A crowd of nearly 300 people from all walks of innovation sashayed through the Broad Institute lobby and auditorium for Xconomy’s Gala Launch party last night.
Founders of billion-dollar corporations, Nobel Prize winners, CEOs of public companies and startups alike, angel investors, venture capitalists, professors, students, legal and management execs, and scores of entrepreneurs in areas from life sciences to Web 2.0 to energy were on hand for the festivities. An inspiring first-hand account by Boston Scientific founder John Abele about his family’s successful search for the USS Grunion, his father’s lost WWII sub found this summer in the Aleutians, started the ball rolling. By all accounts (okay, we only asked ourselves), a good time was had by all.
But we forgot to write our lead story for this morning. Our bad.
The faux-pas was not discovered until around 10:30 last night, when the core Xconomy staff ambled across Ames Street from the Broad to Legal Seafood’s bar for a celebratory round of Guinness and Grey Goose (and tonic). Executive editor Rebecca Zacks, whose job it is to keep the trains running, sipped her drink and asked, calmly: “Do we have a story for tomorrow morning?”
Bob Buderi, editor in chief and train conductor, looked slightly ruffled and replied, “Wade, did you finish the uLocate piece?”
All eyes turned to Chief Correspondent Wade Roush, who is the train. An awkward silence fell over the table; you could hear a drop of clam chowder hit the floor back in the kitchen. “Not yet.”
The editor in chief made an instant executive decision. “Don’t worry about it.” And attention returned to the calamari and popcorn shrimp.
Innovation is all about adaptability, though, hence this account… We will be bringing you more details and a full-out spread about the party early next week.
