. It offered nearly everything his team needed, including a list of materials to make face shields and a pattern to use for assembly.
The UW School of Business will salute 2020 graduates by covering Grainger Hall in red light with inspiring congratulatory messages Saturday night.
For the team at USF, the process started by leveraging open-source design materials from the University of Wisconsin, Madison and making adjustments according to feedback from their local hospitals. Now, Celestin has shared all that he and his team have learned about producing face shields online including directions, 3-D printing details and instructional videos.
The University of Wisconsin Madison launched a new app to help inform the state of Wisconsin on all things coronavirus.
Noted: EatStreet, co-founded by Howard in a University of Wisconsin-Madison dorm room in 2010, has around 150 employees in its Madison headquarters. More than 15,000 restaurants in 250 cities are on the platform.
Faculty members and students at the University of Wisconsin-Madison have created a free website and mobile app to provide information, social support and resources to Wisconsinites amid the coronavirus pandemic.
With dozens of updates a day tracking positive cases, deaths, and modifications to the safer at home order, the University of Wisconsin-Madison has launched a COVID-19 app to put all these resources in one spot.
Quoted: “In the end of the day, there is only the same number of people wiping their, um, you know what,” said Troy Runge, the chair of the biological systems engineering department at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
CROWE director said Wisconsin unemployment rate has reached 19% overall.
Bruce Winkler started his innovation skills at UW Madison, and they haven’t stopped 30 years later. He is the founder of Innovation Strategies LLC. where his company is shifting their focus to ways they can help frontline workers battling Covid19.
E.B., as she was known to family and friends, wanted a career at the intersection of economics, labor and the law. She hoped to attend an elite East Coast law school, but those programs, including Harvard, where her father studied, didn’t accept women. With her father’s approval, she chose the University of Wisconsin, where the “Wisconsin Idea” — fusing academic research to solving social problems — was flourishing.
Shortening vaccine development, which normally has a multi-year cycle. Wisconsin has expertise in this area through its research universities and private companies such as Madison’s FluGen. Co-founders Yoshihiro Kawaoka and Gabriele Neumann are known around the world for their past anti-viral work, which is why FluGen was approached by an India-based firm, Bharat Biotech, which has developed 16 vaccines in the past, to take part in a larger vaccine development project that also involves the UW-Madison.
This time, innovators are exploiting tools and methods that didn’t exist in previous crises. In mid-March, Lennon Rodgers, director of the Grainger Engineering Design Innovation Lab at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, fielded a plea from the university’s hospital to make 1,000 face shields.
The Studio Zer0 team is made up of mechanical engineering students from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and architecture students from UW-Milwaukee. It’s the fifth year that the two universities have joined forces for the contest.
On Friday, representatives from Detroit hospitals started consulting on the project. On Saturday, the group settled on an open-source design from the University of Wisconsin. Suppliers were identified, the factory deployed and prototypes began materializing.
The company is using an open-source design from the University of Wisconsin-Madison for the project and is being done in collaboration with the UAW, the Iowa Department of Homeland Security and the Illinois Manufacturers’ Association, in response to the COVID-19 health crisis.
Quoted: Dave Schroeder, an information technology strategist with the Division of Information Technology at UW-Madison, wrote in an email that controls like those outlined in the district’s email are “ways to use Zoom securely,” but added that “some of those can only be controlled by the person hosting the meeting.”
As the University of Wisconsin-Madison joined universities around the country in shutting down dorms, classrooms and event venues because of the coronavirus pandemic, Jennifer Morzfeld found herself wading through a barrage of emails.
In the midst of finding out about her coursework, the junior political science and international affairs student got one message in particular that left her with a pressing concern, one that thousands of college students now face.
Quoted: That makes the real estate markets difficult to predict for industry experts like Mark Eppli, director of the James A. Graaskamp Center for Real Estate at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
“We have a lot of uncertainty and not a lot of data,” Eppli said.
If your firm is fortunate to feel confident in your survival and has the liquidity, you should take this opportunity to pay your vendors early. This can make a huge difference in their short term cash flow and might very well be the determining factors in keeping them operating until the environment changes and/or other funding sources become available.
Written by Dan Olszewski, UW Entrepreneurship Center Director
UW-Madison researchers and the vaccine companies FluGen and Bharat Biotech are developing and testing a vaccine against COVID-19 called CoroFlu, they announced Thursday.
The COVID-19 shutdowns have taken away cornerstones of newspapers’ already-struggling revenue: business ads and events, said Mike Wagner, a journalism professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
“When news organizations rely on events to advertise about and rely on events that they themselves host, and they’re in an environment where there are no more events, they lose a significant portion of their revenue model,” he said.
Wagner said the situation still has time to get worse.
“It feels like March 84th, but really, we’ve just been at this for a couple of weeks,” he said. “The real economic hits are still to come, and the fact that an organization like the Isthmus had to close down so early, suggests how fragile some news organizations see themselves financially.”
Quoted: “I worry about additional heavy farm losses this year,” said Mark Stephenson, director of dairy policy analysis at University of Wisconsin-Madison.
On the other side of Dane County, workers are assembling face shields for doctors based on a design sketched out by UW-Madison engineers and a Madison design firm.
Quoted: Vicki Bier, director of the Center for Human Performance and Risk Analysis at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, said such scenarios are common, not just in government, but in virtually all industries and organizations.
Quoted: The numbers reflect the staggering impact of restrictions on mass gatherings of 10 people or more and other efforts to slows the spread of virus. Economists said the number of initial claims were unprecedented for Wisconsin, including Noah Williams, economics professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and director of the Center for Research on the Wisconsin Economy (CROWE).
Class size of fall 2020 expected to be 80, compared to 67 last year.
