DeNovo Sciences accepts their award at the Michigan Life Sciences Innovation Center.

“DeNovo Sciences and Fusion Coolant Systems highlight how having a strong entrepreneurial support system can help businesses successfully launch and advance towards attracting capital and commercializing products,” said Paul Krutko, president and CEO, Ann Arbor SPARK.  “Both companies are currently being incubated at Ann Arbor SPARK.  DeNovo Sciences is a tenant at the Michigan Life Science and Innovation Center and Fusion Coolant Systems is a tenant at Ann Arbor SPARK’s SPARK East incubator.  Both companies have also benefitted from Ann Arbor SPARK’s entrepreneurial services, including business planning.”

Denovo Sciences and Fusion Coolant Systems plan to use the Accelerate Michigan Innovation Competition prize monies to further their business development goals, including attracting additional capital investments and ramping up commercialization efforts.

“The $500,000 Accelerate Michigan Innovation Competition prize definitely helps us stay on track with our goals,” said Kalyan Handique, CEO, DeNovo Sciences.  “We will use the funding to test our prototype so that we are ready for big fundraising in the coming year; our goal is to raise $6 million in venture capital.”

DeNovo Sciences is developing an instrument system and reagent kit that allows for the separation, detection and retrieval of circulating tumor cells from peripheral whole blood creating an alternative to traditionally painful and invasive biopsies. Fusion Coolant Systems provides an advanced coolant and lubrication system for use in manufacturing.

See how Fusion Coolant Systems plans on spending their award money:

AMIC winners with their checks!

We are proud to announce that DeNovo Sciences, a Michigan Life Science and Innovation Center tenant, took home the $500,000 grand prize. Fusion Coolant Systems, a UM start-up, took home the $150,000 runner up prize. Other winners with Ann Arbor region ties include Are You a Human, i3D Technologies, H3D, LLamasoft, and ePack.  Congratulations to all the winning companies!

We now look to the Annual Collaboration for Entrepreneurship (ACE ’12) Conference coming up on January 31st from 2pm-9pm at Skyline High School in Ann Arbor. Don’t miss out on this great event!

Paul Krutko speaking at the VC breakfast.

Our team is up bright and early this Tuesday morning to spread the word of cool technologies, high returns, and the growing venture capital scene in Michigan to a group of around 30 Silicon Valley VC’s and high net worth individuals. The group was very interested in hearing more about our upcoming CEO Podcast between Paul Krutko, President and CEO of Ann Arbor SPARK,  and Jan Garfinkle, Founder and Managing Director of Arboretum Ventures. Also, I now have a better understanding of why CA needs a carpool lane and treasure my 20 minute commute. Next stop, the Hacker Dojo in Mountain View to see what unstructured collaborative learning is all about. After checking-in and reading their “Warning” sign all we could find was a sea of Wolverines and Spartans! Britany Affolter-Caine, Talent Enhancement Director, and I learned a great deal from over a dozen “geeks” (remember “geek” isn’t what you remember from high school, today it is a huge compliment) all having roots back to Pure Michigan. One team worked with Ann Arbor SPARK years ago, sold their first company and are onto their next. They were thrilled to hear the great things that are brewing for start-ups in Ann Arbor. Most also knew of our “Dojo” environments, Tech Brewery and Menlo Innovations.

The "warning" sign at Hacker Dojo

After being educated at the dojo, it was back to San Jose for our MichAGAIN event! After passing a Google self-driving car I now know my next new car purchase, how efficient! The Michigan Economic Development Corporation’s Talent Enhancement team and Ann Arbor SPARK hosted around 50 Michiganders for a night of networking, career hunting and reminiscing of “back home”. Energy was high and attendees were thrilled to network with recruiters and CEO’s from Intrinsic Medical Imaging, Systems In Motion, Terumo Cardiovascular System and Terumo Heart. With over a handful of individuals highly interested in making the move back to MichAGAIN, our plates will be full over the coming months and not just with turkey and dressing! Our team is dedicated to help those looking to make the transition back to Pure Michigan seamless. For more information visit www.MichAGAIN.org.

Ann Arbor SPARK’s Business Development team has arrived in California this week on a business and talent attraction trip surrounding the MichAGAIN campaign that is administered by the Michigan Economic Development Corporation. We are hosting three events during our stay in the San Jose area and have meetings set up with business leaders. Our team hopes to educate businesses about all the opportunities that are available for them in the Ann Arbor area.

We arrived yesterday and weren’t even able to make it past the rental car booth without running into a fellow Michigander, IT Professional from Hyundai’s Technical Center in Superior Township, out here working for a few days at their Menlo Park office. We were on our way and surprisingly hit a “Michigan sized” pot hole (yes, they do exist in California too). We found a lively sports bar in Palo Alto to catch the Detroit Lions game with some other very enthusiastic fans. Michigan pride runs strong in the Valley. Today is a packed day of meetings with technology company executives and tonight we host a group of CEO’s for an executive dinner. It looks to be a beautiful day here, about the same weather as Pure Michigan!

The Marketing Roundtable, from 5:30-7 p.m., is on how to turn customers and stakeholders into advocates. Join consumer and business marketing experts as they reveal the latest integrated marketing and customer satisfaction strategies for creating relationships with customers that care, share and buy.  The panel will be moderated by Elizabeth Parkinson, senior vice president of marketing and communications, Michigan Economic Development Corporation, and the panelists are David Lewan, vice president, Public Sector and Sales Operations, ForeSee Results and Son Tran, founder, Pitch Black Media.

The BioArbor event, from 6-7 p.m., is on the current state of Michigan’s bio-industry, including whether the state has what it takes to compete on the domestic and global stages.  Event speakers are Michael A. Finney, president and CEO of the Michigan Economic Development Corporation, and William U. Parfet, MBA, chairman and CEO of MPI Research Inc.

Deal Structures, from 5:45-8 p.m., is on deal structures, including term sheets, alternative deal structures and non-negotiable terms.  Event speakers are Ganesh “Ananth” Ananthasubramaniam of DTE Energy Venture, Paul McCreadie of Arboretum Ventures, and Ryan Waddington of Huron River Ventures.

Access to SPARK’s live event streaming is free!  For more information, visit http://www.annarborusa.org/live-events/index.html

Returning to familiar territory as Dr. Blank was formerly the Dean of the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan, she was an honor for us to host.

Check out our press release!

Check out pictures from the event!

Some of the event organizers: LeRoy Newland, GE; Stefanie Ridenour, MEDC; Me; Valerie Furchi, GE; and John Hill, MSU

     What do you get when you mix a handful of Michiganders and 125+ alums from the great state? An amazing night filled with networking, laughs, rivalry talk and memories. The Michigan Economic Development Corporation’s MichAGAIN Campaign was in full effect last night at Policy Lounge in Washington DC. The group of state and local economic development professionals, university officials, and company representatives put on what some said was “the best event I have ever been to since moving to DC from Michigan”.

Marshall Weir of Mobiata

The masses came out to hear what is really happening in Michigan. The evening included humorous and inspirational talks from Stephen Rapundalo of MichBIO, John Hill of the Michigan State University Alumni Association, and Joan Dunbar of Wayne State University. The theme of the discussion then turned to the ever popular topic of JOBS. Kimberly Bankston of General Electric and Marshall Weir of Mobiata stole the show by sharing their amazing stories of the growth, success, and expansion that both companies are experiencing in Michigan. Combined they were offering the crowd over 300 opportunities that are currently open and challenged them to consider Michigan for their next career opportunity. The party continued well into the night with many Spartans and Wolverines closing the place down together with Pure Michigan on their minds. Watch out DC there are over 125 new ambassadors of Pure Michigan on the streets after last night.

MichAgain's VC luncheon attracted attention to the state's growing companies

What do you get then you put 15 high powered VCs in a room?  About $1 billion of capital to spend and a whole lot of interest in our entrepreneurial endeavors.

Our first MichAGAIN Boston event was a ravishing success.  Our informal program was packed with dynamic speakers including our very own VC expert Skip Simms, as well as Ken Nisbet, head of U-M Tech Transfer Office, Eli Thomssen, CEO of Armmune Bioscience and Accelerate Michigan Innovation Competition winner and Mike Flanagan, head of MEDC’s capital markets team.

Several of the VCs in attendance signed up to volunteer for the next Accelerate Michigan Innovation Competition in November and a few shared their stories of successful investments in Michigan firms.  They all asked that we keep the dialogue ongoing and some expressed interest in spending time in Michigan and meeting one-on-one with our technology start-ups.

So sharpen up your pitches local entrepreneurs and prepare for a future Boston VC invasion.

The 2010 FastTrack Awards will be featured within the AnnArbor.com Deals of the Year event on November 5, 2010.

Topics planned for Business Law & Order include:

• Business structure
• Intellectual property
• Doing business overseas.
• Compensating founders
• Hiring employees versus contractors
• Understanding commercial agreements

Business Law & Order will meet at SPARK Central from 5-7 p.m. on the third Monday of every month except December, July and August.

There is no cost to attend Business Law & Order, but registration is encouraged.  Click here to register for the Business Law & Order kickoff.