Game Changers Silicon Valley

The depth and breadth of the Agtech movement are transforming many agriculture sectors.   The dairy industry is a well-established industry that has received some productivity enhancements over the years. such as automated milking machines.   Otherwise, the products and methods have remained the same over the decades and centuries. The dairy sector is now going through a transformation in Ireland....

The startup ecosystem continues to create new products and services that contribute to our productivity and quality of life.   The participating parties including research and intellectual property from universities, programs for entrepreneurs,   technologists and an established set of service providers from startup accelerators to a range of outsourcing services for everything a startup company n...

On Monday of last week, Capital One announced a data breach affecting an estimated 106 million Credit card customers and applicants. This is one of the largest Data breaches experienced by a large bank.   One noteworthy point is that this cyber theft was conducted against data stored in the cloud-hosted by Amazon Web Services.   In the past, most cyber intrusions have been conducted against a corp...

This conversation is with Jamie Rhodes, founder of the Central Texas Angel Network, an active angel investor group, based in Austin, TX.   The startup story begins with an accelerator hosted by Texas State University and supported by a group of local mentors and advisors.   One of the companies gaining traction in the accelerator was SioTeX .   The company 's Intellectual property which had been f...

According to a United Nations study by the year 2050, the world's population will reach 9.1 billion which is 34 percent higher than today. In order to feed this larger, more urban, and richer population, food production must increase by 70 percent. So the question is given the limits of available farmland and water resources, how are we going to meet this increase in food demand? Agtech Sector Per...

We hear a great deal of discussion about protecting access to our digital assets, bank accounts, travel services, retail sites and even government agencies like the IRS and State Tax Authorities.   The recommendations focus on creating a secure name and password, two-factor authentication and possibly a biometric verification such as a fingerprint or voice print. During the RSA conference in San F...

What are your options if you have a real business but there is a lack of engagement from venture capital?  In 2015, Congress implemented Title IV of the Jobs Act, which was intended to provide a process for startup companies to sell stock to the general public while remaining a private company.     Why haven't you hear about this process, knows as a Reg A+?   The provisions of Reg A+ allow a compa...

Many of the best entrepreneurs have leveraged their corporate experience, contacts, and resources to create new products and deploy a business strategy that was verified while they were corporate managers.  Despite having that extensive background in product development and innovation, the life of the founders in any startup is a never-ending roller coaster ride that can easily derail valid ideas,...

As I scanned the list of my unread emails, one stood out, coming from alerts@citibank.com . The message indicated there was a problem with a credit card transaction, a link was provided to learn more about this problem.   I clicked on the link and was taken to an official-looking Citibank web page with a form to login to my account. Fortunately, I did catch myself before completing the login, real...

Studio software and computer vision have empowered the adoption of virtual characters and virtual movie sets.   The next logical question was: why are we limited to actual human voices in the dialogue?  The emergence of AI is powering a new approach to analyzing voices, identifying and tagging speaking patterns by age, sex, education, cultural heritage, and accent to fix audio tracks in movies.  ...

The world population stands at approximately 7.5 billion people at this time. The United Nations in 2009 and the International Organization for Migration in 2015 both estimated that around 3 million people are moving to cities every week. Today, approximately 54% of people worldwide now live in cities, up from 30% in 1950. Sources estimate this will grow to 2/3 of the world population in the next...

The Aha! Moment and Developing a High-Quality Mentor Relationship This podcast explores the process where a woman entrepreneur had that insightful epiphany that lead her to create a startup company and pursue a resulting vision of providing a solution to an issue.   Beyond this discussion of the Aha! moment, you will hear how this entrepreneur also found a mentor that provided her with the advice...

The startup ecosystem has been widely adopted throughout the US and in most industrialized countries in a similar form.   St engaging investors to fund the development of new technologies, create jobs and businesses for the 21st century.   As a startup company grows, one investor's end game is another investor's entry point. This conversation will look into one of the more obscure aspects in Silic...

Artificial intelligence has projected some fantastic benefits and yet we hear ominous rumblings in the background warnings about a brave new world, it's a world where computers outpace and outperform humans in repetitive past analysis and perhaps even in creative work. Information technology (IT) certifications are a gateway to many professional jobs worldwide, and developing a reliable and cost-e...

In just about every business, Cash remains King in terms of operations, but Growth is the key to valuation.   So, while Cash is King, Growth determines value and growth in value promotes product leadership, attracts our most talented resources and is a high priority among investors.   This pursuit of growth outside of North America can be an expensive and risky endeavor.   Companies will typically...

This story is about a woman who is addressing the water contamination problem exemplified in Flint Michigan's 2014 lead poisoning crisis.   Meena Sankaram, the founder of Ketos speaks about her water analysis technology as well as her story about the search for investors and her "all in"bet including her life savings.   Manthi Nguyen, an angel investor and advisor to the company provides an invest...

It's the leading cause of hospitalizations for people over 65 years old.   Over 6 million people are living with heart failure, and each year, over 500,000 new cases are diagnosed.   Heart failure accounts for nearly 1 million hospitalizations annually, more than all forms of cancer combined.

There is an ongoing narrative in the media about entrepreneurs coming to Silicon Valley, building a startup company, finding investors and riding off, rich and happy into the sunset. But it does not always work that way.   Building a startup company is one of the most challenging endeavors anyone can undertake, the commitment must be total, complete with an "all-in" game plan; being obsessive is n...

Quantum computing is one of those concepts that is difficult to explain, especially in the sense that the underlying technology its most basic component, the qubit, seems outside our everyday experience. During the discussion with Matt, I recognized that a person does not need to fully grasp the properties of a qubit in order to become aware of the potential quantum computing can deliver. Airline...

Our conversation today is about how a small team of researches was developing a compound to treat cataracts,   The team noticed that one of the areas where the compound might be useful was in oral hygiene and the removal of plague. Our conversation will focus on how this unintended discovery evolved, was identified, tested and then ultimately launched as a product.

There are impressive results coming from solar power systems installed in third world countries and emerging economies. In these areas, Electric generating stations based only on solar power are being used to establish the foundation of economic and infrastructure development.                    Join me with my guests, Jim Chu, founder of Untapped (Untapped-inc.org), and Barrett Raftery, Executive...

Concerned about air quality inside an office or work environment?  You could be getting lethargic due to the effects of carbon dioxide by re-breathing the exhaled carbon dioxide in your office.  This podcast addresses the build up and effects of Carbon Dioxide, ( CO2) and how Artveola has developed a technology that uses specialized algae and Microfluidics to consume CO2 and produce oxygen.  Air q...