Category: National

BSX Meets With Much Approval, Biogen and Icahn Set the (Showdown) Date, Fate’s Fate Revealed, Win Free Stuff, & More Life Sciences News

Each week I round up the latest news from the New England life sciences cluster, but this week I also want to offer you, gentle reader, the opportunity to share your views on the cluster, as part of a survey we’re helping PricewaterhouseCoopers conduct. Participating in the survey is a great chance to help key … Continue reading “BSX Meets With Much Approval, Biogen and Icahn Set the (Showdown) Date, Fate’s Fate Revealed, Win Free Stuff, & More Life Sciences News”

An Elegy for the Multimedia CD-ROM Stars

On balance, I’m a fan of all things Web. But every successful new medium disrupts or transforms the media that came before—just as the movies killed vaudeville, TV killed episodic radio, MP3s are upending the music industry, and Netflix is killing the neighborhood video store—and it’s important to recognize the value that can be lost … Continue reading “An Elegy for the Multimedia CD-ROM Stars”

Who Knew? Take 2: More Strange-But-True Details of Boston’s Innovation Leaders

Personal insights. Conversation starters. Gossip. Whatever the excuse, it’s high time for the second installment in Xconomy’s Who Knew? series, our wildly popular roundup of little-known, offbeat facts about the New England innovation community (and a few outside innovators with ties to the local scene). In this installment, you’ll learn who runs his own indoor … Continue reading “Who Knew? Take 2: More Strange-But-True Details of Boston’s Innovation Leaders”

Turn Your HDTV into a Digital Art Canvas

You no longer need to be a multi-billionaire to have large-scale digital art in your home. When Bill Gates built his 40,000-square-foot mansion on Lake Washington in the early 1990s, one of the most talked-about features was a 22-foot-wide, rear-projection video wall in the reception hall, showing digitized versions of fine art, historic photographs, and … Continue reading “Turn Your HDTV into a Digital Art Canvas”

The Coolest Tools for Trawling & Tracking the Web

Ahh, Boston in springtime. Duck boat armadas on the Charles. The vinegary smell of the wood-chip mulch landscapers spread everywhere. Tow trucks hauling away cars so that street sweepers can get at the dead leaves accumulating since October. A guy on a recumbent bike pulling a train of three skateboarders along the Esplanade. I could … Continue reading “The Coolest Tools for Trawling & Tracking the Web”

Twist of Fate—How A Band of VCs Recruited a Scientific Dream Team to Control Our Cells’ Destinies

“Like all VCs,” Amir Nashat is saying, “we come late to the story.” Nashat is talking about the formation of Fate Therapeutics, and in one sense what he’s saying is true. Venture capitalists bankroll, advise, strengthen, and help grow companies built around other people’s innovations—and so the story of even a very early stage startup … Continue reading “Twist of Fate—How A Band of VCs Recruited a Scientific Dream Team to Control Our Cells’ Destinies”

Second Down, Ten Yards to Go for Matchmine

When we first wrote about Needham, MA-based Matchmine last September, the Kraft Group spinoff had just introduced its MatchKey “portable preferences” system, which is designed to put an end to the fragmented state of recommendation systems on the Web. Right now, every online retailer, video rental site, or music site you visit—be it Amazon, Netflix, … Continue reading “Second Down, Ten Yards to Go for Matchmine”

Two Local Startups Launch Mobile Photo-sharing Networks for the Masses

If you snap photos with your camera phone, you probably mean to share them eventually. But if you’re like 75 percent of camera phone owners surveyed by Ontela, a Seattle mobile imaging firm, those pictures are still sitting in your phone’s memory, because you’ve never succeeded at transferring them to your PC, or a photo … Continue reading “Two Local Startups Launch Mobile Photo-sharing Networks for the Masses”

Reinventing Our Visual World, Pixel By Pixel

Every week I come across news items, tech trends, and useful gadgets and services that I know Xconomy’s readers would find interesting, but that don’t fit with our usual lineup of hyperlocal news stories about Boston’s innovation scene. To create an outlet for such random finds—and, frankly, to get me off Bob and Rebecca’s backs … Continue reading “Reinventing Our Visual World, Pixel By Pixel”

Povo Lets Residents Say What’s Best and Worst About Boston, Block by Block

Mix one cup of Wikipedia with one cup of Google Maps, add a generous dollop of MIT-bred geekdom, and bake for about 14 months. Serves 600,000. The confection in question is Povo.com, a user-editable online community directory that debuted in Boston last week. A project of Boston-based Arts Alliance Labs, a combination venture capital firm … Continue reading “Povo Lets Residents Say What’s Best and Worst About Boston, Block by Block”

PowerPoint to the People

A 2001 New Yorker essay entitled “Absolute PowerPoint” contained the stunning claim that over 30 million PowerPoint presentations were being given every day. The article attributed this statistic to Microsoft; it did not say how the company gathered the data. But whatever the actual prevalence of PowerPoint in 2001, it’s surely even greater now, given … Continue reading “PowerPoint to the People”

IDG Ventures Boston is Now Flybridge Capital Partners; Clearing Up “Brand Confusion”

Update, 4/18/08: Boston Globe columnist Scott Kirsner spoke with Greeley and with IDG’s Pat McGovern and got more background information about the name change and Flybridge’s new direction. — Local early stage venture capital firm IDG Ventures Boston has a new name and twice as much money to put behind it. The company announced today … Continue reading “IDG Ventures Boston is Now Flybridge Capital Partners; Clearing Up “Brand Confusion””

WorldWinner Helps Keep Boston in the Game of Casual Games

Poor Flo. She’s the only hostess at the diner. So she has to seat the people coming in the door, serve them coffee, take their orders, seat more people, serve the first table’s order, pour more coffee, take more orders, seat more people before they get impatient, take dessert orders, clear tables…and, if she’s lucky, … Continue reading “WorldWinner Helps Keep Boston in the Game of Casual Games”

PeopleCube Says Office Scheduling Software Can Slow Global Warming

Here’s a new excuse for staying at home on a workday: You may be helping to reduce your company’s carbon footprint. Framingham, MA-based PeopleCube makes scheduling software that’s used for everything from deploying tugboats in Seattle Harbor to sending Metropolitan Life insurance agents out to meet prospects. About five years ago, according to CEO John … Continue reading “PeopleCube Says Office Scheduling Software Can Slow Global Warming”

The Greater Boston Internet Video Cluster

Boston may take a back seat to Los Angeles and New York as a locus for TV, film, and video production, but it’s front and center when it comes to the array of technologies that go into publishing and monetizing video content on the Internet. Not so long ago, video lovers were pretty much limited … Continue reading “The Greater Boston Internet Video Cluster”

.406 Ventures Caps First Fund at $167 Million; Focused on Massachusetts IT Firms

Dan Primack of Private Equity Hub is reporting today that .406 Ventures, the Boston-based early stage venture capital firm founded in 2005 by local entrepreneurs Maria Cirino, Larry Begley, and Liam Donohue, has finished raising its first investment fund. The firm gathered $167 million altogether, mostly from institutional investors such as Parish Capital. Primack (one … Continue reading “.406 Ventures Caps First Fund at $167 Million; Focused on Massachusetts IT Firms”

Universities: An Entrepreneur’s Ecosystem

Universities offer a thriving ecosystem that lends itself particularly well to entrepreneurship among students, faculty, and staff. My belief in the ability of the institution of higher education to foster entrepreneurship comes first hand from my experiences as a student entrepreneur at the University of Toronto, as well as my work with Young Inventors International, … Continue reading “Universities: An Entrepreneur’s Ecosystem”

3Com Left at the Altar, EMC’s Head in the Cloud, Let There Be LEDs, and Other News

Bob and Rebecca both went on vacation last week, but local newsmakers didn’t. I did my best to keep on top of the business-and-technology headlines, with some help from a terrific freelancer, Neil Savage; here’s a look back at the bounty. —Pogo Jet, a Chicopee, MA-based regional airline planning to fly very light jets like … Continue reading “3Com Left at the Altar, EMC’s Head in the Cloud, Let There Be LEDs, and Other News”

EMC Creates Cloud Computing Division, Hires Former Microsoft Exec to Lead It; Oh, They Bought His Startup, Too

There’s a term of art in journalism called “burying the lede.” It means taking the reader on a pleasant, diverting stroll for a few paragraphs before getting to the real news. That’s what Hopkinton, MA-based EMC (NYSE: [[ticker:EMC]]) did in spades in a late-afternoon press release today. The announcement is ostensibly about EMC’s all-cash acquisition … Continue reading “EMC Creates Cloud Computing Division, Hires Former Microsoft Exec to Lead It; Oh, They Bought His Startup, Too”

To Get Windows Mobile into Enterprises, Microsoft Turns to Boston Software Veteran

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer is the kind of guy who can start a company with a single phone call. And when Ballmer called Mort Rosenthal in early 2007, he knew exactly what he wanted: a new company that would help Microsoft’s biggest customers in industries like financial services, health care, and professional services start seeing … Continue reading “To Get Windows Mobile into Enterprises, Microsoft Turns to Boston Software Veteran”

EMC Soaring Into the Cloud (Computing)—the Question is When, Not If

Cloud computing has put the wind in the IT industry’s sails lately. It seems that there are as many interpretations of what the term means as there are clouds in the sky. But basically it’s the idea that truly large-scale computing power—from software applications to storage and information management services—will exist out there on the … Continue reading “EMC Soaring Into the Cloud (Computing)—the Question is When, Not If”

“An Incredible Intellectual Environment”—Research VP Rick Rashid on Microsoft’s New Cambridge Lab

Microsoft announced yesterday that by July Cambridge, MA, will be home to the fifth R&D outpost outside the company’s Redmond, WA, headquarters, joining existing Microsoft Research facilities in Silicon Valley, Beijing, China, Cambridge, England, and Bangalore, India. The new lab, to be located at One Memorial Drive adjacent to the MIT campus and led by … Continue reading ““An Incredible Intellectual Environment”—Research VP Rick Rashid on Microsoft’s New Cambridge Lab”

MIT Teams With Italian Energy Giant, Elixir Postpones Its IPO, Biogen Idec Will Buy or Be Bought, & More

It’s a little bit of an odd week, with the Monday holiday and all the last-minute preparations for last night’s AWESOME battle of the bands (more on that soon), so I’m rounding up last week’s deals a little later than usual. The bonus is you get the first part of this week’s action as well. … Continue reading “MIT Teams With Italian Energy Giant, Elixir Postpones Its IPO, Biogen Idec Will Buy or Be Bought, & More”

Microsoft Passed Over Cambridge Enterprise Search Firm Endeca Before Acquiring Norway’s Fast

A Microsoft product manager says the software giant evaluated several companies selling advanced search tools for businesses, including Cambridge, MA, startup Endeca, before deciding to offer $1.23 billion for Fast Search & Transfer of Oslo, Norway, which has a 200-employee outpost in Needham, MA. But that may be just as well for Endeca, in light … Continue reading “Microsoft Passed Over Cambridge Enterprise Search Firm Endeca Before Acquiring Norway’s Fast”

InCytu’s Betting that On-the-Spot Body Repair Will Succeed Where Traditional Tissue Engineering Has Not

With its aim of growing replacements for injured or ailing body parts, tissue engineering is a field that at first seemed spectacularly promising. (Anyone remember the mouse with a human ear growing on its back?) But it has ended up being a bit of a boondoggle. Although researchers have made important scientific advances in areas … Continue reading “InCytu’s Betting that On-the-Spot Body Repair Will Succeed Where Traditional Tissue Engineering Has Not”

EMC, Cubist, and Others Do Some Last-Minute Shopping, Dyax Readies for an Offering, Millennium Sees a Payday, and More

It’s been relatively quiet since last we rounded up (on Christmas Eve), but a few local tech companies managed to ink a deal or two—mainly acquisitions—in the waning hours of 2007. —Dyax (NASDAQ: [[ticker:DYAX]]) filed a shelf registration statement that, when declared effective by the SEC, will give the Cambridge, MA-based biotech the ability to … Continue reading “EMC, Cubist, and Others Do Some Last-Minute Shopping, Dyax Readies for an Offering, Millennium Sees a Payday, and More”

You Get What You Celebrate

People think we have an education crisis, and that fixing some or all of the elements of “supply”—more teachers, more computers, more books, more standards, more tests, etc.— will solve the problem. My view is that we don’t have an education crisis, and we don’t have a supply crisis—we have a “demand” crisis. We need … Continue reading “You Get What You Celebrate”

Harvard’s Brock Reeve Sizes up the Prospects for Stem Cells in 2008 and Beyond

2007 has been an outstanding year for stem cells—those much-ballyhooed cells with the ability to develop into numerous tissues in the body and ultimately, researchers hope, repair the damage in ailments such as Parkinson’s disease or spinal cord injury. Scientific papers have been flying fast and furious, but which of the year’s developments are the … Continue reading “Harvard’s Brock Reeve Sizes up the Prospects for Stem Cells in 2008 and Beyond”

Microsoft Delivers Surprise Early Challenge to VMware

We’re all used to hearing from Microsoft (NASDAQ: [[ticker:MSFT]]) that big software releases will come later than promised, so it was a bit of a shock yesterday when the company said its “Hyper-V” virtualization technology—a part of Windows Server 2008 originally expected early next year—is ready for evaluation now. The news took some of the … Continue reading “Microsoft Delivers Surprise Early Challenge to VMware”

Microsoft Cambridge Lab Getting into Gear—Core Hires Expected Soon

Reed Sturtevant is building a Microsoft development lab and innovation group here in Cambridge, but I caught up with him in Redmond, WA. I gather the former Eons chief technology officer and local tech legend has logged a lot of miles between Seattle and Boston since being plucked away from Eons in late September. And, … Continue reading “Microsoft Cambridge Lab Getting into Gear—Core Hires Expected Soon”

Amazon Kindle: One Very Small Step for E-Books

An “electronic paper” screen created by Cambridge’s E Ink is the heart of the new Amazon Kindle e-book reading device, introduced yesterday amidst grand pronouncements about the beginning of a new era of electronic book publishing and reading. “This is the future of reading. It will be everywhere,” said business writer Michael Lewis, who ought … Continue reading “Amazon Kindle: One Very Small Step for E-Books”

Imprivata: Working Toward a One-Password World

If you think you’re drowning in computer passwords, consider the plight of some doctors today. Many medical offices have a separate computer in each exam room, with several databases and other programs running on each machine. Programs containing patient data must be password-protected, and one study found that to access this data, some doctors had … Continue reading “Imprivata: Working Toward a One-Password World”

The Exponential Economy

A decade ago, economists and investors began referring to the “New Economy” to describe the revolution in economic affairs that they expected the Internet and other computer technologies would launch. Even at the time, it wasn’t clear what exactly was so new about the New Economy that it would suspend the conventional laws of economics. … Continue reading “The Exponential Economy”

Why Is It So Hard For Innovators to Keep It Simple?

I’m just back from Providence, Rhode Island, and a stimulating two days co-hosting BIF-3, the third annual summit of the Business Innovation Factory. Presenter after presenter, from all walks of life, told remarkable stories about reinventing a police department, rethinking national security, even redesigning the lowly nail, to make it more resistant to hurricanes. If … Continue reading “Why Is It So Hard For Innovators to Keep It Simple?”

Microsoft Hires Eons CTO to Start Lab Next Door to MIT

Microsoft has hired Eons chief technology officer and local software legend Reed Sturtevant to head a new development lab and innovation group that is expected to set up shop next door to the MIT campus. “That’s true,” said Sturtevant when I asked him about the lab in a telephone conversation this evening. “It’s starting Monday … Continue reading “Microsoft Hires Eons CTO to Start Lab Next Door to MIT”

Apple and Starbucks to Boston: Drop Dead (When it Comes to Music)

My, Apple makes life fun. Every week there’s something new to awe at, or argue about; something kindly or incredibly innovative that the company has done, and something crazy-making. Today I’m feeling grateful to Mr. Jobs for offering $100 in store credit to people like myself who bought the 8-gigabyte iPhone for $599 two months … Continue reading “Apple and Starbucks to Boston: Drop Dead (When it Comes to Music)”

Healionics Signs Deal To Make Components for Glaucoma Device in Dogs

First come dogs, then people—at least in the Pacific Northwest. Redmond, WA-based Healionics is announcing today that it has signed an agreement to manufacture and supply Chandler, AZ-based TR BioSurgical with bioengineered components for implants used in dogs with glaucoma. Healionics will provide TR BioSurgical with its bioengineered material, which will be incorporated into a … Continue reading “Healionics Signs Deal To Make Components for Glaucoma Device in Dogs”