7 more of the 183 incredible people in the Swamp Fox Community you want to know

Immediately upon registering to attend InnoVenture 2007, you'll be able to see everyone else that is registered. As of today, there are 183 incredible people you'll want to know in the Swamp Fox Community, which is growing daily.

Wilson McQueen
TETRAD Technologies and Cyclone Technologies
Pompano, FL

TETRAD Technologies Group, Inc. is a product development and commercialization company that is partnered with Cyclone Technologies LLLP. Cyclone is the R&D company for the Cyclone External Combustion Engine and IP holder. TETRAD will participate in the late-phase development of the Cyclone Engine and will bring it to market and manufacture the Cyclone Multi-fuel External Combustion Engine.

Shane Woody
InsituTec Inc
Charlotte, NC

Dr. Shane Woody graduated from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. He is a co-founder of InsituTec, a high tech start up company that focuses on precision motion and measurement. The company has received four SBIR’s Phase I & II awards. These grants included research for the MDA (fast steering mirrors), NIST (microprobes), NSF (self sensing tweezers) as well as industrial contracts.

Anthony Boccanfuso
University of South Carolina
Columbia, SC

As Director, Research and Economic Development for the University of South Carolina, Dr. Anthony Boccanfuso supports the research and economic development activities of the university. With the university’s increased focus on Future FuelsTM and related facilities, Tony has taken a leading role in growing these efforts.

Sudhir Panvelker
Roche Carolina Inc.
Florence, SC

Dr. Sudhir Panvelker is the Director of Manufacturing of Roche Carolina Inc. (RCI), a member of the Roche Pharmaceuticals group. Dr. Panvelker holds a Ph.D. in chemical engineering and has been with RCI since the company began its operations in Florence, SC in 1995.

Bernard Spielvogel
BoroScience International, Inc
Columbia, SC

I am an internationally recognized expert in boron chemistry with over 135 technical papers and over 50 patents. Founder of 5 high tech companies. Raised over $5million in SBIR awards. Academic positions:, professor of chemistry at Duke Univ; UNC,Chape Hill; NC State (Raleigh); Northern IL Univ.;Dalhousie Univ (Halifax,NS) Basic Research Grants administrator at Army Research Office, RTP,NC (20yrs)

Roy Hogsed
nuBridges LLC
Atlanta, GA

I currently serve as Executive Vice President of Sales for nuBridges overseeing all aspects of Sales. Prior to nuBridges, I was President / CEO at iSoft Corporation. Before iSoft Iworked in Executive Management with two software start up companies in the area of desktop security and data management. Prior to that I spent eleven years as Senior Vice President, Worldwide Sales.

Tony Prince
Frontier Capital Investments
Charlotte, NC

I was the founder and CEO of LURHQ, a leading provider of managed IT security services. Prior to working for LURHQ, I was a Consultant at Trusted Information Systems (TIS). I left TIS after the company's successful IPO to form LURHQ. I'm a cum laude graduate of the University of South Carolina and holds a BS in Computer Science.

If we unleashed this power, imagine the impact it would have on public education

Discussions about choice in public education generally focus the demand side. That is, choice provides parents in failing schools better options for their children.

The real power of school choice though is on the supply side. If we unleashed the power of teachers to be creative, imagine the impact it would have on public education. Imagine if like educator Cynde O'Rear all teachers could say:

I became the one who made classroom decisions concerning my students. I didn't have to be on the same page, using the same techniques, same books or same lessons as all the other teachers. I could be creative and spontaneous, depending on the students' interests.

In this way, I was allowed to try new approaches, to branch out and tackle more difficult and challenging teaching skills. I was allowed the freedom to grow, the room to make mistakes, to modify and adjust without hovering administrators evaluating me. In turn, this encouraged my students as well to take risks, to try new things and to accept a challenge.

If I needed help with an errant student, my principal sat down and discussed with me ways to "coach" that child, and that is a term that I have come to embrace with great affection.

My planning period was protected because my administration believed firmly that this is the most important time of my school day. Being prepared is, first and foremost, the prime building block to an effective educator.

But, mostly, my administration said to me: You are competent.

That statement empowers like no other.

Imagine how, if all teachers felt this way, education would be transformed.

Constraints breed creativity: Very Cool Rubikubism

My ADHD makes me anxious thinking of toying with one Rubik's cube, much less this. But this is very cool. I can't imagine having patience to actually do it.



I originally found this at Signal vs. Noise.

Great Place, Great People, Great Promise... blah, blah, blah

I was struck recently by the announcement of the City of Gastonia about the product of a seven-month research and creative development process to brand the city to attract new business, residents, tourists and shoppers. Here's what they came up with:

Gastonia: Great Place, Great People, Great Promise

What, do you reckon, took them seven months?

When they launched their branding initiative back in the summer, they established their objective: "The City of Gastonia wants to develop a strong message that accurately defines today’s Gastonia." The mayor observed, “Branding helps cities re-invent their identities, promote their greatest assets and be more identifiable to economic potentials.”

Rather than rigorously assessing how their targets of new business, residents, tourists and shoppers see Gastonia and tapping into what they find distinctive about the city, community leaders ended up with a statement that says more about how they would like to think about themselves. Few people are going to read their messaging and be rushing to Gastonia any time soon.

I'm reminded of the marketing maxim that, "It's not what you say about yourself, but what your customers say about you, that counts."

The Austin, TX Chamber of Commerce spent big bucks and came up with the tag line which is how they wanted to see themselves, "The Human Capitol." Of course, most people in and out of Austin know that city as "The Live Music Capital of the World." Live music attracts a lot more people to Austin than "Human Capitol" ever will.

After doing a little research, the city "found that Austin had more live music venues per capita than such music hotbeds as Nashville, Memphis, Los Angeles, Las Vegas or New York City." So ultimately the city adopted the tagline "The Live Music Capital of the World" because it is a distinctive claim that Austin can make and reflects the creative culture that community leaders want to promote that is much deeper than just music.

Great Place, Great People, Great Promise is chamber of commerce sloganeering. I'm not trying to beat up in Gastonia. We're all guilty of sloganeering.

What's the City of Gastonia's greatest asset that would entice you to visit, or even move and work there? That's the vision Gastonia needs to capture. In all our communities, that's the vision we need to capture.

6 of the 131 incredible people in the Swamp Fox Community you want to know

Immediately upon registering to attend InnoVenture 2007, you'll be able to see everyone else that is registered.

As of today, there are 131 incredible people you'll want to know in the Swamp Fox Community, which is growing daily. You do that by registering to attend InnoVenture.

Kathy Harris
Noro-Moseley Partners
Atlanta, GA

I began my career at KPMG and have spent the last 20 years in investment banking, mezzanine lending and venture capital. My venture career started in 2000 in Atlanta.

Jonathan Kane
Milliken & Company
Spartanburg, SC

Employed by Milliken & Co. since 1988 I have been engaged in cutting edge manufacturing operations, Process improvement, environmental initiatives, and spent the last ten years in leading business development teams. Currently I lead a team of technology and business development professionals whose objective is to significantly grow our presence in nonwovens.

Phil Noble
CIVISonline
Charleston, SC

Phil Noble is one of the top experts in the US and internationally on the use of the Internet in politics, public affairs, government and media. He is the founder of CIVISonine and its affiliate PoliticsOnline. Noble is a veteran of over 350 political campaigns and public affairs projects in 40 states and 30 countries and he has worked to elect the head of state in 15 countries.

Alan Liby
Oak Ridge National Laboratory
Oak Ridge, TN

Dr. Alan Liby is an Economic Development Manager at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and works with management and technical organizations, universities, and regional economic development organizations to develop and implement strategies to use ORNL resources to support new business creation and existing industry growth. He holds Metallurgical Engineer, MS and PhD degrees.

Robert (Bob) McMahan
State of North Carolina
Raleigh, NC

Dr. McMahan is the State Science and Technology Advisor for North Carolina, and the Executive Director of the North Carolina Office of Science and Technology in the Department of Commerce. In this role he acts as a Senior Advisor to the Governor, the Secretary of Commerce, the General Assembly, and the Boards of Science and Technology and Economic Development about science and technology matters.

Matthew Gevaert
CURF - Clemson University Research Foundation
Anderson, SC

Having developed an understanding of and skills in biomedical sciences and biotechnology (BS Chemistry; Ph.D. BioEngineering) I am now applying them for business purposes, commercializing Clemson University’s “bio” intellectual property portfolio via licenses to technology-based businesses, some of which are entrepreneurial start-ups created around the Clemson discovery.

A step in the right direction: SC Virtual Schools

The South Carolina Virtual Schools Program would give students greater flexibility to advance at their own pace by earning required graduation credits online, and would also allow them to take courses that wouldn’t normally be offered in their attendance zones, such as Advanced Placement or foreign languages.

This increased personalization of education is a big step in the right direction.

Very cool and elegant way to make a statistical point

This is a very cool and elegant way to make a statistical point.

This new series looks at contemporary American culture through the austere lens of statistics. Each image portrays a specific quantity of something: fifteen million sheets of office paper (five minutes of paper use); 106,000 aluminum cans (thirty seconds of can consumption) and so on. My hope is that images representing these quantities might have a different effect than the raw numbers alone, such as we find daily in articles and books. Statistics tend to feel abstract and anesthetizing, making it difficult to connect with and make meaning of 3.6 million SUV sales in one year, for example, or 2.3 million Americans in prison, or 426,000 cell phones discarded every day. This project visually examines these vast and bizarre measures of our society, in large intricately detailed prints assembled from thousands of smaller photographs.

This is why the decision can't be made by local school districts

State backs new science charter school. Greenville school board had denied it.

The state Board of Education overturned the Greenville County school board's decision to deny a charter for a science charter school that hopes to attract 400 of the district's top students.

The Greenville board said its denial was based on its belief that the proposed Greenville Science Charter School didn't have a sound financial plan and didn't demonstrate that it had enough community support.

"I did not see evidence that that was the case," said state board member Kristin Maguire of Clemson. "In fact, I saw the opposite of that."

Imagine that.

Swamp Fox Community up to 73 incredible people you want to know

Immediately upon registering to attend InnoVenture 2007, you'll be able to see everyone else that is registered.

As of today, there are 73 incredible people you'll want to know in the Swamp Fox Community, which is growing daily. You do that by registering to attend InnoVenture.

Is the Google Virtual Machine the future?

This is a very interesting blog post about the future of personal computing.

In my own personal experience, more and more of my time is spent on a Google application, be it the start-up menu I organize by life around, or my email client, or my personal calendar.

There is an interesting bifurcation in my world. The freelancers are increasingly using Google and open source applications. Enterprise users, that is corporations, universities, and governments, still rely on commercially licensed software, things like Microsoft and Oracle applications. It's only a matter of time before non commercially licensed applications penetrate the enterprise world too.

My bet is that the Google Virtual Machine is the future.

A very Swamp Foxy approach to business

I recently stumbled upon an online book, Getting Real, that promotes a very Swamp Foxy approach to business.

Getting real is less. Less mass, less software, less features, less paperwork, less of everything that's not essential (and most of what you think is essential actually isn't).

I love it.

Swamp Fox Community up to 37 incredible people you want to know

Last week, Swamp Fox launched an innovative online tool, so that immediately upon registering for InnoVenture you'll be able to see everyone else that is registered.

Jeremy Stipkala from Charleston said about the new system:

Let me congratulate you on a fantastic website!! It goes far beyond anything I have seen before. I get to meet everyone before I get there! You have added a ton of value to everyone's experience!

Jeremy's profile is:

A patent attorney, I lead Stipkala LLC, a proud sponsor of InnoVenture 2007. [Bless you Jeremy.] I earned my Ph.D. in Chemistry at Johns Hopkins University studying solar energy conversion using semiconductor nanoparticles. Then, I received my J.D. with High Honors from the George Washington University Law School. I worked eight years with a leading IP firm before launching Stipkala LLC.

There are 36 other incredible people you'll want to know in the Swamp Fox Community, which is growing daily. You do that by registering to attend InnoVenture.

I look forward to seeing you in March. Sparks will fly!

SC Business Review Question of the Week

I received a presentation from a friend at Ideation International recently, that had this quote:

With six billion people on the planet, it is safe to conclude that the majority of great ideas exist outside of your company.

There's no question that is true. So this week's question announced on the SC Business Review radio program is:

Where have you been able to successfully leverage a great idea of someone outside your organization so you both excelled?

We'll report a summary of your comments on the SC Business Review on Monday, February 12th.