Excerpt:

"To even begin to understand how these slightly unsettling results are arrived at, we need to understand who compiles them and who they are for. The lists are made by well-travelled academics, researchers and journalists for corporate, media and creative executives on generous expense accounts as well as other academics enjoying grants and stipends. And, of course, by Tyler Brûlé.

Most of these people are profoundly concerned with things like well-designed street furniture, a proliferation of eye-wateringly expensive artisanal retail, boutique hotels with good (English-speaking) service and environmentally friendly mayoral policies. Certainly these are all things which help but they skew the polls to a particular type of European or marginal Pacific city. What they also do is to strip out all the complexity, all the friction and buzz that make big cities what they are."

Read the rest of the story here.
News from Concentrate

We have been providing this Boot Camp twice a year since 2002.  181 companies have gone through the two day program each paying $1,000 tuition.  Sound like a lot?  We often get that from boot strapping entrepreneurs.  Understandably so.  But time and time again our surveys receive a thumbs up from every participant.  We get comments like it was the best time and money spent at this critical time in their development. 

Do we have hard evidence of a return on that tuition investment?  How about the fact that these campers have raised over $20 million in equity and just under $20 million in grants since their participation in the program.  Sensigen was a Boot Camp company in 2002.  They raised more than a million in private equity and recently sold to Sequenom (SQNM).  Michigan Aerospace attended Boot Camp last year and is building their company with a million dollars of grant money.

You can apply now to attend our next Boot Camp November 5 & 6.  You won’t be the same company coming out of camp as you were going in.  It’s a good investment in yourself.

Our friend Jim Price over at the Ross School at U of M was interviewed for the school newsletter.  He discusses the differences between the two cultures and the paradigm shift these corporate managers need to make in their thinking about innovation and change.  He confirms our belief in how best to pursue non-dilutive financing when risk capital is not available.  We really like his analogy about failure to skiing. Check it out.

BTW we are presenting a program in two weeks, July 14 at SPARK Central, on the many state programs available for start-ups in the forms of grants, tax credits, loans and equity investment.  Register soon so you’ll have a seat.

When you look around at the incentives other states are providing technology and other innovative entrepreneurs you will be hard pressed to find one that has as many creative programs providing capital than Michigan.  We have programs for university based commercialization opportunities, SBIR/STTR recipients, micro loans, tax incentives to collaborate with established companies, investment matches, and more.  There are grants, tax breaks, loans and equity investments.  So many it’s hard to keep track of them all.

So we are going to give you a run down on the many programs available in a two hour presentation with the people intimately involved with creating these programs and overseeing them.  It will be a brown bag lunch at SPARK Central.  Register soon so we can get a count on attendance.  Space is limited.

Click here to register.

For many technology based companies the feds SBIR/STTR grants are a great way to keep you going.  Most companies that apply are not approved.  That’s why you need to take advantage of training programs.  Unless you have applied successfully on your own before, don’t try it alone since there is so much help for you that is cheap.

You will hear more about the state programs referred to above in future blogs.  Watch for an event we’re working on that will give you an overview of all the options available to Michigan start-ups.  In the mean time check out this training session next week if you think you are eligible for an NIH grant.