Category: Business/Technology

NeuWave Medical, a company founded in 2008 based on UW-Madison research, has raised $25.3 million, according to papers filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. NeuWave has more than 75 employees, with nearly 50 of them in Madison.

Penn State University, which develops sensitive technology for the U.S. Navy, disclosed Friday that Chinese hackers have been sifting through the computers of its engineering school for more than two years.

Noted: Networking is another must, adds the University of Wisconsin’s Tosan Olle. For Olle, networking – and the company intelligence you gain from it – is like currency. “The more you know about how your assignments fit within the overall organization and how different parts of the organization work to make a whole, more likely you are to build networks, possibly enhance job prospects both inside and outside the division and have a more enriched experience overall.”

Noted: The business school at the University of Wisconsin-Madison has a course tied to a $1.5 million fund, which can be invested in companies started by students in the class. The fund has made 20 investments since 1998—less than half of the startups have shut down, while a handful have been sold. “But it’s not as good as it may sound,” said Dan Olszewski, the program’s instructor. “Some companies that are two years old are still alive, but they’re not on the right track.”

Noted: Wall has been interested in development since earning an economics degree from UW-Madison in 1987. He then completed a master’s degree in real estate appraisal/investment analysis where he studied under Professor James Graaskamp, considered a leader in the field of urban land economics and risk management.

Discovery to Product, an experimental accelerator launched on University of Wisconsin-Madison’s campus last year, is starting to churn out its first few companies, organizers say.

Noted: Then, about two years ago, the Allmans’ 21-year-old son Nathan, a University of Wisconsin student, turned his family’s longing into a business. He entered the idea for Chefs for Seniors into the University’s Burrill Business Plan Competition.

Where some see a tech bubble, University of Wisconsin-Madison graduate student Sam Jacobsen sees opportunity.

Nancy Wong, the app’s designer and professor of consumer science at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, said on the institution’s website that in many people what looked like a lack of concern for the environment was really “a failure to connect individual action to that bigger picture.”

Two UW grads are putting their degrees to good use. “When we tell people we sell sandals, and we’re from the Midwest, it’s a little bit contradictory,” says Matt McManus, owner and founder of Bokos Footwear Company. He and his brother, James, launched their staple rubber sandal two years ago this week.

Noted: A graduate of the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh and UW-Madison’s law school, she worked for the federal government before providing legal counsel to former governor Tony Earl. She has been an executive at Miller Brewing and Kraft Foods and also directed the Department of Employee Relations at the City of Milwaukee.

Last week, Cellular Dynamics International CEO Bob Palay described the $307 million acquisition of his company by Fujifilm as a union of two businesses that “share a common strategic vision for achieving leadership in the field of regenerative medicine.”

Dan Thoma, who earned a Ph.D. in metallurgical engineering in 1992 from UW-Madison, will become director of the Grainger Institute in June, the university said Monday. The institute, funded in 2014 with $25 million from the Grainger Foundation in Illinois, is an incubator for transdisciplinary research in the UW-Madison College of Engineering.

Quoted: James Ver Hoeve, a scientist with University of Wisconsin’s ophthalmology department put it more bluntly in an email: “administering drops is not a particularly effective way to get drugs to the retina.”

In an effort to better understand its entrepreneurial graduates, the University of Wisconsin-Madison has sent a survey to nearly 300,000 alumni.

Noted: The company was co-founded in 2004 by University of Wisconsin-Madison scientist James Thomson, who is viewed as one of the most influential stem cell scientists in the world. It became a publicly traded company in 2013 and is at the forefront of an area known as regenerative medicine, which uses our own cells, tissues and organs to promote healing.

Noted: Cellular Dynamics was founded by UW-Madison stem cell pioneer James Thomson in 2004.

Just a few years ago, Claus Moberg and Jami Morton were graduate students studying air pollution at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Cellular Dynamics International Inc. said Monday it has agreed to be acquired by Fujifilm Holdings Corp., Tokyo, for $16.50 a share or about $307 million. Madison-based CDI uses the cell-reprogramming techniques of University of Wisconsin-Madison scientist James Thomson to manufacture large quantities of human cells.

As Assay Depot is proving that virtual internships aren’t just for PR companies looking for someone to run their social media, Professor David Williamson Shaffer of the University of Wisconsin-Madison is preparing to launch the next generation of virtual internship. Shaffer, the director of the Games and Professional Simulations research group in the Wisconsin Center for Education Research, is working on creating simulated internships that will allow companies to train would-be interns in the exact skills they’re looking for before they ever start a real internship, and to track the skill acquisition of interns as they progress through the program.

Noted: Marc Cayles educational background is hardly one youd associate with tech start-ups. At the University of Wisconsin-Madison, he majored in rural sociology.

What is the Internet of Things? If you have a “smart” thermostat made by Nest, you’re already part of it. The Internet of Things IoT connects uniquely identifiable devices to the Internet. A networked smart appliance can text you if things are out of the ordinary, track usage and accept programming changes sent from a smartphone. Leveraging new tools that live on the Internet, objects that had seemed fixed in form are being reimagined all around us.

Noted: Fetch was founded in 2013 by Wes Schroll, who was a University of Wisconsin-Madison student at the time. The company says its app provides benefits to three parties: Shoppers gets coupons, award points and expedited check-out; grocers get greater shopper loyalty and engagement; and consumer brands get the ability to deliver coupons to shoppers in the aisle at the point of decision.