Boston-based Currensee announced today that it’s opening its online community for foreign currency traders to all comers, after nearly six months of private beta testing. The company also said that it has closed its Series A funding round, raising $6 million from North Bridge Venture Partners in Waltham, MA. “It’s a major milestone for us,” … Continue reading “Currensee Opens Currency-Trader Community, Closes $6M Venture Round”
Author: Wade Roush
Between 2007 and 2014, I was a staff editor for Xconomy in Boston and San Francisco.
Since 2008 I've been writing a weekly opinion/review column called VOX: The Voice of Xperience. (From 2008 to 2013 the column was known as World Wide Wade.)
I've been writing about science and technology professionally since 1994. Before joining Xconomy in 2007, I was a staff member at MIT’s Technology Review from 2001 to 2006, serving as senior editor, San Francisco bureau chief, and executive editor of TechnologyReview.com. Before that, I was the Boston bureau reporter for Science, managing editor of supercomputing publications at NASA Ames Research Center, and Web editor at e-book pioneer NuvoMedia.
I have a B.A. in the history of science from Harvard College and a PhD in the history and social study of science and technology from MIT. I've published articles in Science, Technology Review, IEEE Spectrum, Encyclopaedia Brittanica, Technology and Culture, Alaska Airlines Magazine, and World Business, and I've been a guest of NPR, CNN, CNBC, NECN, WGBH and the PBS NewsHour. I'm a frequent conference participant and enjoy opportunities to moderate panel discussions and on-stage chats.
My personal site: waderoush.com
My social media coordinates:
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Kauffman Acquires StudentBusinesses
StudentBusinesses.com, a startup founded by a group of Harvard College graduates nearly two years ago to help entrepreneurial university students network with potential investors, advisors, and collaborators, has been acquired by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation of Kansas City, MO, according to CEO and co-founder Travis May. The purchase price was undisclosed. The company’s online … Continue reading “Kauffman Acquires StudentBusinesses”
HubSpot Gets $16 Million to “Put Mass Behind SaaS”; Marketing Automation Company Has Plans to Go Public, CEO Says
It’s a big day at HubSpot, the Cambridge, MA-based marketing technology startup founded three years ago by local investor-entrepreneurs Brian Halligan and Dharmesh Shah. The company announced that it has raised a $16 million Series C financing round, led by new investor Scale Ventures, with existing investors General Catalyst Partners and Matrix Partners also joining … Continue reading “HubSpot Gets $16 Million to “Put Mass Behind SaaS”; Marketing Automation Company Has Plans to Go Public, CEO Says”
Lots of Energy on Tap at MIT Energy Night
You know how Hollywood always goes overboard with gizmos and hijinks when it’s trying to represent young people doing science? (I’m thinking especially of 1980s movies like WarGames, Real Genius, and Weird Science.) Well, the MIT Museum in Cambridge, MA, looked exactly like that last Friday as the annual “MIT Energy Night” event showcased dozens … Continue reading “Lots of Energy on Tap at MIT Energy Night”
Charles River Lays Off 115 in Quebec
Wilmington, MA-based Charles River Laboratories (NYSE: [[ticker:CRL]]) has eliminated 115 positions at subsidiary CTBR Bio-Research in Senneville, Quebec, according to an article yesterday in the Montreal Gazette. A spokesperson quoted in the article attributed the cuts to the postponement of contract clinical research and development projects by the company’s pharmaceutical-industry clients. It’s not Charles River’s … Continue reading “Charles River Lays Off 115 in Quebec”
Jackpot Rewards Raises $12M
Jackpot Rewards, a Newton, MA-based startup that runs cash-back rewards programs and sweepstakes for online shoppers, has raised just over $12 million in new financing in the form of convertible debt, according to regulatory documents filed today. We profiled the company in February 2008, when it first announced its plans to give away a $1 … Continue reading “Jackpot Rewards Raises $12M”
Ballmer in Boston: Microsoft CEO on New England Startups, Competing with Apple, and the “New Normal” of IT
Microsoft is adjusting to a “new normal” with levels of demand for information technology that may be permanently lower than in the past—but it will still vie aggressively with competitors such as Apple for the dollars of consumers and enterprises, CEO Steve Ballmer told an audience in Boston today. In a rare visit to New … Continue reading “Ballmer in Boston: Microsoft CEO on New England Startups, Competing with Apple, and the “New Normal” of IT”
The Kauffman Foundation: Bringing Entrepreneurship Up to Date in Kansas City
Before I came to Xconomy, I didn’t know much about the Kansas City-based Kauffman Foundation beyond what I heard on the radio. If you’re an NPR listener like me, you’ve probably heard their underwriting plug that says it’s the “Foundation of Entrepreneurship.” But then I started covering stories like the foundation’s annual New Economy Index, … Continue reading “The Kauffman Foundation: Bringing Entrepreneurship Up to Date in Kansas City”
Appswell Tests the Crowdsourcing Model for iPhone Apps
Last time I checked, there were 85,000 iPhone applications in Apple’s iTunes App Store, a number that seems to grow by thousands every week. But most of those apps were dreamed up by developers, not by average users. Now there’s a way for anyone with a bright idea for an iPhone app to submit it—and, … Continue reading “Appswell Tests the Crowdsourcing Model for iPhone Apps”
Book of Odds Comes Out of Stealth to Make Intuitive Sense of Statistics—But Can It Sell Ads?
Despite the fact that “Google it” is now synonymous with “look it up,” Google itself isn’t a primary reference source. It merely aggregates facts and claims from everywhere else. If you wanted to create a genuinely new reference work on the scale of a dictionary or an encyclopedia—even if it lived online—you’d still have to … Continue reading “Book of Odds Comes Out of Stealth to Make Intuitive Sense of Statistics—But Can It Sell Ads?”
Facing Up to Facebook
My friend Brad King, a journalism professor at Ball State University, makes fun of me for being such a Web and gadget geek while at the same time shunning social networking tools like Facebook. He’s got a point. I’ve written a lot about Facebook, MySpace, and their predecessors, but I’ve never wholeheartedly joined in, the … Continue reading “Facing Up to Facebook”
“Not Your Father’s Route 128”: Jason Schupbach Promotes Massachusetts’ Creative Economy
In his 2006 run for the Massachusetts governor’s office, Deval Patrick campaigned on the need to make the most of the state’s “creative economy,” meaning industries such as advertising, architecture, design, digital media, film, gaming, marketing, music, publishing, tourism, and the arts. It’s a sector that employs at least 100,000 people in the state, and … Continue reading ““Not Your Father’s Route 128”: Jason Schupbach Promotes Massachusetts’ Creative Economy”
Deshpande Center Awards 8 Grants
The Deshpande Center for Technological Innovation at MIT today announced the recipients of its Fall 2009 research grants. The funds, $600,000 in all, will go to eight teams working on early-stage projects the areas of composite materials, diagnostics, disease therapies, drug discovery, diabetes treatment, high power electronics, energy efficient displays, and sensors. Recipients include Vladimir … Continue reading “Deshpande Center Awards 8 Grants”
PermissionTV Reinvents Itself as VisibleGains, Offers Interactive Video for Sales and Marketing
Sometimes, you need to keep the diamond and replace the ring. That’s how Cliff Pollan, recruited in March to be president and CEO of Waltham, MA-based VisibleGains, describes the process his company has been through over the last six months. In this case, the company has kept its core technology, an interactive video engine that … Continue reading “PermissionTV Reinvents Itself as VisibleGains, Offers Interactive Video for Sales and Marketing”
Qteros Making Ethanol from Sewage
It’s petrol from poop: Marlborough, MA-based Qteros today unveiled a joint development agreement with Israeli commodities recycler Applied CleanTech under which the two companies are using Qteros’ modified microorganisms to turn Applied CleanTech’s “Recyllose” feedstock, which is made from the solid matter in municipal wastewater, into ethanol for vehicle fuel and other uses. The process … Continue reading “Qteros Making Ethanol from Sewage”
Springpad Relaunches Personal Organizer, Adds Wine Library’s Vaynerchuk
Charlestown, MA-based Spring Partners announced today that it has relaunched Springpad, its online personal organizer, to include a number of new features that help users find, personalize, and share content. For example, Springpad now comes with a “Web clipper” tool that makes it easier for users to add material discovered at websites, such as restaurant … Continue reading “Springpad Relaunches Personal Organizer, Adds Wine Library’s Vaynerchuk”
Dart Boston: The Hub’s New Hub for Twenty-Something Entrepreneurs
Apparently, social media services like Facebook and Twitter aren’t everything they’re cracked up to be, even for the twenty-somethings who are supposedly their most devoted users. Here in Boston, there’s a new group for young startup types who prefer to talk about their entrepreneurial ambitions in person at actual bars, of all places. It’s called … Continue reading “Dart Boston: The Hub’s New Hub for Twenty-Something Entrepreneurs”
Nuance Buys eCopy
Burlington, MA-based Nuance Communications (NASDAQ: [[ticker:NUAN]]) said today it has purchased image scanning and indexing company eCopy of Nashua, NH, for $54 million in Nuance stock. ECopy’s software for touchscreen-driven multifunction printers (MFPs) helps companies scan business documents and easily incorporate them into accounting and records systems. “Nuance and eCopy share a vision of connecting … Continue reading “Nuance Buys eCopy”
Vivox Opens Facebook Voice Chat
Natick, MA-based Vivox said today that it’s opening its new “Vivox Web Voice for Facebook” service to all Facebook members. The application—which allows Facebook users to set up free voice chat rooms and invite their friends to participate from within Facebook—is one of the first creations of Vivox Labs, a new R&D arm of the … Continue reading “Vivox Opens Facebook Voice Chat”
Revolutionary Angels Launches Pay-to-Play Business Plan Competition
Depending on who you talk to, you get conflicting views about where real innovation and growth come from in today’s economy. One school, well represented at the established venture capital firms on Winter Street in Waltham or Sand Hill Road in Palo Alto, says that there are only a few truly disruptive technology ideas in … Continue reading “Revolutionary Angels Launches Pay-to-Play Business Plan Competition”
How to Launch a Professional-Looking Blog on a Shoestring
Maybe you’d like to have a sleek, attractive blog or website for yourself or your business. Maybe you’ve looked around at some of the free blogging or lifestreaming platforms like Blogger, Posterous, Tumblr, TypePad, and WordPress.com and you’ve been underwhelmed by the cookie-cutter sameness of the sites you see there. If either of those things … Continue reading “How to Launch a Professional-Looking Blog on a Shoestring”
iRobot Alumni Build Robot-Vacuum Accessories To Promote “Successful Cleaning Missions”
Sometimes a robot just needs a little help from its friends. And now a pair of former iRobot engineers who lost their jobs in last year’s downsizing at the Bedford, MA, company have struck out on their own to help iRobot’s popular Roomba floor cleaning robots do their jobs better. Launched in January, Robot Add-Ons … Continue reading “iRobot Alumni Build Robot-Vacuum Accessories To Promote “Successful Cleaning Missions””
Hearings on Non-Compete Restrictions Set for Next Week
A bill proposing restrictions on non-compete agreements in employment contracts in Massachusetts will have its first hearing on Beacon Hill next week, after nine months of discussion, revision, and compromise. The state legislature’s Joint Committee on Labor and Workforce Development will hear comments on the bill, introduced by State Representatives Lori Ehrlich and Will Brownsberger, … Continue reading “Hearings on Non-Compete Restrictions Set for Next Week”
Akamai Takes High-Definition to the Internet
Engineers long ago figured out how to deliver high-definition TV signals via over-the-air broadcast and cable, but the Internet is a different animal. Trying to squeeze that much data through a home or office Internet connection can lead to stutter and long “buffering” delays. For some time now, Akamai has been working on upgrades to … Continue reading “Akamai Takes High-Definition to the Internet”
Zintro’s Pay-by-the-Call Service Connects Investors, Others with Industry Experts
If you spend much time in the business or legal world, “due diligence” is a phrase you hear a lot. It’s the polite term for the time you have to spend figuring out whether a potential client, vendor, investment, acquisition, or partner is legit or phony, smart or just slick. Part of the process involves … Continue reading “Zintro’s Pay-by-the-Call Service Connects Investors, Others with Industry Experts”
Egenera Picks Up $3M
Marlborough, MA-based Egenera has raised $3 million in new equity financing, according to regulatory forms filed today. An executive for the company, which makes software for managing physical and virtual servers in corporate data centers, told Mass High Tech the funds came from existing investors, a group that includes Austin Ventures, Crosslink Capital, Kodiak Venture … Continue reading “Egenera Picks Up $3M”
Xerox Spends $6.4B on ACS
Xerox (NYSE: [[ticker:XRX]]), the document-management giant headquartered in Norwalk, CT, said today that it will buy Affiliated Computer Services (NYSE: [[ticker:ACS]]), a Dallas, TX-based business process outsourcing firm, for $6.4 billion in cash and stock. The acquisition will turn Xerox—like IBM or Dell—into a hybrid technology and services firm; ACS has 74,000 employees focusing on … Continue reading “Xerox Spends $6.4B on ACS”
Robonica President, an Ex-Hasbro Exec, Hopes to Put Boston Back on Toy Industry Map with Rolling Robots
Boston is home to a huge cluster of hot game companies, from Harmonix to Turbine to 38 Studios. But you might be surprised to learn just how deep the region’s gaming history goes. If Xconomy had been around a century ago, we probably would have been writing about Parker Brothers, which got its start in … Continue reading “Robonica President, an Ex-Hasbro Exec, Hopes to Put Boston Back on Toy Industry Map with Rolling Robots”
$10M for Tetraphase
Watertown, MA-based Tetraphase Pharmaceuticals has raised $10 million out of a planned $29.6 million equity financing round, according to regulatory documents filed Wednesday. The Harvard spinoff, which is using synthetic chemistry to develop new antibiotics for drug-resistant infections, previously raised $25 million in two tranches that closed in August 2008.
Ansel Adams Meets Apple: The Camera Phone Craze in Photography
[Corrected 9/28/09: Chase Jarvis is based in Seattle, not San Francisco. I regret the error and apologize to our Seattle readers!] Seattle-based commercial photographer Chase Jarvis is known for his arresting, color-saturated images of people in motion—skiing, swimming, somersaulting. He’s also known for (literally) trademarking the phrase “the best camera is the one you have … Continue reading “Ansel Adams Meets Apple: The Camera Phone Craze in Photography”
A123Systems’ IPO Gives Shareholders a Big Jolt
[Corrected 9:05 a.m. 9/25/09, see below] In a performance reminiscent of the frothy days of the dot-com boom, stock in Watertown, MA-based lithium ion battery maker A123Systems (NASDAQ: [[ticker:AONE]]) soared more than 50 percent in its first day of trading yesterday. It’s been years since a New England technology firm burst out of the IPO … Continue reading “A123Systems’ IPO Gives Shareholders a Big Jolt”
Shareaholic Collects Angel Funding Round
Shareaholic founder Jay Meattle was in touch today to say that his Cambridge startup has raised its first round of angel funding. Back in July, I reviewed Shareaholic’s popular browser plugin, which makes it easy to save or share material found on the Web via common social networking, social bookmarking, and news aggregator services. Meattle … Continue reading “Shareaholic Collects Angel Funding Round”
Ze-gen Ramps Up its Waste Gasification Process: Lessons from a Clean-Energy Startup
Xconomy has been around for 27 months now, long enough to watch quite a few of our fellow Boston-area startups expand, deal with serious challenges, and start to get their technologies out into the world. One of them is Ze-gen, a waste gasification company that I first visited in August 2007. This week I got … Continue reading “Ze-gen Ramps Up its Waste Gasification Process: Lessons from a Clean-Energy Startup”
Genzyme Says Supplies, Sales of Two Enzyme Drugs Will Be Even Lower Than Previously Predicted
When Cambridge, MA-based Genzyme (NASDAQ: [[ticker:GENZ]]) shut down its Allston, MA, bioreactor plant in June after discovering viral contamination, it was clear that there would be worldwide shortages of its best-selling enzyme replacement therapies, agalsidase beta (Fabrazyme) and imiglucerase (Cerezyme), and that there would be a hit to the company’s bottom line. The company got … Continue reading “Genzyme Says Supplies, Sales of Two Enzyme Drugs Will Be Even Lower Than Previously Predicted”
Mzinga Ups Financing, Fuses Products
Mzinga of Burlington, MA, said today that it has raised $10 million in new capital this month, including a previously disclosed $6.1 million financing and a more recent add-on. New investors Acadia Woods Partners and BlueCrest Venture Finance Master Fund joined existing investors W Capital Partners and Shared Capital Partners in the rounds. Mzinga also … Continue reading “Mzinga Ups Financing, Fuses Products”
Goby—Exploring the Web’s Depths So You Can Explore the World
It’s Friday, the weekend is beckoning, and you’ve got your Web browser open. As much as we’d love it if you spent the weekend reading Xconomy, there’s now a less sedentary option, from a Boston startup called Goby. It’s a search engine designed specifically to help you find fun things to do out in the … Continue reading “Goby—Exploring the Web’s Depths So You Can Explore the World”
New England’s Vizit Turns the Digital Photo Frame from a Dumb Display into a Sophisticated Media Hub
The digital photo frame is one of those consumer-electronics categories that seems perpetually poised to take off, but never quite gets airborne. I bought a Ceiva frame for my grandmother back in 2001—it plugged into a phone line and downloaded new pictures from the Ceiva website every night at 3 a.m. Today, things are pretty … Continue reading “New England’s Vizit Turns the Digital Photo Frame from a Dumb Display into a Sophisticated Media Hub”
Inverness Buys Free & Clear
Waltham, MA-based Inverness Medical Innovations (NYSE: [[ticker:IMA]]) said today that it has acquired Seattle-based Free & Clear for $100 million in cash, plus up to $30 million in potential follow-on payments based on Free & Clear’s 2010 revenues. Inverness manufactures consumer diagnostic tests such as pregnancy tests, and also provides wellness and disease management services … Continue reading “Inverness Buys Free & Clear”
$3M for Conduit Labs
Regulatory documents filed September 15 show that Conduit Labs, the Cambridge, MA-based maker of music-driven online games such as Loudcrowd, has collected $3 million in new equity financing. Conduit founder and CEO Nabeel Hyatt told Mass High Tech that the funding came from Charles River Ventures of Waltham, MA, and Prism VentureWorks of Westwood, MA, … Continue reading “$3M for Conduit Labs”
PrimeraDx Raises $20 Million More for Molecular Diagnostics Tool
PrimeraDx, a four-year-old startup in Mansfield, MA, said today it has closed a $20 million Series C financing round to continue work on automated lab equipment that, according to the company, could vastly speed up a host of medical tests. New investor CHL Medical Partners of Stamford, CT, led the round. Existing investors Abingworth, Burrill … Continue reading “PrimeraDx Raises $20 Million More for Molecular Diagnostics Tool”
Akamai Aims to Help Companies Switch to Virtual Desktops
More and more big companies are supplying their employees not with standard desktop PCs and office software, but with “virtualized desktops.” If your company has made the switch, then your desktop may still look the same, but your office programs are actually running in your company’s data center, where a server is feeding a screen … Continue reading “Akamai Aims to Help Companies Switch to Virtual Desktops”
Need to Catch Up With Digital Natives? Check These Seven Projects to Spread Your Digital Wings
If you’re under 25 or so, you probably don’t need much training on how to share digital photos, make a digital sketch, create an animated cartoon, make a personalized online map, or the like. I wrote the last three installments of my World Wide Wade column for everyone else: The majority of everyday computer users … Continue reading “Need to Catch Up With Digital Natives? Check These Seven Projects to Spread Your Digital Wings”
SAIC Gets Robot Sub Contract
The Naval Undersea Warfare Center in Newport, RI, has awarded a contract worth up to $19 million to San Diego-based Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC) (NYSE: [[ticker:SAIC]]). Under the contract, which SAIC announced today, the company will perform training, modeling, simulation, and other support services for robot submarine research programs at the Navy’s Autonomous Undersea … Continue reading “SAIC Gets Robot Sub Contract”
Put Yourself On the Map, Build a Virtual House: Seven Projects to Stretch Your Digital Wings, Part Three
When I set out to write “Seven Projects to Stretch Your Digital Wings” two weeks ago, I really meant to put all seven projects into one column. But I’m famous around Xconomy for my inability to say anything briefly. If 800 words are good, then 1,600 words are even better—that’s my motto. The point being … Continue reading “Put Yourself On the Map, Build a Virtual House: Seven Projects to Stretch Your Digital Wings, Part Three”
“It’s All Here,” Massachusetts State Government Says in Business-Expansion Campaign
At Akamai headquarters in Cambridge, MA, today, state officials took the wraps off a cross-media campaign intended to promote Massachusetts as a place to study, live, work, vacation, or grow a business. The new website for the campaign—themed “It’s All Here“—brings together resources for entrepreneurs considering starting their companies in Massachusetts, students looking for jobs … Continue reading ““It’s All Here,” Massachusetts State Government Says in Business-Expansion Campaign”
Google-Brightcove Acquisition Rumors Surface, Get Sunk
A report today that Google is in talks to acquire Cambridge, MA-based video hosting company Brightcove met with curt no-comment reactions from both companies, and has been flatly contradicted by one analyst. The report, which surfaced on Twitter Wednesday afternoon, came from Mark Glaser, a San Francisco-based freelance technology writer who is also executive editor … Continue reading “Google-Brightcove Acquisition Rumors Surface, Get Sunk”
New Speech Recognition Engine Under the Hood at Vlingo; Startup Dumps IBM and Nuance for AT&T
Vlingo, the Cambridge, MA-based startup that makes a suite of speech-to-text applications used by millions of iPhone, BlackBerry, and Nokia mobile device owners, is about to get a brain transplant of sorts. It said today that it will largely abandon a core speech-recognition engine developed by IBM and maintained by Nuance Communications in favor of … Continue reading “New Speech Recognition Engine Under the Hood at Vlingo; Startup Dumps IBM and Nuance for AT&T”
Nimbit’s MyStore Lets Bands Tap the Power of Facebook to Promote Music and Merchandise
It’s not getting any easier to write and perform great music. But for up-and-coming artists, it is getting easier to build a fan base—especially if they can get their fans to do part of the work for them. That’s the idea behind MyStore, a new Facebook application launched last week by Framingham, MA-based Nimbit. The … Continue reading “Nimbit’s MyStore Lets Bands Tap the Power of Facebook to Promote Music and Merchandise”
Video Games Add $2 Billion to Massachusetts Economy, Tech Group Says
Massachusetts “digital gaming” companies have total revenues exceeding $2 billion, according to a survey being released today by the Mass Technology Leadership Council. And those companies are hiring aggressively, with plans to increase their head counts by an average of 20 percent in 2009, the survey found. The gaming industry employs roughly 1,200 people across … Continue reading “Video Games Add $2 Billion to Massachusetts Economy, Tech Group Says”
Vivox, Bringer of Voice to Virtual Worlds, Strikes Major Deal with Electronic Arts
For a long time, Second Life was stuck in the cyber equivalent of the silent-movie era: people communicated by typing, and their words showed up in little thought bubbles above their avatars’ heads. All of that changed drastically around 2007, when Linden Lab, the company behind Second Life, hired an obscure outfit called Vivox to … Continue reading “Vivox, Bringer of Voice to Virtual Worlds, Strikes Major Deal with Electronic Arts”