Erik Iverson, who takes the helm July 1 at the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, will make his first public appearance in the state at the Wisconsin Entrepreneurs’ Conference in June.
Category: Business/Technology
Study finds link between difficulty finding a date and making risky investments
The way you manage your money could be affected by your ability to find a partner.
How smart contact lenses will create the sci-fi eyes of the future
The feat of correcting vision with a tiny, permeable, and tear-friendly contact lens is impressive enough, but soon that will be only the beginning. Scientists are thinking bigger about what can fit in a small lens — and contacts are about to get a whole lot smarter.
Beloit Memorial High School students receive UW Madison scholarships
BELOIT, Wis. — Three sophomore students at Beloit Memorial High School will receive full-tuition scholarships to the UW Madison Business School upon graduation as part of the Business Emerging Leaders Program.
Wisconsin Microfinance program offers hope amid devastation
Noted: Soon after that, with support from fellow students and colleagues at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Polynice created an initiative that still is helping families become self-sufficient in Haiti more than six years later.
Wollersheim Winery, UW students collaborate to release new Red Fusion wine
Wollersheim Winery will be releasing a new wine Wednesday in collaboration with the University of Wisconsin-Madison fermentation sciences program, according to a release.
UW-Madison startup company invents safer electrolyte for batteries
UW-Madison startup company Silatronix recently invented a safer electrolyte that will be used for phone, laptop and tablet batteries. Silatronix is planning on moving into pilot production with a major Japanese battery manufacturer, which still has not been identified.
From farm products to T-shirts using Virent’s technology
The company, at 3571 Anderson St., has 37 employees. It was founded in 2002 based on UW-Madison research and has forged partnerships with several major companies including Cargill, Shell, Coca-Cola and Honda.
Drones May Soon Be Able to Detect Improvised Explosive Devices
Drones may soon have the capability to save thousands of lives each year by detecting terrorists’ improvised explosive devices and active land mines from long-ago wars thanks to innovative technology developed at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Bomb-sniffing drone technology developed at UW could become nightmare for terrorists
The proven detection technology that also can detect chemical and nuclear weapons and drugs was successfully miniaturized and designed to fly on small unmanned aircraft by Fusion Technology Lab graduate students about five months ago, according to Jerry Kulcinski, an emeritus professor of nuclear engineering and the lab’s director.
If you’re a distracted media multitasker, take a few deep breaths to get your focus back
Do you text while watching TV, or listen to music while reading? Media multitasking is known to distract people not only when they are doing it, but when they aren’t consuming media – which is detrimental to performance at school or work, for maintaining relationships and for general well-being. A new study by the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the United States shows that a short meditation exercise involving counting one’s breath – inhaling and exhaling nine times – can sharpen one’s focus, and especially so for heavy media multitaskers.
State continues to lag in venture capital
Noted: Recent work by Tessa Conroy and Steven Deller of the University of Wisconsin-Madison showed that start-ups here accounted for a smaller share of job creation than in all but three states.
Facebook, Twitter Engagement Done Best at Baylor and UW-Madison
Want to know how to do Twitter or Facebook right at your institution? You might want to study the practices used by the University of Wisconsin-Madison for the first and Baylor University for the second. Those two institutions have been deemed the “top users” of the those social media sites by Engagement Labs, which develops technology for measuring online social engagement.
Incentives offered to charge up sales of electric vehicles
Noted: Other workplace charging challenge partners in Wisconsin include University of Wisconsin campuses in Madison, Whitewater and Oshkosh, ABB Inc. in Wauwatosa, Evolution Marketing in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin Public Service Corp. of Green Bay, Xcel Energy Inc. of Minnesota (the parent company of Northern States Power), GE Healthcare and Organic Valley Cooperative in Lafarge.
Tech and Biotech: gBETA startups to graduate; finalists chosen for Biz Plan contest; UW2020 projects picked
Three items related to UW-Madison — Three UW-Madison spinoffs, using technology patented by the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation (WARF), participated in gener8tor’s gBETA spring class. Another was formed by a team of UW-Madison MBA students … One of the gBETA startups, Linectra, is already a contender in a prestigious statewide competition, the Wisconsin Governor’s Business Plan Contest … Fourteen UW-Madison research projects will each get about $300,000 over the next two years as part of the UW2020: WARF Discovery Initiative.
Five gBETA companies to make their debut
Noted: The gBETA program provides free coaching and connections to selected start-ups with ties to any Wisconsin college or university. It is run by gener8tor, which operates start-up accelerators in Madison and Milwaukee, and is supported by the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation and American Family Insurance
Controversial debt buyers get a break under new Wisconsin law
Noted: University of Wisconsin-Madison finance professor Jim Johannes, who testified in favor of the bill, said it standardizes courts’ interpretation of what is required in order to sue.
“It puts a fork in what you need as evidence when you approach the courts in the pleading stage of a case,” he said. “It provides clarity for the courts. Previously, before this the courts could interpret it any way they wanted to.”
SEC fines biotech investor, UW alum G. Steven Burrill for misusing investors’ money
Noted: In 1998, Burrill donated funds to start the UW School of Business’s G. Steven Burrill Business Plan Competition, a contest whose winners have included Madison biofuels company Virent Energy Systems and Madison online and mobile restaurant food ordering company EatStreet.
The Burrill contest held its final event in 2015.
Anti-Semitic Fliers Mysteriously Printed from UW-Milwaukee Printers
Several colleges across the country are investigating after a rash of anti-Semitic fliers began printing from their network-connected printers or fax machines.
Two days and three winners from Transcend Madison
The Steven Burrill Business Plan Competition had an iconic aura on the University of Wisconsin campus. Some of Madison’s most prominent millennial entrepreneurs competed in the contest: Jon Hardin, Matt Howard, Chris Meyer, Nathan Lustig, Troy Vosseller, and Forrest Woolworth. From 2007 to 2013, Burrill Business Plan entrepreneurs raised at least 117M and create at least 290 jobs.
A clean getaway: UW student snowmobile wins best in clean energy
A team of students in the College of Engineering at University of Wisconsin took first place and won $2,000 at a regional competition to develop clean energy snowmobiles last week.
The challenge asked students to redesign the powertrain of a conventional snowmobile to be as clean and quiet as possible, while maintaining power and affordability.
Madison start-up creates marketplace for digital art
Noted: Both University of Wisconsin-Madison students, Terry was a junior majoring in computer science; Cowdrey, a sophomore in business and marketing. Cowdrey’s father, for one, was taken aback, but came to understand why his son did it.
Reverse split keeps Cellectar listed on Nasdaq market
Noted: Cellectar was founded in Madison in 2003 by University of Wisconsin-Madison professor Jamey Weichert. Following a 2011 merger with a public company, Novelos Therapeutics, the corporate headquarters was moved to Massachusetts. The company moved back to Madison in 2014.
In a changing credit union industry, Summit keeps growing
Noted: A graduate of the University of Wisconsin-Madison who learned the business through the Credit Unions Executives Society and gained experience in various credit union executive roles, Sponem is one of the industry’s most visible leaders in the state.
Nine common shopping myths, busted
Noted: Let’s get philosophical for a minute: Is the best price always the best deal? A recent study from the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Wisconsin School of Business suggests that shoppers consider a retailer’s reputation as well as its prices. Savvy shoppers will think twice before buying from a less reputable merchant.
Time Capsule: A Photo History of Business Education
Noted: In 1974, the consortium included Indiana University, the University of North Carolina, the University of Rochester, the University of Southern California, the University of Wisconsin, and Washington University in St. Louis. That year, those six schools graduated 63 black MBA students—more than had graduated from all U.S. business schools combined eight years earlier. This year marks the 50th anniversary of the consortium, which now includes 18 universities that have graduated more than 8,000 MBA students from minority populations.
The Home Market opens at Hilldale
Noted: The Madison store will be managed by Taren Mansfield, a UW-Madison graduate who most recently worked as an executive with Target on Madison’s Far West Side.
EatStreet founder to speak at first-ever Technori Milwaukee
Noted: EatStreet, which supplies restaurants with software for handling online orders, is one of the state’s fastest-growing start-ups. Howard and his partners started EatStreet in 2010 when they were students at the Unveristy of Wisconsin-Madison. EatStreet raised $15 million of outside funding in late 2015, saying it planned to add 30 employees to its staff of 110 people.
Salud! California wines crafted by local palates define Madison’s Cambridge Winery
Noted: Eventually, Greg Bothwell, Cambridge’s young vineyard manager and a recent graduate of the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s horticulture program, plans to help with winemaking too.
The Soap Opera has new owners but remains true to its brand
Noted: Sean, 32, and Stacey, 29, are both UW-Madison graduates. They met in 2011 and married in 2014, and have taken over a business with a dedicated customer base and a strong stable of employees, one of which has been with the company since 1979. They had been contemplating buying a business for years but when Sean, who works as a broker connecting business owners with potential buyers, began talking with Bauer about the future of the business, the talks ultimately led to the Scannells making an offer.
‘WisCajun’ finds the spice of life
Noted: For more than 20 years, Cook was a research scientist at UW-Madison, specializing in allergic and infectious eye diseases. Cook, 59, retired in late 2013 and was awarded emeritus status in 2014, which allowed her to continue her affiliation with the university.
Madison Style: Love of place and plants combine with creativity for business owner
Retired UW-Madison plant pathologist Vaughan James probably did not realize he was planting seeds for a small business when he put in gardens at his home in 2000. The 1,100 perennials provide a profusion of inspiration and photography subjects for his silk screening and sublimation printing business, R.V. James Designs.
UW-Madison spin-off company studies potential autism identifiers
UW-Madison spin-off organization Stemina Biomarker Discovery is attempting to create a biological method to diagnose autism by screening blood samples.
CEO Elizabeth Donley and UW-Madison professor in the Department of Animal Sciences Gabriela Cezar founded the company in 2006, according to a university release.
Monona’s SHINE medical co. approved for Janesville expansion
Noted: The founder of the company, Gregory Piefer, studied at UW-Madison. The company performed a national search for places to locate their new facility, but Pitas said keeping the local company in Wisconsin brings the company full circle.
“The idea that work that goes on at the university should help people throughout the state. So, this is a great example of technology coming out of the university and helping people in Janesville with great-paying jobs,” she said.
Also quoted: Richard Steeves, professor emeritus of human oncology.
SHINE Medical wins NRC’s OK to build medical isotope plant
Noted: Piefer was in the UW-Madison’s nuclear engineering Ph.D program, and after getting his degree, he developed the technology, he said, and forged a partnership with the private, nonprofit Morgridge Institute for Research on the UW campus.
Subprime gets bad rap in ‘Big Short’ but is key to easing affordability crisis
Op-ed by Jaime Luque, Assistant Professor, Real Estate & Urban Land Economics, University of Wisconsin-Madison
UW-Madison team helping to develop system for thwarting cyberattacks
The University of Wisconsin-Madison is one of three schools working with non-profit research institute SRI International under a $5.3 million federal grant to develop technology to thwart particularly costly cyberattacks.
Tech and Biotech: SHINE awaits NRC decision on Janesville plant next week
Next Thursday is decision day for SHINE Medical Technologies. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission in Rockville, Maryland, will decide if SHINE will get a permit to build a plant in Janesville that will manufacture a radioisotope crucial for the health care industry.
Understory raises $7.5 million, heads home to Wisconsin
Noted: Kubicek has a graduate degree in atmospheric science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He also has undergraduate degrees in electrical engineering from UW-Madison and in physics from the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater.
Wisconsin dairy farmers worry about losing Latino workers
Noted: According to a UW study, nearly 90% of Wisconsin’s immigrant dairy workers are from Mexico. Some of them have come here from other states, such as Arizona, that have passed laws cracking down on undocumented workers.
UW scientists team up with Big Oil to develop renewable jet fuel
Low oil prices are restraining the ability of renewable energy technologies to compete, but work forges ahead on alternatives to petroleum-based fuels.
Plugged in
Quoted: “Medical education and nursing education is really grappling with: ‘How do we train the health professionals of the future to care for the patient and not for the electronic health records?’” says Katharyn May, a professor and the dean of the UW School of Nursing.
Insurance student hopes to help at-risk farmers cope with climate change
Noted: The University of Wisconsin School of Business student has collaborated with Askar Choudhury, James Jones and Raquiba Choudhury of Illinois State University, using an innovative statistical approach to analyze data by finding a trigger point that would initiate payment for crop loss through a simplified, index-based insurance policy. The approach is designed to be less costly than traditional agricultural insurance policies.
Tech leaders say UW budget cuts are a ‘dark cloud’ on the state’s economy
Seven executives met for a recent roundtable discussion at Wisconsin State Journal offices, one year after they gathered for a similar exchange, to see if conditions in the area’s tech industry have improved or slid backward.
Behind the Scenes at SpaceX’s Hyperloop Pod Competition
Noted: Badgerloop, the University of Wisconsin’s largely undergraduate team, laid claim to one of the event’s most impressive booths. Throughout the weekend, team members, who were clad in matching red-and-black polo shirts and khakis, built an Oculus Rift-like headset out of cardboard to help explain their pod’s unique technology to the steady throng around their eye-catching display.
Fertility app maker BluDiagnostics raises $1.2 million of debt funding
Noted: BluDiagnostics was formed in 2015 by Katie Brenner, a postdoctoral fellow in biochemistry at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. It raised $600,000 of the money in January, when it said it was trying to raise $800,000. That goal has been amended to $1.2 million, according to the recent filing.
UW-Madison team finishes third in SpaceX design competition
A UW-Madison team that designed a pod for transporting people at futuristic speed finished third in SpaceX’s first worldwide Hyperloop competition, hosted at Texas A&M University Jan. 29 and 30.
Don’t worry, Johnson Controls still will pay U.S. taxes
Noted: Author Robert Misey is chair of the International Department at Reinhart Boerner Van Deuren S.C. and adjunct professor at the University of Wisconsin School of Law. He previously worked for the IRS Chief Counsel (International) in Washington.
Teachers, UW-Madison game designers collaborate on video games
Noted: Field Day Lab is continuing to develop some of the ideas that were born in the workshop into free, open-sourced video games. The game designers said they aim to further engage students with an interactive learning environment.
“By engaging science teachers right from the start, we want to build games that will actually be used in classrooms,” said David Gagnon, the director of Field Day Lab, in the release. “Too many games languish because they do not fit what teachers want. With the teachers’ help, we want to build them right—right out of the gate.”
This robot changes how it looks depending on your personality
We’ve already got robot receptionists, who respond to human interactions — now we have a robot that changes how it looks depending on your personality. This robot, designed by Sean Andrist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, has been developed to respond to ’social gaze’ — essentially the social context in which we look at one another. The robot uses social cues, which it processes via a bespoke algorithm, to figure out what kind of personality you have and respond accordingly.
UPDATE: Students Compete to Change the Future of Transportation
Students who are part of the University of Wisconsin’s BadgerLoop team took third in the world for their Hyperloop design in Texas yesterday.
EatStreet partners with Uber to expand online food delivery
Noted: Howard started the company with two friends when he was a student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. EatStreet provides more than 15,000 restaurants in 250 cities across the country with around the clock support.
Planning, new transportation systems key to meeting Madison housing challenge, experts say
Quoted: And, according to Andra Ghent, associate professor in the Department of Real Estate and Urban Land Economics at UW-Madison’s School of Business, baby boomers will be flooding the market in five to 10 years, creating even more demand.
Washington University patent royalty lawsuit time-barred – judge
A Delaware federal judge has dismissed a patent royalty lawsuit filed by Washington University in St. Louis against a foundation affiliated with the University of Wisconsin, ruling that its claims were barred by the statute of limitations.
UW Included In Cybersecurity Grant To Protect Scientific Data
Computer scientists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison are tasked with protecting data from some of the nation’s most prolific science research programs, and they’ve just gotten a financial boost to bolster their efforts.
Students Compete to Change the Future of Transportation
Students part of University of Wisconsin’s BadgerLoop are preparing for a national SpaceX competition that challenges them to bring transportation technology to life.
The BadgerLoop team is creating their version of SpaceX’s Hyperloop concept, a new technology that uses air pressures to propel a transportation pod down a tube for fast travel.
Keeping the jobs in Madison after a tech acquisition not a sure thing
Madison tech companies that get acquired don’t need to close up shop if they can convince their buyers there’s more benefits from the acquisition than the technology itself, leaders of life sciences companies said at a WARF panel.
Investment Trends – Healthy U.S. consumers may be ready to spend
Quoted: Those consumers just might be one of the answers to investors’ woes, said David Silberman, who is pursuing a master’s degree in finance and participating in the Applied Security Analysis Program at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
UW students compete in global engineering contest
(Video) Last year, Space X and Tesla announced an exciting engineering competition for university students. The goal of the competition is to come up with a mode of transportation that is faster, safer, less expensive and more sustainable than planes, cars or trains. A team from the University of Wisconsin is in the competition this year.
Fertility app maker BluDiagnostics raises $600,000
Noted: BluDiagnostics was formed by Katie Brenner, a postdoctoral fellow in biochemistry at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. The app, called the BluDiagnostics Fertility Finder, analyzes hormones found in saliva and displays results through the app.