Three Michigan companies have received a combined $104,000 through the Michigan Microloan Fund Program, managed by the Ann Arbor SPARK business incubator. This latest round means the program has invested a total of more than $1.3 million in 36 companies since it was started last July.
Microloans range from $10,000 to $50,000 and are reserved for privately held companies based in Michigan.
The latest grant recipients include:
Terra-Telesis, doing business as AWGET (Airport Wind Generated Electric Turbine): The Okemos, MI, company is developing a turbine that harnesses winds generated by planes taking off and landing, touse them as a power source at airports.
KnowledgeWatch: The Ann Arbor, MI, company “tracks and harvests” news from many sources and delivers them in one-page, real-time, customized news digests for knowledge workers and decision-makers.
uwemp: The Ann Arbor-based educational software company is developing what it calls “Confidence-based Learning” that offers students relevant, Web-based curricula.
Author: Howard Lovy
Howard Lovy is a veteran journalist who has focused primarily on technology, science and innovation during the past decade.
In 2001, he helped launch Small Times Magazine, a nanotech publication based in Ann Arbor, MI, where he built the freelance team and worked closely with writers to set the tone and style for an emerging sector that had never before been covered from a business perspective. Lovy's work at Small Times, and on one of the first nanotechnology-themed blogs, helped him earn a reputation for making complex subjects understandable, interesting, and even entertaining for a broad audience. It also earned him the 2004 Prize in Communication from the Foresight Institute, a nanotech think tank.
In his freelance work, Lovy covers nanotechnology in addition to technological innovation in Michigan with an emphasis on efforts to survive and retool in the state's post-automotive age. Lovy's work has appeared in many publications, including Wired News, Salon.com, the Wall Street Journal, The Detroit News, The Scientist, the Forbes/Wolfe Nanotech Report, Michigan Messenger, and the Ann Arbor Chronicle.
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