Innovation + Job News

TechTown has become a Network Partner in Microsoft's BizSpark Program.

BizSpark works to help make connections for businesses and entrepreneurs on a global level.

Members get access to software ecosystems of Microsoft and BizSpark's partners, who provide resources, guidance and even mentors for early stage start-ups. This is done with no upfront costs for the start-up's first three years, which is often when the firms can least afford it but need it most.

The BizSpark Program is mainly aimed at IT firms and other technology-based start-ups. TechTown sees this as another way to plug its companies and entrepreneurs into a broader society of like-minded professionals.

Eligible companies must be actively engaged in development of a software-based product or service that is a core piece of their business model, less than three years and have less than $1 million in revenue.

For information on applying to BizSpark, click here.

Source: TechTown
Writer: Jon Zemke

The Center for Digital Filmmaking is getting ready to debut, just in time to help locals take advantage of the deluge of films hitting Michigan.

Darren Brown, a local filmmaker, is starting the center by teaming up with Pixel It Productions at Wayne State's TechTown campus. Brown has years of filmmaking and videomaking under his belt.

The Center for Digital Filmmaking's training program runs about 12 weeks. The course uses a hands-on approach. Brown says he showcased the school's curriculum to production houses in the state to help establish the center's professional credibility.

The school holds classes for about 30 students three days a week. Coursework includes The Basics of Video Production, Lighting, Green Screening, Creative Writing, Creating a Budget and Casting and Preparation for the Shoot. Classes are taught by pros, and students also will have to produce their own projects in the final weeks of the course.

For information, contact Brown at Darren@cdfdetroit.com or (313) 397-7790.

Source: Darren Brown, founder of The Center for Digital Filmmaking
Writer: Jon Zemke

Npower Michigan is turning new business into a few new hires at its headquarters in the Youthville building in New Center.

The non-profit spun out of Microsoft performs tech assessments for other non-profits. The idea is to find inexpensive ways so these community organizations can work more efficiently. Npower Michigan is sort of the Great Lakes State chapter of the larger Npower non-profit.

Npower Michigan is set to do 114 technology assessments in the later half of this year. That's three times as many assessments it did for Michigan non-profits in 2008 fiscal year.

That bump in work allowed the non-profit to add an employee this summer, increasing its staff to four. Management is now looking at hiring more people this spring.

"A lot of that is because of the work we're doing in various communities across the state," says Andy Wolber, executive director of Npower Michigan.

Source: Andy Wolber, executive director of Npower Michigan
Writer: Jon Zemke

Think of it as the University of Michigan returning to its roots.

U-M started in downtown Detroit in 1817 before moving to Ann Arbor. A dozen of the university's students will come back to the Motor City this winter to participate in the Semester in Detroit program.

The students will shack up at Wayne State University's dorms and take classes at U-M's Detroit Center at the northwest corner of Woodward Avenue and Martin Luther King Boulevard. They will also have the option of taking classes at Wayne State and interning at a number of Detroit's community and cultural arts organizations.

The new program is part of an effort to get the state's three major research universities (U-M, WSU and Michigan State University) to connect and collaborate with each other. It's modeled after U-M's Semester in Washington, D.C., program, which is designed to take students out of U-M's environment and immerse them in another culture for a semester.

Among the courses featured in the program are the Core Urban Planning, a part-time community-based internship and elective courses in the university's School of Art and Design called "Detroit Connections."

For information on the program, contact Craig Regester at regester@umich.edu or (313) 505-5185.
 
Source: University of Michigan
Writer: Jon Zemke

The Detroit Regional Chamber has put diversifying the economy high on its priorities list.

Excerpt:

Regional chambers of commerce from across the Midwest announced on Wednesday they were promoting a national initiative to help rebuild the region's economy, an initiative that includes efforts to clean and maintain the Great Lakes.

The Detroit Regional Chamber is the lead group in the effort that also includes chambers from Cleveland and Chicago. In all, more than 30 local chambers of commerce and companies that employ more 94,000 people signed on to the initiative.

Read the rest of the MiTechNews.com story here.

With the credit markets frozen, some of Detroit's budding businesses are turning to the city's Microloan Program for help to grow.

Excerpt:

Catherine Franklin wanted to expand her vending machine business in Detroit, but she couldn't obtain a loan to get the money because of the financial crisis that has frozen private lending.

But she turned to the City of Detroit's small business microloan program, which provided her with the money to purchase another vending company and grow her business, Vending R' Us, which provides vending machines to businesses and services them. Franklin said it would have been impossible in today's economic climate without the program.

"I did try to get some lending through a traditional financial organization," she said. "They said no, even though we've been in business for six years. ... If the economy was better, I would probably have gotten approved no problem."

Read the rest of the Detroit Free Press story here.

The latest installment of Wayne State Unversity's Nano@Wayne Seminar Series is set to kick off today.

Arthur P. Ramirez of LGS Bell Labs Innovations fame will speak about crystalline organic semiconductors and their impact on the electronics industry. In plain English that means he will talk about how they work with things like LED displays or solar technology.

Ramirez has a Ph.D. in physics from Yale University, a fellow of the American Physical Society and has held high-level positions at Bell Labs and Alamos National Laboratory. He is also the author of more than 200 papers published in academic journals.

The free seminar will begin at 2:30 p.m. in the university's Welcome Center Auditorium. For information, send an email to ab6925@wayne.edu.

Source: Wayne State University
Writer: Jon Zemke

Detroit is taking a page from Ann Arbor SPARK's highly successful Entrepreneur Boot Camp with its own Startup Weekend Detroit.

The event will bring together entrepreneurs, venture capitalists and creative people of all stripes. The idea is that bring them all together will help them create their own businesses in Detroit.

Startup Weekend starts with participants pitching ideas for their new businesses Friday evening. They then form teams around the most promising ideas and work on the ideas throughout the weekend.

The event will be held in Compuware's downtown headquarters between Friday and Sunday. It costs $40 to attend. For information, click here.

Source: Startup Weekend Detroit
Writer: Jon Zemke

One of Detroit's largest staffing firms is getting bigger after Strategic Staffing Solutions made its biggest acquisition yet.

The 18-year-old firm is absorbing National Technical Systems' technical resources division. It's a move that will mean 180 new employees and six new offices in four states will now fall under Strategic Staffing Solutions' umbrella.

The Motor City firm already has 1,500 employees and 27 offices across the U.S and in Europe. The new offices are in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Minneapolis, Columbia, S.C., Troy, and Lowell, Mass. The acquisition's $20 million in sales will lift Strategic Staffing Solutions' revenue projection to $160 million annually.
 
Strategic Staffing Solutions is a staffing company specializing in information technology services. It also does consulting, management and provides customized project solutions. National Technical Systems provides product compliance services, technical resources, design engineering services and program management support to a number of industries.

Source: Peter Van Dyke, spokesman with Berg Muirhead and Associates
Writer: Jon Zemke

Medow & Mayberry News Corp., the company that owns venerable The Hamtramck Citizen, is branching its business plan out into the web.

It recently retained two web developers after they redesigned and upgraded The Citizen's web site. The 10-person company, which also owns the Farmington and Livonia gazettes, suspects it may continue hiring in the near future.

"We're expanding the company because being in the print business is extremely difficult at the moment," says Dan Medow, president and publisher of Medow & Mayberry News Corp.

He points out how the Christian Science Monitor recently announced it was ending its print edition and focusing on Internet publishing. News outlets, especially newspapers, have been investing more and more money into their web content in recent years. More and more Web sites, like Model D and its sister publications, are also appearing to produce web-only news.

The folks at The Citizen and the gazettes are also looking to help more people create a presence on the web. The company plans to offer Web site design, hosting and other Internet-related services.

Source: Dan Medow, president and publisher of Medow & Mayberry News Corp
Writer: Jon Zemke