Mass Innovation Nights kicked off the new year hosting the 46^th monthly meetup at the IBM Innovation Center in Waltham with a focus on tools for marketing pros . Every month ten companies bring new products to the event and the #MassInno community turns out to blog, tweet, post pictures and video, add product mentions to LinkedIn and Facebook statuses, and otherwise help spread the word.

To read more about the event check out Mass Innovation Night Founder, Bobbie Carlton's blog post, Kicking off a new year of innovation.

Looking for global entrepreneurs who want to build a smarter planet? Check out these videos from #IBMSmartCamp GEP Global Finals.

Check out and follow the IBM SmartCamp at http://ibmsmartcamp.com/

Join the Global Entrepreneur Program!!!

• Are you a privately help startup less than 5 years old?
• Are you activitely engaged in developing a software based product or service?
• Visit ibm.com/isv/startup and learn about the no charge benefits the IBM Global Entrepreneur program has to offer.

 

 

The Capital Network - http://www.thecapitalnetwork.org

 

 

 MassChallenge - http://masschallenge.org 

Tie Boston- https://boston.tie.org/

As a startup, do you wonder why you would want to become an IBM Global Entrepreneur Partner (GEP)? What does IBM offer other programs don’t?

First, amazing access to IBM the World leader with resources and technology.

GEP program that includes:

• Mentoring & Networking

• Access to no-charge-software

• Visibility to Smarter Planet Initiatives

• Ongoing Education & IBM insights

• Personalized touch points by IBM Relationship Managers assisting you on your Entrepreneurial road to success.

• Plus exclusive invites to key partner events

The Capital Network (TCN) Venture Fast Track Day June 18^th was one of those “exclusive GEP event invite” worth reporting about.

Who and what is TCN?

TCN’s mission: To fuel the success of entrepreneurs, to build our economy, and improve our quality of life by helping entrepreneurs fill their early stage funding gap. https://ibm.biz/BdxuLJ

Venture Fast Track Day was informative and packed schedule of activity.

15 IBM GEP’s attended the day’s event starting at 8:30 am. Many “walked away with invaluable information, shared by an amazing experts” on Venture funding nuances.

Topics Discussed:
Plan for funding: What Stage Is Your Business and What Are Your Options
Angel & Venture Term Sheets and Negotiation with an Investor
Entrepreneur-Advisor Matching Lunch Session
Maximizing Value through IP & a Case Study
Company Valuation and Metrics - Top Down or Bottom Up?
Pitching the plan and financial projections

The topics were laid out progressively for a startup at any stage to gain insights and knowledge from experts within the ecosystem. Experts included Jean Hammond – Member, Launchpad, Hub Angels, Golden Seeds and Jennifer Jordan – MassVentures, Golden Seeds.

The Entrepreneur-Advisor Matching Lunch session was an excellent way for startups to get very valuable feedback on their 60 second pitch. The combination of mentors/advisors and startups at the table provided a venue for the startups to gain advice and learn from other entrepreneurs’ experience.

There was a wealth of takeaways from just this one event.

Join IBM GEP and experience all the opportunities and advantages the program has to offer https://ibm.biz/BdxnAM !

Contact Mehjabin Kapasi mkapasi@us.ibm.com for information or questions.

List of @IBMWaltham events https://ibm.biz/BdxGQr

MassTLC held their annual unconference on Nov 1st at the Hynes Convention Center. Very well structured for a conference that is NOT at all about structure! My first time at the agenda creation and was thoroughly impressed by the energy, ideas and expertise all in one room. Within 45 mins of starting the agenda creation the boards were filled with ideas and presenters promising to be a very valuable day!

One of the sessions on mapping the healthcare big data spaces by Richard Dale. He facilitated a great conversation around consumers of big data, the users, plethora of data sources, exciting innovations and opportunities in this space.  IBM Watson was one of the innovations that sparked a good discussion in this area.
"Building Skills in the Ecosystem" led by Kelly Smith and Patty Orben of IBM Developerworks helped uncover the different ways people are using to train themselves or their employees in the tech skills. "You need to know what you don't know!". Common theme for the discussion was how important it is to get the skills development to begin really early, even as early as K-5!

"Partnering with Strategics" session made startups think about how they should be asking the hard questions about their strategic partnerships. What is the win for the large corporation so you align well to get the maximum benefit? Eric Apse and Lisa from IBM Venture capital group helped facilitate that discussion to share examples of how this is done with IBM global entrepreneur partners.

"Going Global" brought together ideas and insights on what kind of challenges do businesses face when trying to expand globally...be it cultural, economical or political. Interesting perspectives from students, entrepreneurs, influencers on how important it is to be leveraging local ecosystems, no matter where you are in the world...coz frankly you can't do this alone!

Along with the amazing energy of audience throughout the day, there was also incredible energy from different IBMers who came together for this event. The IBM exhibitor table also brought together our IBM colleagues from developerWorks, Rational, General Business(GB), Netezza and Ecosystem Development.

Through the various levels of expertise represented at the booth we were able to touch entrepreneurs, developers, business owners and IT Practitioners. Luis Cuneo from GB Market Development enjoyed being part of the creative energy at the unconference and realized that through this effort we have been successful in creating whole new brand awareness of IBM in the developer community.

As if all this excitement was not enough.....there was a constant drumbeat of seasoned entrepreneurs mentoring new and upcoming startups! A perfect showcase of how the community gives back in the form of experiences, feedback and insights to nurture the next generation of startups. Janet Powers, CEO of Women's Toolbox and an IBM Business Partner, was one of the mentors at the event. She was able to provider her experience and expertise to help this new breed of startups. In addition she also facilitated a session on "How to publish your blog on major media" - one of the hot topics of today.

Overall a very well executed event which resulted in a multitude of connections on many different levels!
 

We were honored on Tuesday this week to participate in a high energy panel discussion with women entrepreneurs hosted by WPT at the Canadian Consulate in NY. The 2-day mini-conference is targeting women owned startups from Canada looking to build strategic relationships across the border, and importantly with each other. For many of them -- they were meeting for the first time in NYC :) .

Women Powering Technology (WPT) is an organization created to inspire, support, elevate and empower women in technology personally, professionally and together as a community. Angelique Mohring - CEO of GainX was the catalyst in getting the organizations and startups to come together.

The Canadian Consulate in NY (@CanadaNY) fosters innovation within Canada and globally. We have had the privilege to work with the Canadian Technology Accelerator program at the Canadian Consulate in Boston. It was a wonderful opportunity to connect with the folks in NY as well.

The Deputy Consulate General of Canada - Heidi Kutz, leveraging the attendees' social media footprint eloquently described the women, their roles and aspirations, in this way,

• Roles  - "Business women, CEOs, founders, coaches, epidemiologists, solution architects, professional mediators, best overall oktoberfest family and cultural events organizers, two of them served as strategic positions in male dominated corporation"
• Things that value most to them - "Aspire to passion in innovation, volunteering and promoting community engagement. Optimistic and upto the challenge"
• Things they are good at  - "Scale and deliberate innovation. Advance contiuous process improvement championships. Take clients from concept to go live with confidence and do this seamlessly"

She ended this great introduction with this great quote - "in this market who you know is as important as what you know! ".

IBM - Eric Apse from IBM Venture Capital Group and Joe Perry from East Region Innovation Center Ecosystem were part of an interesting panel to discuss the value of partnerships for startups.

Some key insights from them:

• Building Ecosystems and then leveraging those relationships to understand need for skills and extending your reach
• Its really about value that each partnership brings. Both parties should benefit from the relationship. Companies that are most successful that understand their market well. Establishing successful partnership is understanding and defining value that both orgs need to demonstrate success.
• One of the strengths of IBM - all resources that we have to offer. One of the challenges of IBM - all resources that we have to offer. This is where our IBM Global Entrepreneur Program provides access to resources to help ease navigating the IBM portfolio to determine the exact fit.
• How do you maintain a cadence of remaining innovative? IBM has acquired over 100 companies over the last decade. We are always redefining ourselves at every stage and come out on top. IBM has transformed itself based on what's happening in technology and also what's happening in society on a whole. Everytime we have a new CEO...its always been a push to say focus on the customer and adapt accordingly. Same for building strategic relationships based on what the customer wants.

Some of the Startups at the Conference:

Charity Republic

Charity Republic creates efficiencies in an education system that is still predominantly paper-based. Charity Republic recently launched Hour Republic, an online and smartphone solution that helps students easily track their volunteer and co-op (work placement) activities, find volunteer opportunities in the community that are of interest to them, and share their volunteer experiences with fellow students.

Plasticity

Plasticity is SaaS-based employee engagement software based on the study of Neuroscience.

RENOMii

RENOMii is Cloud based project management software for contractors & homeowners.

Tacit innovations

Tacit Innovations is fast growing Canadian technology company recognized for transforming the way restaurants engage and service their customers.

ODScore

ODScore has unique, proven performance technology and methods for implementing performance measurement, hiring, learning, succession, goal attainment and mentoring.

Style ID

StyleID is a style identifier that cross references your favourite movies, music videos, television & award  shows to help consumers identify the designer of items worn, used or featured.

MadHatter

Marketing meets Tech:
Mobile applications, web apps, websites, content management systems, search engine optimization, marketing strategy, marketing technology, marketing automation ...

We ended the discussion by going around the table and everyone listing an example of a business pitfall that startups can learn from: .

• partnering with large corporations you need to know you have to always sell
• always know your exit strategy. Make sure one person in your company has complete financial reign and understands where you want to go with your business
• learn the financial aspects
• make sure you have the right skills in the right place
• you need to know the answer to "what success looks like"

The panel discussion was followed by 6 one-on-one sessions with the startups and IBM. The startups received advice on their pitches, investment, the challenges of being a women in tech, and so on. The women took lessons on how to make their value proposition concise and always include proof points and customer stories to help tell their story.

All in all the day was packed with entrepreneurial energy all around!

For the first time, IBM will open up Watson as a development platform in the Cloud to spur innovation and fuel a new ecosystem of entrepreneurial software app providers who will bring forward a new generation of applications infused with Watson's cognitive computing intelligence.

Learn more about this and more here: https://www.ibm.com/developerworks/community/blogs/industry-solution-partners/entry/put_the_power_of_watson_behind_your_apps?lang=en

We are proud to announce that IBM is enhancing its Massachusetts presence with a new IBM Client Center in Cambridge.  The new IBM Client Center in Cambridge stands as a firm symbol of IBM's commitment to expand its Massachusetts based ecosystem and drive local innovation. Additionally, we are hopeful that the centers' proximity to Boston, leading academic institutions, a multitude of IT Companies and businesses, as well as over 20 venture capital firms, startup accelerators and incubators will open many new doors for networking and partnership opportunity.  We will continue to partner with the Mass Lab Software Executive Briefing Center and leverage both locations to serve our partners and clients.

Learn more about the new center here - http://ibm.co/1bfx88M and please share within your network.

We are looking to do a formal grand opening in early Q2.

Co-located in the new Client Center:

IBM Innovation Center
IBM Technical Exploration Center
IBM Social Center for Research & Visualization of Deep Analytics,
IBM Interactive
IBM Institute for Business Value
The IBM Human Ability and Accessibility Center.

We look forward to seeing you here soon!

On Feb 4th 2014 IBM will be hosting an event called "Connecting Companies with Capital" at our new location in Cambridge MA. The day is part of IBM Entrepreneur Week with a series of worldwide events happening throughout the week.

Register today : https://ibm.biz/Feb4-Cambridge

Livestream link to the event: https://ibm.biz/BdRfxR

Here is a glimpse into the agenda. (Times subject to change)

Bobbie Carlton, Co-Founder of MassInnovation Nights Bobbie is an award-winning marketing, PR and social media professional who is the co-founder of Innovation Nights LLC, a network of free monthly product launch parties and networking events powered entirely by social media. She teaches classes in social media marketing, consults with small businesses and individuals on social networking and social media marketing, and works with companies who are looking to access the Boston region entrepreneurial and innovation community.

Glenn Champagne is an active angel investor and has served on the board of directors of leading edge Boston based angel investment group Launchpad Venture Group from 2004 through 2011. Glenn has lead the successful due diligence on several portfolio companies and continues to serve on the screening committee. Over the last 11 years Launchpad Venture Group has made nearly 40 investments, investing over $12MM in companies that in turn have gone on to raise over $200MM of venture capital. In that time, Launchpad Venture Group grew from approximately 20 to 80+ members.

Jack Danahy is the original founder and CEO of two successful security software companies; Qiave Technologies, acquired by Watchguard Technologies in 2000, and Ounce Labs, acquired by IBM in July of 2009.Through his current firm, Danahy Advisors, Jack works as a mentor and advisor to early stage security companies while continuing to develop advanced security strategies for private industry and public sector clients.Jack is a national speaker and writer on topics of computer network and data security, and holds six patents in a variety of security technologies.   He has been featured in online, print, and television media on topics of cyber attacks and cyber defense, and has contributed to legislation on cybersecurity in both the US House and Senate.  Jack volunteers his time to industry and national security groups in the areas of data privacy, cyberthreats, and critical infrastructure protection, and he is a Computerworld Laureate and a distinguished fellow at the Ponemon Institute.

Robert DeNoble, Senior Healthcare Executive and Thought leader- Bob served as President/CEO of the Marino Center for Integrative Health, President/CEO of Applied Management Systems, Senior Manager/Director in the healthcare consulting practice at KPMG, and in senior executive positions at several major hospitals. Bob is currently serving in a senior leadership capacity at ConnectedVisits, a pioneer in the burgeoning telemedicine/telehealth field and serves as an advisor to several innovative healthcare companies.

Michael Duffy is a Professional CEO with a long history of creating winning teams and valuable technology companies. Extraordinary ability to develop, refine, and execute strategy while nurturing a culture that attracts, develops and retains exceptional people.Based on his leadership as President and CEO, OpenPages became the leading provider of GRC solutions for the enterprise, and achieved record growth and a global market presence.This outstanding performance and market leading position resulted in IBM's acquisition of OpenPages in 2010. In 2007 Michael was awarded he prestigious Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year award. Prior to OpenPages, Michael served as general manager of Intel's wide area networking business. Previous to that, he was senior vice president of worldwide sales, marketing, and services at Shiva Corporation, which was acquired by Intel in 1998. Michael also served in leadership positions as GTE Internetworking, as well as Software 2000, a provider of financial and human resource applications for the AS/400 platform. Michael received a B.S. degree in Accountancy from Bentley College.

David Fogel is Managing Director of Swifton CFOs LLC, an outsourced CFO firm that provides emerging businesses with cost-effective and strategic financial leadership. David's expertise lies in constructing a reliable financial framework to attract funding, which is a valuable guide for his clients' continued growth. As a contributor to the ongoing development of greater Boston's entrepreneurial ecosystem, in the last year alone he has been an active presenter and panelist with MassChallenge, CleanTech Open, WPI Venture Forum, McCarter English Series on Entrepreneurship, Harvard Entrepreneurship Conference, 128 Innovation Capital Group, MIT Enterprise Forum Smart Start Program, Startup Leadership, The Capital Network and the MIT Entrepreneurial Teams (MIT e-Teams). He is also an active member of Mass TLC, MassMedic, SBANE, Beacon Angels, TiE Angels and Mass Medical Angels.   David is Adjunct Instructor of Finance and Accounting in the MBA program at Worcester Polytechnic Institute and the Undergraduate program at Becker College.  David is also a licensed Certified Public Accountant (CPA). David has a BS from Miami University (Ohio), and a MBA from the University of Cincinnati.

Ashifi Gogo, Founder of Sproxil Ashifi founded Sproxil® in 2008 and serves as the company's Chief Executive Officer. Under his leadership, Sproxil developed its award-winning Mobile Product Authentication™ (MPA™) technology that has been used over two million times (as of June 2012) by consumers to verify medication authenticity. An expert in end-consumer authentication technologies, Ashifi is Six Sigma Black Belt certified in Good Manufacturing Practice and Continuous Process Improvement. Ashifi holds one US Patent and is also a named inventor on two published US and foreign patent applications.

Jeremy Halpern, is a Partner and the Director of Business Development for the Emerging Companies Group.  Jeremy’s practice focuses on emerging companies, private equity, venture capital and angel financing transactions, mergers and acquisitions, executive and team compensation matters, and general start-up support. Jeremy works primarily with companies, investors, strategic partners and executives in technology, life sciences and food & beverage.Concurrently, Jeremy is an angel investor and serves on the Boards of MassVentures, a micro venture capital firm supported by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, The Capital Network, a Boston based non-profit serving entrepreneurs, and Pintley, a MassChallenge 2011 Finalist company providing marketing solutions to the craft brewing industry. Jeremy received his B.A., summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa, from the University of California, Berkeley, and his J.D. from the University of California at Los Angeles. Prior to law school, Jeremy spent two years as the Executive Chairman of a concert and special events production company. Jeremy is a member of or participates at Launchpad Venture Group, TiE-Angels, Boston Harbor Angels, Golden Seeds, MassChallenge, Web Innovators Group, MassTLC, Mobile Mondays, M2D2, MTTC, Tufts $100k Competition, MedTech Ignite, Sandbox and The Capital Network.

Kelley Hilborn is the Community Development Director for SoftLayer and manages Community Development as well as Catalyst operations in the eastern region of the US, Canada, and Latin America. Kelley also serves as the technical liaison between SoftLayer and technology-based startup companies everywhere. Prior to joining SoftLayer, Kelley spent 19 years in Information Technology where he managed support, infrastructure, administration, VoIP, networking, and security for companies such as Interstate Batteries, Time Warner, and The Planet. Though not a programmer, Kelley served as the COO and CTO of two startups prior to running Community Development and currently serves as a mentor and CTO advisor to multiple startups.

Alex Homsi

Mitch Lapidus is a business growth expert leading firms toward improved revenue and profits from a sales, marketing, and operations perspective.  He is currently in a leadership position within a former division of Citigroup based in Israel called Ness Technologies that was divested to The Rohatyn Group (Venture Capital firm) due to recent Dodd Frank rulings. As a Vice President supporting many of Ness’ global Fortune 500 relationships such as Citigroup, American Express, and Disney, Mitch travels extensively globally.  Mitch is a serial entrepreneur and has founded and sold successful businesses across media, consumer products, healthcare, technology hardware / software / services, and real estate-related verticals and has significant active equity positions in several firms today where he lends his expertise.Mitch has been both a professional motivational speaker, alumni adjunct mentor for Rutgers’ MBA Business program, and management consultant.  He has held several senior executive leadership positions in firms including NEC Corporation of America, Dun & Bradstreet, and multiple IBM Business Partners. Helping entrepreneurs at every stage of their business lifecycle is the core to what Mitch Lapidus does, and he has been connected closely to IBM and its market offerings for more than a decade.

Ben Littauer is an experienced technologist with business savvy and a track record of success.  He has over 25 years’ experience in Internet technologies as an engineer, manager, entrepreneur, analyst, and management consultant. Active angel investor and mentor to entrepreneurs. Strong pragmatic business focus. Solution not technology oriented. Deep understanding of a wide variety of Internet technologies and their application. Excellent communication skills, written and oral.  Experienced presenting at the CxO level.  Able to translate from geek-speak to business parlance and back again. Founder, President, and CTO of Baranof Software 1990 – 1997. Self-funded, profitable from year two. Sold to Tally Systems.Technology Strategist in health care. Industry analyst.

Richard Lucash has long been active in the Boston/Cambridge angel community and is the co-founder of two angel groups: SideCar Angels (www.sidecarangels.com), a unique organization focused on syndication, and LaunchPad Venture Group, for which he also served as a director.  He currently co-leads SideCar with Jeffrey Stoler.  Richard acts as an advisory board member and mentor to entrepreneurial companies.  He has had an extensive career as an attorney concentrating on emerging technology and other entrepreneurial companies, and investors in those companies.  Richard holds an AV® Preeminent TM (highest) rating for attorneys from Martindale-Hubbell.  He holds a J.D. from the Cornell Law School, and an undergraduate degree in Physics from M.I.T.

Jess McLear - Jess is an angel investor and member of Launchpad Venture Group.  Her family has been investing in and mentoring start up companies for over 20 years in both Canada and the US.  Her portfolio companies fall into many sectors including manufacturing, IT, medical devices and consumer goods.She sits on the board or plays a role in a number of investments including Peach, 3Play Media, CPL as well as others.  She mentors at MassChallenge and is an advisor for TCN.

Norm Meisner is a principal in the Beta Fund, a $5M fund for investing in early stage companies in the greater Boston area. He has worked for nine startups as VP of sales or VP of business development, yielding five acquisitions and one IPO. These have included Ungermann-Bass (IPO), Synernetics (acquired by 3Com), Net2Net (acquired by Visual Networks), Connected (acquired by Iron Mountain) and Authentica (acquired by EMC). He has been an angel investor since 1999 and has invested in 35 early stage companies, of which 5 have yielded substantial positive exits (including SmartCells acquired by Merck, Synchronoss, which had an IPO, and Softricity, acquired by Microsoft.) and 20 are still currently active in various stages. He is a member of the Launchpad Venture Group. He is on the advisory board of The Capital Network, and has been a board member or board observer at several companies, focusing on overall strategic planning and sales and partnering strategies.

Laurisa Neuwirth is the Director of Entrepreneur Engagement for EdTechTimes.com and a shameless evangelist on behalf of the Greater Boston innovation economy. With a diverse background including software development, philanthropy and human capital, Laurisa blogs about technology disruptions in industries that are critical to our local economy. A founding member of EdTech Women Boston and the Boston chapter of Women on Boards 2020, Laurisa is an Innovation Award Mentor for the Smaller Business Association of New England and sit on the Board of Directors. You can follow her on twitter @LaurisaNeuwirth.

Panos Panay is a passionate entrepreneur and active startup mentor in the creative media space. As the founder of Sonicbids, he created the leading platform for bands to book gigs and market themselves online, building a subscriber network of 550,000 bands and 35,000 promoters from over 100 countries. He led the company as CEO for 13 years, from its inception until after its successful acquisition by Backstage LLC, in a deal backed by Guggenheim Partners. He writes weekly about startups and entrepreneurship for blogs and publications such as Huffington Post, Forbes, WSJ Accelerators and Fast Company; and guest lectures at universities including MIT Engineering, Boston University, Brown University, and Bentley College.

Nick Pappas has been working with early-stage technology companies for over 10 years, advising management teams and boards of directors on market expansion, capital raising and merger and acquisition strategies. Nick joined MassVentures in 2009 and is responsible for identifying investment opportunities and working closely with MassVentures’ portfolio companies. He currently manages MassVentures’ investments in Incentive Targeting, Ntirety, OwnerIQ, Harvest Automation, Courion, Segterra, Libboo, Vsnap and Clarity.

Janet Powers started The Womens toolbox following a successful corporate career at Fidelity Investments, where she was Vice President of Program Management. She served as a liaison between business and technology departments, sourcing and building technology solutions to solve the business problems of its internal and external customers. She was also part of a team that brought new products and services to the market. Earlier in her career, she worked for a global non-profit delivering health programs to expand opportunities for women and families. There she was responsible for educating the group’s regional representatives on how to use technology to run and report on local initiatives. Traveling internationally to deliver onsite training, she witnessed the challenges women face in developing countries. Today, Janet Powers has melded the two, helping corporations and small business owners leverage technology and practical advice for economic growth. She comes to the table with a solid understanding of the women’s market and a personal, deep felt commitment to its long term success.

Jon Prial specializes in marketing and strategy focusing on market management, go to market, and business development across broader eco-systems. Jon’s strong focus on corporate vision and communications, including social media, helps in driving business strategies. Jon brings 32 years of software marketing, technical and general management skills to Georgian. He led the marketing strategy and initial execution for IBMs entrée into the Linux market and held executive positions in sales, business development and marketing in IBM’s Pervasive Computing Division. Jon led the development of IBM’s Information on Demand strategy and also ran the Enterprise Content Management unit, driving the integration strategy and acquisition of FileNet Corporation. Jon is on the Board of Advisers for an early-stage software startup and is also an Adjunct Executive Professor in Northeastern University’s Executive Education program Georgian Partners is a growth equity firm investing in expansion stage Enterprise Software, Internet and Information companies that are exploiting Applied Analytics: the convergence of Cloud-based business solutions, Big Data, and broad Information Rights.

Ramji Raghavan is the Founder/CEO of Pragya Systems, which is creating solutions to disrupt how course content is authored, shared and managed. Ramji was most recently at Movik Networks, where as Founder/CEO and CTO he led the company to raise over $40M in venture capital and deliver ground-breaking RAN-aware solutions to help mobile operators deal with the rapidly increasing rich media internet content in their 3G/4G networks. Prior to founding Movik, Ramji was the General Manager of the Networking Business Unit of Telsima (acquired by Aviat), where he ran a multi-national organization building market leading WiMax and IPTV backhaul products for emerging markets. Prior to Telsima, Ramji was the Founder and CTO of Coriolis Networks before which he held senior leadership roles at Digital/Cabletron and Motorola.Ramji is on the board of Tie Boston, a non-profit fostering entrepreneurship and is the Chair of Tie Challenge, a year long accelerator program for startups across different sectors.

Tarlin Ray is Managing Director of Triple Threat Advisor, a consulting firm focused on supporting and accelerating startups and early stage businesses. Over 15 year career working in and with startups, he has extensive experience in strategic planning, sales, marketing, business development and operations in a variety of industries, including travel, technology, education, apparel and video games. Ray is also the Co-President of the HBS Alumni Angels of Boston and New England, on the Board of Advisors for New Space Global and Prepmatic Inc, and is a mentor at MassChallenge. Ray earned his A.B. in Economics, cum laude, from Harvard University and M.B.A from Harvard Business School.

Victor Rosansky is an international consultant, speaker and author who has dedicated over 25 years helping organizations and people build competitive, high growth organizations. Victor was recently featured on CBS Evening News for his work in NYC's Jump Start program that helps transition potential entrepreneurs into startup ventures. Over his career he benefitted from working with such highly successful entrepreneurs as Sam Walton founder of Walmart, Fred Smith founder of Fedex and Lou Gerstner when he was at American Express. Victor was a co-Founder of ODI and has been a serial entrepreneur in the medical imaging and biotech area. His publications include the best selling, The Power of Alignment, most recently, Rapid Realignment: How to Quickly Integrate People, Processes, and Strategy for Unbeatable Performance, and Making Quality Work: A Leadership Guide for the Results Driven Manager.  He has taught managerial economics at Boston University; consulting Skills to MBA students at the Hult International Business School, and was an invited lecturer at the International University of Japan. He is a faculty member at the Levin Institute in NYC, where he presents to new entrepreneurs his latest research into the application of concepts of neuroscience to starting up companies.

Arnie Scott currently serves as Vice Chairman and a Director of First Commons Bank, NA, a national bank which he co-founded in 2008.  He also serves as on the Board of Directors of Hub Management Co.,  Pneuron Corp. and Sevo Nutraceuticals, Inc. He is a member of the Advisory Boards of AI-Resource, LLC, Successimo and Vestmark.Prior to 2001 he was a senior officer and a Director of MFS Investment Management. He also has been a lecturer at Boston University Law School’s Morin School of Banking and Finance.

Mustapha Shaikh is a Serial Entrepreneur with businesses in the IT, Healthcare, Finance, Telecom segments.He is Founder of Humjai Technologies that provides IT services to US nonprofit organizations. Mustapha is currently also President of National Dental Management Group, overseeing and managing several large sized dental clinics. Under his leadership, National Dental has grown up to become a multi-million dollar firm and has become one of the fastest growing Dental firm in Massachusetts. In 2002 Mustapha Co-founded Noble Wireless & Telecom Services Pvt. Ltd. along with his brother in India catering to the booming telecom industry. Noble has finished tens of thousands of infrastructure projects, Cell phone sites and provided Engineering services to majority of the cellular companies across the nation.  He is also co-founder of Oshi Capital Management, LLC working on expansion of its Hedge Fund. Recently Mustapha joined the board of VocalBee as an investor and Strategist, an early stage start-up in the field of Social and Mobile Marketing platform.

Ken Smith is a career entrepreneur.  He has held senior management roles in seven start-ups in the high tech, clean tech, and consumer products industries. He has served as co-chair of the CEO Services Committee at the MIT Enterprise forum, a business plan review and coach for Springboard Enterprises, and has been a guest speaker / lecturer at Harvard University, MIT, Boston College, Boston University, Babson College, UCLA and Berkeley.  He has been invited to give keynote presentations and participate on expert panels at major international conferences in San Francisco, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Boston, London, Glasgow, and Leipzig.   Ken holds an M. Ed. in Computer-assisted Instruction (with honors) and a BA from the University of San Francisco.

Satish Tadikonda is the Founder, President and Chief Executive Officer and is member of the Board of Directors of Virtify, Inc., a market leader for structured content management software solutions for the life sciences industry. With over 25 years of industry experience, Satish's expertise spans drug and medical device development, and software systems development. Prior to Virtify, Satish was the founder of Tribiosys, Inc., a Cambridge, MA-based scientific consulting company.  Satish is also a member of the Board of Directors of NuView Inc., and The Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE)-Boston Chapter, and serves on the Advisory Board of Cellanyx, Inc. and AlephCloud Inc. He is an Executive Partner of Blue Cloud Ventures, a fund focused on investing in in fast growing SaaS, PaaS and enterprise application and infrastructure software companies. Satish is a Charter Member of TiE and is an active member of the TiE Angel Network.

Praveen Tailam is the Managing Director of TiE Angels Boston, an early stage investment group of TiE Boston. TiE Angels Boston is a rapidly growing angel group leveraging its local and global network and rich intellectual capital. TiE (The Indus Entrepreneurs) is a global organization which fosters and empowers entrepreneurs worldwide with its large network of charter members (successful entrepreneurs and industry thought leaders). Praveen manages the deal flow & screening, due diligence, investments & portfolio management as well as building strong partnerships with local angel groups, incubators, accelerators and entrepreneur clubs from local universities (MIT, Harvard, Suffolk, Babson etc). In his past Praveen was in technology consulting running his own practice for 6 years. Technology background includes enterprise software, unified messaging platforms, enterprise support etc. Praveen hold Masters in Information Systems from Northeastern University and  Bachelors in Mechanical Engineering.

James L. Woodward has over 35 years of high tech management experience. He has been a Founder or the first CFO of eight successful companies including Iris Graphics (sold to Scitex), Computer Access (Lotus), Exos (Microsoft), and ActualSoft (Palm). Before and after their sale, these have had combined revenues well over a billion dollars. Jim has raised over $25 million from VCs and Angels and has been CFO or Director of several public and many private companies. He made his first angel investment in 1970 and was a founding member of the Launchpad Angel Group in 2000. He was involved in the MIT Enterprise Forum from 1980 until recently in a variety of roles including Chair. For ten years he wrote a monthly column on entrepreneurship for the Forum Reporter. He has judged and mentored in a wide variety of business plan contests, including mentoring a winner of the MIT 100K, a 2nd place in ICE, and Mass Challenge money winners in 2010, 2011, and 2012.

Connie Wright, is a principal at CommonwealthPacific Ventures, an angel investing firm and has more than 30 years of accounting, consulting, and professional services management experience.  Connie advises new business start-ups on how to build a scalable business and is an expert in SAS 115 and accounting process improvement. She assists firms in acquiring funding; connecting firms to capital and preparing firms for successful exits; M&A and going public. Spending the last 15 years managing consulting practices, Connie began her career as a CPA with Deloitte & Touche and became a senior manager of its audit practice, working with clients in the United States and Germany

Join CED, TiE Carolinas and RTP Foundation for a  discussion on entrepreneurs ecosystem development with IBM. 
Learn what other entrepreneurs in the IBM Global Entrepreneur Program have done in leveraging IBM Watson cloud platform to build their solutions for a smarter planet. 

Agenda:

5:30 - 6:00PM   Registration and Dinner Networking

6:00 - 6:10PM   Welcome Remark

6:10 - 6:40PM   Keynote: Satin Mirchandani, MD Buyline CEO

6:40 - 7:30PM   1st Panel: Watson Cognitive Technology and Ecosystem

7:30 - 7:50PM   Q&A

7:50 - 8:00PM   Break

8:00 - 8:40PM   2nd Panel: The Next Ender’s Game: using games to solve problems

8:40 - 9:00PM   Q&A

 

1^st Panel Discussion:

Topic: Watson Cognitive Systems and Ecosystem

Session Description:  

Watson is IBM’s first-generation cognitive system – containing massive statistical algorithms running massively in parallel. It combines natural language processing, machine learning, and hypothesis generation and evaluation to give you direct, confidence-based responses. Cognitive systems like IBM Watson, transform how organizations think, act, and operate in the future with technologies which leverage natural language, hypothesis generation and evidence-based learning.

This panel will discuss the Watson Cognitive Computing technology and share their perspective on emergent business opportunities for entrepreneurs around Watson and like technologies.  

Panelists:

Moderator: Chris (Spence) Spencer, Manager, Future Technology Strategist and Manager of Blue Mix at IBM Corporation

Panelists

Bobby Bahram,  General Partner, Excelerate Health Ventures

Satin Mirchandani, CEO and President, MD Buyline

Abhi Muthiyan, Founder and CTO, Patagonia Health

David Sink, Director, Client Solutions and Delivery, IBM Watson Solutions 

2^nd Panel Discussion:

Topic: The Next Ender’s Game: using games to solve problems

Session Description:

Games can be incredibly adept at explaining complex systems. Learn how businesses effectively use gaming to make important business decisions. This session provides insight into how the combination of cloud computing, sophisticated game design and applications can produce Serious Games, that process data to drive business improvements. The session will show how Serious Games can stretch beyond skills training and actively engage participants to effect real change.   

Panelists:

Moderator: Porter Stowell

Serious Games, Social Business Center of Competency, IBM

Panelists

1. Hunter Moore, CEO, Athena's Compass

2. Chris Hazard, Founder and CEO of Hazardous Software

3. Phaedra Boinodiris, Serious Gaming/Gamification Global Leader, IBM

Venue:

IBM Recreation Center,  Building 400 room 110

3039 E. Cornwallis Road, RTP, NC 27709 

On Feb 4th IBM hosted Day 2 of the inaugural IBM Global Entrepreneur week with 44 in-person events around the world. At our newest location in Cambridge, we hosted our next installment in our series we call "Connecting Companies with Capital"

Boy,...what a day it was! There was energy, buzz, mentoring, keynotes, cool startup technologies and so much more!!! If you missed it, you can catch a part of the event which was livestreamed that day here:

We had a packed room with overflow rooms on the 2nd floor showing the livestream content of keynotes and panel discussions.

Chris Lynch from Atlas Ventures kicked off the day with some great lessons for entrepreneurs and insights. Our panel discussion bringing together IBM, American Airlines and Constant Contact and their respective partners was something the audience found very valuable and informative. The startups shared their experiences (good and bad) providing a holistic view of the complete partnership.

Victor Rosansky was able to convey some interesting secrets for entrepreneurs to be successful which piqued their interest to know more. Visit here to get a copy of his presentation and stay connected!

You would think there was loads of information packed into these 2 hours but wait...there's more!!!

We then moved into our key component of the day - "Speed Mentoring". 30 mentors were able to connect with almost 100 startups to provide some advice and get some information to foster some initial connections which they can follow up on. The short time allotted (5 mins) for each pair helped ensure we get most connections made in a short amount of time.

That was by no means the only networking happening...people were able to avail of the all the meeting spaces, rooms and breakout areas to gather for a quick bite to eat or carry on follow up conversations.

The seven breakout sessions were a natural flow from the networking lunch. Each of the sessions was well attended, and the leaders, who were subject matter experts in each of the areas provided the right intros to help get the conversations started.

Jon Prial of Georgian Ventures mentioned on his blog - "A last great takeaway was hammered during a breakout session on Markets was on how a company needs to push away all distractions and focus, focus, focus."  - led by Jess McLear and Lauren Celano

Twitter was abuzz with comments from attendees at the session...here are some on our Social Media Breakout with Bobbie, Tammy, Eric and Rachel.

Patrick Bench, Phil Budden and John Farley discussing "How to work with International Companies?"

Peter Clay and Dan Levin had a full room for the breakout titled "Understanding Your Market"

Robert Bishop answered targeted questions on "Legal Challenges for Startups"

Ben, Panos and Mustapha hit it out of the park with valuable info on "Funding options for Startups"

Kelley Hilborn and Paul Cheek discussed different ways to "Leverage the Cloud" for growing your business.

But wait....there is still more..... :)

Charlie Hill - CTO of IBM Design shared principles of IBM Design Thinking in an interesting afternoon keynote followed by a closing by Joe Perry elaborating on how IBM works with startups through the IBM Global Entrepreneur Program and the Softlayer Catalyst Program.

Kara from MassChallenge shared her thoughts on the day - "It was a great event - high-quality speakers, great networking, excellent startups featured. It was a brilliant idea to incorporate a design thinking piece as well. Some of the ecosystem veterans I spoke to said it was one of the best events in the ecosystem they'd been to in a while."

The startup showcase in the afternoon highlighted some the cool startups from the local universities.

VocalBee

@VocalBee is an easy to use, powerful tool for businesses to promote their products, services or brands using the social phenomenon of smart-phone picture taking, networking, and word of mouth marketing.

VerbalCare

VerbalCare is a patient experience platform that improves quality of care, patient engagement and workflow efficiency.

Nick Dougherty - "It was a great event and we really made some great connections. As I look at the business cards in front of me, there are angels, potential customers, potential partners, IBM resources, mentors, and consultants who could all impart significant and positive change into our company.  Overall the response was positive for our product and that the general consensus was "you guys are on the right track.""

UberSimple

AppPack^TM by @Ubersimple makes keeping information from events and vendors painless and easy using mobile technology and mobile sensors. UberSimple registration process is what we used to register 250+ people for the event and it worked super fast and  super simple!

SplashScore

Splashscore is an influencer activation engine that provides consumer brands with an army of advocates.

PressKit

@Presskit.to builds digital portfolio solutions for creative professionals & the organizations they work with. Capable of delivering curated content to any device with a single URL, Presskit.to makes it easy for artists to pitch a concise message to anyone capable of advancing their careers

Aidan Rush - "As valuable as networking always is, the seminars were more beneficial to me this day. Victor Rosansky's presentation was very insightful, and the opening keynote presenter set a great tone for the rest of the day. I attended the social media breakout, which surprisingly to me provided some new perspective on a field I thought I knew everything about."

CollegePower

CollegePower’s mobile app that helps local businesses attract college students by offering conducive and exclusive discounts

Stay tuned for Entrepreneur Week!

A special thanks to all our speakers, mentors and our ecosystem partners who helped make this event a success!

Very small snapshot of all the twitter buzz that was created :)

We invite you to share your comments/feedback with us through this blog.

New England Systems (NES) held a customer event at The Capital Grille in Burlington MA on Feb 27th.

IBM & NES collaborated to assemble a group of customers willing to share their perspective and experience  with Big Data technologies. 

Jennifer Ely Carter from NES and Stewart Hanna from IBM helped moderated a panel of influencers in the BigData space. Customers on the panel included:

Chris Morkunas - Data Governance Manager : Safety Insurance

Chris Smith - Director of MIS : Safety Insurance 

Tim O'Leary - VP of Technology Consulting: Epsilon

Joy Mukherjee - Sr Director BI,Data Warehousing, Testing, Services Integration and IT Solutions at Blue Cross Blue Shield of MA.

This Big Data round table was an opportunity for NES customers and IBM customers to share their insights as to how they are leveraging big data and analytics to achieve a competitive advantage. Customers representing a wide array of industries from all over New England participated in the event.  Chris Morkunas, Data Governance Manager at Safety Insurance had this to say:

“It was my pleasure to serve as a panelist on IBM’s Big Data Round Table earlier this month. As somebody who has a decent grasp of the benefits available from the cultivation of big data, I enjoyed being able to share my insights with audience members and learn from the other panelists. All companies on the panel were at different stages in their integration of big data into their business processes. This diversity was also clearly present in the audience, as evidence by the numerous different types of questions asked. The whole experience was a refreshing contrast to the big data presentations that I have attended in the past, which mainly consist of an industry expert listing off all of the possible things that can be done with big data. This generally leaves heads spinning on the shoulders of those just diving into the topic. I would definitely attend an event like this again; as panelist or an audience member. I would encourage others to attend as panelists as well, even if they have not been working for ten or twenty years on projects centered around big data.”

NES, a premier IBM Business Partner, has been delivering IT solutions to customers throughout the Northeast for over 30 years.  NES provides consulting for IT alignment with corporate business strategy; data governance;  and technology solutions and services for data integration,  data warehousing, business intelligence and analytics. The NES technical team has deep skills across all the major databases, various appliances, and the major BI tools. Given the long standing partnership with IBM, NES is highly skilled in IBM's information management portfolio. 

This week IBM announced its intent to acquire Boston-based Cloudant, privately held database as a service provider (DBaaS) that enables developers to easily and quickly create next generation mobile and web apps.

This news reinforces IBM's BlueMix announcement today, which is a new platform-as-a-service that enables developers to create apps in the cloud. Cloudant's database services will be offered via BlueMix.

The acquisition of Cloudant sits squarely at the intersection of three important areas for IBM -- Big Data and Analytics, Cloud Computing and Mobile.

Big Data and Analytics: Cloudant complements IBM’s Big Data and Analytics portfolio beyond traditional data management by providing a database as a DBaaS that enables clients to simplify and accelerate the development of scalable mobile and web apps.

Cloud Computing: The acquisition of Cloudant will also strengthen IBM's cloud solutions by providing developers with the tools and resources to build, test, deploy and scale cloud apps on a variety of hosting layers.  Cloudant runs on the IBM SoftLayer platform today.

Mobile: Cloudant also is integral to IBM's MobileFirst solutions and enables developers who use Worklight to quickly create flexible, reliable and scalable apps that include a variety of structured and unstructured data.

Cloudant will sit within IBM's newly formed Information and Analytics Group, led by Senior Vice President, Bob Picciano. As you already know, expanding its Big Data & Analytics solutions is not a new focus for IBM. In addition to a strong heritage in organic growth through R&D, IBM has already invested more than $17 billion in 30+ acquisitions. These investments are clearly paying off -- business analytics is now nearly a $16 billion business for IBM. You may recall that was the original target for 2015, but IBM has already taken our 2015 objective for business analytics revenue up to $20 billion.

Learn more here - http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/43238.wss

2 amazing opportunities to get connected with world-class mentors and entrepreneurial community in Massachusetts!

Just the application process alone for both of these accelerators is a learning experience and helps you think about a lot of areas of your business. IBM has a great collaborative partnership with both MassChallenge and TiE Boston.

Top Startups Wanted: MassChallenge 2014

MassChallenge is the world's largest startup accelerator and the first to support entrepreneurs with no strings attached. Over $1.5 million in cash grants and $10 million of in-kind benefits are awarded annually, with no equity taken. Additional benefits of the four-month program include world-class mentorship and training, free office space, access to funding, legal advice, media attention, and more.

Applications are due by April 2 - Apply at masschallenge.org/apply. Use this refund code to reduce your application fee: IBM010

TiE Challenge: Where entrepreneurs accelerate entrepreneurs

TiE Challenge offers entrepreneurs help from top Boston entrepreneurs and access to capital. TiE Challenge 2014 is now accepting applications.

• Twenty winning ideas will be chosen for year-long accelerator program
• Winning ideas have an opportunity to present to TiE-Angels for potential investment of up to $1M.
• Selected companies receive awards and opportunity to use shared office space in the heart of Kendall Square.

TiE Challenge Class of 2013 had phenomenal success. Click here to read about these companies or watch a video on TiE Challenge program here.
Apply to TiE Challenge 2014 - http://tinyurl.com/tiechallenge  Open to companies of all stages, industries, and/or capital requirements.
April 30 – Last day to apply
May 15 – Winners announced
May 29 – Present to panel of judges @ TiECON East
May 30 – Winners showcased & Champions Announced
TiE Challenge program is run by experienced entrepreneurs, many of whom have taken companies public and had multi-billion dollar exits.
For more details about the TiE Challenge program please visit: https://boston.tie.org/initiative/9/tie-challenge

Good luck Applying!