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Category: Business/Technology

Make Wisconsin a Biobelt leader

Wisconsin State Journal

While critics continue to attack ethanol and other biofuels, Wisconsin should be thankful Gov. Jim Doyle is proceeding full speed ahead to make the state a leader in biofuel development.
The latest advancement was last week’s announcement that Wisconsin is joining 11 states to form an alliance to promote growth in the biofuels industry.

Plan on bike advertising wins

Wisconsin State Journal

A business plan for bicycle advertising on college campuses took first place and a $10,000 prize in the 10th annual G. Steven Burrill Technology Business Plan Competition Friday.
AdverCycle, a plan presented by Stacy Knuth and Matt Lerner, edged nine other teams from UW-Madison that were competing for $22,000 in prize money at Grainger Hall.

Sanimax biodiesel is as clear as water

Wisconsin State Journal

Randy Fortenbery, a UW- Madison economist who has studied the feasibility of biodiesel plants in Wisconsin, sees that option as a big plus for the plant.

“They do have a distinct competitive advantage in that they are aligned with (Sanimax) who controls a lot of the recycled grease collection in Wisconsin,” he said. “That’s a nice situation.”

An unholy Union

Badger Herald

Today, the Wisconsin Legislative Joint Finance Committee will pore over hundreds of millions of dollars in University of Wisconsin building plans in an informational briefing. They will begin the process of determining which of the proposed campus building projects receive the stateâ??s approval.

Editorial: UW’s right to investigate apparel allegations

Capital Times

University of Wisconsin T-shirts and other Badger-logo products should be made in Wisconsin.

Unfortunately, the university has a long history of going out of state and overseas for merchandise….

As a result, there are ongoing concerns about whether T-shirts, hats and other items with Badger logos are being made in sweatshops.

Students to try to make silk purse from sow’s ear

Wisconsin State Journal

Tim Sell sees potential every time he comes to work. He hopes a group of UW-Madison students taking part in a unique entrepreneurial program next week will have similar visions.

Sell, the marketing supervisor for the UW-Madison’s Surplus With A Purpose (SWAP) Shop, is anxious for the participants in the first Wiscontrepreneur Challenge to walk the aisles of the shop at 2102 Wright St.

‘There for his students’

Wisconsin State Journal

UW-Madison’s Center for Real Estate will be renamed this month to honor real estate education pioneer James A. Graaskamp.
The April 25-26 event will be at the university’s Fluno Center for Executive Education, 601 University Ave. The Center for Real Estate is in the Fluno Center.

Regents approve tuition hike for UW-Madison business majors (AP)

MADISON, Wis. (AP) – University of Wisconsin-Madison business students learned a painful lesson about supply and demand Friday when their tuition was increased by $1,000 for next year.

Saying demand for business education was increasing faster than state support, the UW System Board of Regents raised business majorsâ?? tuition by $500 per semester to boost teachersâ?? pay and hire more faculty and staff.

â??The differential is needed to maintain the high quality of the program,â? Regent Charles Pruitt of Shorewood said before the regents voted at a meeting in Oshkosh.

Study: High-tech jobs grow here

Capital Times

A report meant to shine the spotlight on Dane County’s high-tech economy shows that technology jobs increased in the Madison area by 5.5 percent from 2005 to 2006.

The 2007 Greater Madison Wisconsin Area Directory of High-Tech Companies, released this week, lists about 500 technology firms with combined revenues of $5.5 billion.

Reporter: News future is tied to the Web

Capital Times

“The way people consume news has fundamentally changed” with the advent of the Web, creating a new media landscape that will be dominated by niche Web sites rather than general interest newspapers.

That prediction came Thursday from Jim VandeHei, a former high-profile political reporter for the Washington Post, who caused a minor sensation in the journalism world several months ago when he announced he’d be leaving the venerable paper to build an online news site from the ground up. He was in Madison through the University of Wisconsin’s writer-in-residence program and spoke to local journalists at Capital Newspapers.

Patently Wrong (Red Herring)

Efforts by universities to turn inventions into quick cash has bogged down innovation, a new study concludes.
 
The study, unveiled Thursday at the Innovation Policy and Economy Summit in Washington, contends that universitiesâ?? â??home run mentalityâ? creates a focus on technologies that offer the â??biggest, fastest payback,â? but keeps much intellectual property buried on campus and away from the ma

WARF is likely to hold on to stem cell patent rights

Wisconsin Technology Network

A look at the facts in the dispute over three important University of Wisconsin stem cell patents – and the history behind similar disputes – shows a strong likelihood that the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation will retain all of its patent rights, even if some of its claims are changed or cancelled.

Bucky Badger pride: U-DUB wears UW school spirit everywhere

Capital Times

Like many of her peers, recent UW-Madison graduate Melissa Sandgren wears her Badger pride on her sleeve, literally.

She’s written the word “Bucky” in bleach pen on a red top and painted pawprints on a T-shirt with “Property of Bucky” scrawled across it. She’s cut off collars, ripped and re-tied Wisconsin shirts in creative ways to give her school spirit an ’80s flare. On football game days, she’s never had a problem creating a unique Badger look.

It was this extreme school spirit that inspired the 22-year-old journalism and marketing graduate to start her own business, U-DUB.

Patent ruling isn’t a blow to UW’s research leadership

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Concern apparently has been voiced across the state that the recent U.S. Patent Office decisions rejecting three patents held by the patenting and licensing arm of the University of Wisconsin could be a devastating blow to the state’s acknowledged leadership in stem cell research.

As one of the parties who lodged the thus-far successful challenge against the overreaching patents on human embryonic stem cells held by the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, let me reassure you that is simply not the case. And despite what WARF officials say, that’s not at all because appeals will be successful. A column by John Simpson.

UW off to El Salvador for investigation

Daily Cardinal

UW-Madison representatives will travel to El Salvador Wednesday to visit Hermosa Manufacturing and to meet with previous workers of the Adidas manufacturer. Chancellor John Wiley hopes the trip will help him, along with the universityâ??s Labor Licensing Policy Committee, to make an informed decision on whether the university should cut the contract with Adidas, according to a University Communications release.

Power line delayed as ATC mulls options

Capital Times

Local officials are applauding the decision by American Transmission Co. to delay construction of a controversial 345-kilovolt transmission line across Dane County, but energy conservation activist Nino Amato said it’s just a tactical move by the company to “reposition” itself in trying to justify need for the line.

Mark Williamson, vice president of major projects for ATC, said today the company needs more time to take a hard look at power usage forecasts and the potential to bury a part of the new line in sensitive areas, such as along the Beltline near the Arboretum.

UW to check Salvadoran factories

Capital Times

A representative of the UW-Madison is traveling to El Salvador to investigate workers’ rights at factories that make the university’s athletic apparel, including alleged workers’ rights abuses at a former Adidas Group subcontractor.

The University of Wisconsin contracts with Adidas to provide athletic uniforms and shoes, and the company can sell apparel with the UW logo. Adidas agreed to a code of conduct that stipulated its responsibilities in dealing with workers, factories and suppliers.

….Chancellor John Wiley did not agree to end the contract, but said Adidas should do more to help workers if they were unfairly treated by the subcontractor. Now he is sending Dawn Crim to investigate the situation.

Govâ??t rejects 3 stem cell patents

Daily Cardinal

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office summarily rejected three of five stem cell patents last week that the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation has held since 1998, after two watchdog groups accused WARF of patenting â??elementaryâ? stem cell propagation techniques.

UW event will honor Graaskamp legacy

Capital Times

James A. Graaskamp, the late and legendary UW-Madison real estate professor, will be honored April 25-26 when the UW-Madison Center for Real Estate is renamed in his memory.

Since 2005, almost 600 alumni and friends generated nearly $11 million in donations for the Center and its renaming. The support provides the critical resources to allow the Wisconsin Real Estate Program to remain competitive and to carry on the legacy of Jim Graaskamp, the UW said in a news release.

iPod Nation

Capital Times

The recent spate of legal threats from the music industry against the UW campus community apparently has convinced few students to change their file swapping habit, but they’re also using a slew of other tools to find new music.

A stroll down State Street is all one needs to see the pervasiveness of the digital music culture: white wires disappear into students’ ears, an Apple iPod loaded with hundreds, even thousands, of songs on the other end — some tracks likely acquired illegally.

Doyle touts biofuels, renewables

Capital Times

Vowing the Midwest can become “the Saudi Arabia of renewable energy — with Wisconsin at the forefront,” Gov. Jim Doyle today unveiled the new Office of Energy Independence and gave support to a regional renewable energy credit trading system.

“If an oil field in Iran has to compete against a farm field in Wisconsin, that’s a very good thing for the environment, for our economy and for the world,” said Doyle in remarks prepared for an event today on the UW-Madison campus.

Stemina hopes â??biomarkersâ?? blaze a profitable trail (wisbusiness.com)

www.wisbusiness.com

MADISON — Harnessing the power of stem cells in previously unexplored ways, Stemina Biomarker Discovery, Inc. is one of the newest startups to spring out of Madisonâ??s thriving biotechnology sector.

Elizabeth Donley, the companyâ??s chief executive officer, presented Steminaâ??s scientific goals and business model at the recent Molecular Medicine Tri-Conference in San Francisco.

Donley explained that when human embryonic stem cells are grown in culture, they can be used for disease diagnosis, screening drugs for side effects and reducing development costs of pharmaceuticals.

Spring Break Project

Wisconsin State Journal

Three Members of UW-Madison’s Students In Free Enterprise team will spend their spring break in the Appalachian region this year to help educate people in the area about personal finance and budgeting.

The team members were to leave the region this morning accompanied by six Madison-area high school students, two chaperones and Joyce Waters, a financial counselor from Debtscape, a Maryland-based non-profit that provides debt management and credit counseling services.

UW Business School Moves Up To 29th

Wisconsin State Journal

The UW-Madison School of Business is getting a little more respect, moving up two places to 29th in this year’s ranking of business schools by U.S. News and World Report.The ranking, which is eight places higher than two years ago, is the highest the business school has received from the magazine since 1990.

Doug Moe: Hoffman film takes bizarre twist

Capital Times

Given how strange the Barbara Hoffman murder case was in real life, it’s fitting that the movie version of the case should have its share of strangeness as well.

According to a story this week in the New York Post, strangeness recently invaded the Schenectady, N.Y., set of the filming of Madison author Karl Harter’s 1990 book on the Hoffman case, “Winter of Frozen Dreams.”

….THE LOS ANGELES Times on Friday had a substantial story about the ongoing attempt in the Wisconsin Legislature to get financial incentives for filmmakers — scheduled to begin Jan. 1 of next year — into effect immediately. The concern is that a $10 million film on the life of a Madison native, poker star Phil Hellmuth, will likely film in Canada rather than here if the incentives aren’t in effect.

Culinary clips: Gene Becker

The UW just raised thousands of dollars through on online auction of an eclectic assortment of merchandise, much of which was donated by alumni.

Overnight getaways, celebrity-autographed guitars, lunch with football coach Bret Bielema and autographed sports jerseys and equipment made up a chunk of the sales roster, and bidding ended this week. There also was food: six months of ice cream from the Madison-based Chocolate Shoppe, a Fudge Bottom Pie party for 12 and a case of Mojo Organic Beef Jerky.

A case of beef jerky? What’s with that?

Succession plan: Campus Nerds streamline net operation

Capital Times

Net Nerds has a new leader and a new format, but it’s still about fixing people’s computer problems.

Kristen Berman, who founded Net Nerds in 2004 after she and her roommates bought beer for a neighbor who fixed their computer, graduated in December and landed a job in Silicon Valley working for Intuit, which produces TurboTax and QuickBooks.

Berman…is retaining ownership of Net Nerds but has handed the operational reins to Chris Friederich, a UW junior finance major.

From a failure comes success

Wisconsin State Journal

Gillware is a Madison company whose beginning was failure – specifically the failure of the hard drive on the computer of Tyler Gill, one of its founders.
The year was 2003.

The UW-Madison student was faced with what could be called the nightmare of anyone who uses a desktop or laptop computer.

Meeting lacks attendance

Badger Herald

Unable to discuss new business Monday, the Joint Southeast Campus Area Committee listened to a presentation by the East Campus Utility regarding the Peterson and Ogg Hall buildings, which are scheduled to come down this fall.

Doug Moe: Comics editor got his start here

Capital Times

HERE’S MILTON Griepp on Jay Kennedy, the King Features Syndicate editor-in-chief and former Madisonian who drowned at 50 in a rip tide off Costa Rica last week:

“He was pleasant, upbeat, optimistic and a great guy to be around,” Griepp was saying Friday. “Super smart, an encyclopedic memory and relentless in pursuit of his goals.”

Also in this column: ….An art review in Friday’s Los Angeles Times gave posthumous credit to a well-liked and respected UW-Madison art professor in the critical early development of the renowned artist Bruce Nauman.

Court to hear drink special case appeal

Capital Times

The state Supreme Court has agreed to hear a challenge to Madison’s controversial ban on drink specials in bars.

The court will hear an appeal by UW-Madison students who claim that a 2002 agreement between city officials and the Dane County Tavern League to ban two-for-one drink specials after 8 p.m. on Friday and Saturday nights constitutes an illegal restraint of trade.

Growing mentorships: Giving guidance to young farmers

Capital Times

Farming can be somewhat isolating, says Chris McGuire. Especially during the growing season when there’s so much to do, farmers are in their fields a lot, and much of that time is spent alone.

McGuire knows what he’s talking about. He and his wife, Juli, are CSA farmers near Belmont. Their business, Two Onion Farm, is part of the Madison Area Community Supported Agriculture Coalition (MACSAC).