Samsung Electronics' Galaxy S (left) and Apple's iPhone 4 are displayed at the headquarters of South Korean mobile carrier KT. Apple claims some of Samsung's designs violate its patents. (Ahn Young-joon/AP)

The suit would be the most expensive patent violation in history, and it's just one front in Apple's war against phones running Google's Android operating system.

"This is officially World War III," says Carl Howe, an analyst with Yankee Group. "I think this is a case of whether the iPhone really, as Apple claims, changed the world in 2007."

To put that in perspective, think about the smartphone you had before that, Howe says. They were often boxy, and they had keyboards. When the iPhone came out, the commercials showed a hand interacting with the glowing, elegant screen. It had soft edges and a clear, glass face.

The iPhone was a big hit, and Howe says other smartphone makers, including Samsung, changed the way they designed their phones.

"After iPhone was introduced, suddenly all the designs looked like black slabs with touch interfaces, no keyboards and lots of icons," he says.

Imitation may be the sincerest form of flattery, but in the world of business, where style and design are part of what make a brand like Apple unique, imitation is seen more as a way to confuse customers. Howe says Apple patented designs for its iPhone and iPad tablet.

"They're things like a flat, clear surface on the front of the product, or a rectangular product with four evenly rounded corners," he says, "lots of things that just sound like, 'Oh, you can get a patent for that?' But they fundamentally determine what the device looks like."

Samsung and Apple would not comment for this story.

A recent court filing by Apple compared pictures of Samsung smartphones before the iPhone and after. Some of the early versions have keyboards or other buttons, and they have sharper corners.

Mark Lemley, a professor at Stanford Law School, says the patent office isn't always right when it grants patents. Take that rectangle with the round corners.

"That really is a patent of stunning breadth if you take seriously the idea, when you look at the diagram in the patent, that Apple gets to own a computer that's shaped like a rectangle," Lemley says. "Well, then designing around [that is] going to be awfully hard for Samsung or anybody else."

Other critics say that even if Apple did it all best, it wasn't even the first to get a patent on these designs. David Martin, the chairman of M-Cam, a company that evaluates the value of patents, says the difference between the emotional response that says these technologies look alike and the actual construction of the patent law are two different things.

"That line has been entirely blurred," Martin says.

Emotional response might be Apple's most effective weapon, especially in this case. Apple did change the way people use and think about smartphones, and it opened up a new market for tablet computers. Analyst Carl Howe says Apple might be able to make a sympathetic case to jurors.

"One of the things Apple is good at [is] they're really good at presenting information in very influencing ways," Howe says. "So I would actually give them an edge simply because they're probably going to be able to make their case in a way that a jury will understand."

This is just one of many cases in the U.S. and around the world where Apple is pursuing Samsung and other rivals such as HTC. In all of them, the other companies pull out a few patents of their own and sue Apple right back.

Lemley, the Stanford professor, thinks it's a sign that something is wrong with the patent system, which is meant to promote innovation.

"They've probably spent $700 million in legal fees, and at the end of the day everybody's got enough patents that they could all interfere with each other making products," he says. "That's not the way we want innovation to work."

For consumers, this might bring higher prices and fewer choices. In fact, in Europe, a judge banned Samsung's Galaxy Tab 7.7 tablet from stores. For Apple, which recently saw sales of its iPhone slow, this could be a battle worth fighting.

Copyright 2012 National Public Radio. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.

Source: www.freedigitalphotos.net

What does the newest research tell us about online dating?

We look at the huge business of online dating. Why is the industry so powerful? How does it work? And what’s the best way to actually find someone? We look at why people are lured online — and what sites really work. Kara Miller talked with Bob Seay about Harvard Business School professor Mikolaj Piskorski's research on the topic.

Bob: We're looking at the world of online dating and new research in the field. How big is the online dating business?
 
Kara: It’s huge — about $2 billion in revenue every year. And there’s obviously a tremendous range of sites. Some cater to different religious groups or various ethnicities, some try to position themselves as more casual dating sites and some are for more serious, long-term relationships.
 
Bob: And why have people embraced online dating, even though there’s lots of ways to meet people in real life?
 
Kara: That’s a fascinating question, and I put it to Mikolaj Piskorski, a professor at Harvard Business School who has looked at why online dating is so appealing. He says that in the first place, online relationships — even relationships on Facebook, which are often not romantic — let you slip outside the bounds of real-world or “offline” interaction. With all of the information people put on their profiles, you can find out things that it would be inappropriately nosy to ask about directly.
 
Bob: Websites like Facebook often do let you get around social conventions.
 
Kara: Yes, and Piskorski says that’s part of the key to a website’s success. It has to offer added value and give you something you just can’t get in the real world. That ability to look at people’s pictures and read about them is a kind of secret pleasure that both Facebook and dating sites allow.
 
But dating sites also have incorporated “real-world” ways of meeting people into their structure. So Piskorski says that there are essentially three types of dating sites: sites that orbit around shared activities, sites that act as a mutual friend and help set you up with a few people who might be good for you and sites that feature lots of pictures of people and are a little like online bars.
 
Bob: Is there a site that works best?
 
Kara: It depends a bit on who you are. Let’s take the bar-like sites like OKCupid and match.com. Many people who are most likely to get asked out at an actual bar are most likely to get asked out online. But, interestingly, the people who are least likely to find a match in the offline world tend to look at the most pictures and information about potential dates. Piskorski says that part of the reason for this is that they’re being careful. These are also the people who are mostly likely to not receive an email back from someone they’d like to go out with. So those sites can end up really injuring self-esteem and making people doubt their attractiveness and ability to get a date.
 
Bob: It sounds, then, like online bars have some real downsides.
 
Kara: They do. However, research shows that some of the same people who do poorly on those sites often do much better on sites like eHarmony, which acts like a friend setting two mutual friends up on a date. The idea there is that because they know a lot about you, they’re well equipped to say that person A has a chance of liking person B.
 
Bob: So, does the research indicate that it’s better to meet someone online or offline?
 
Kara: What online companies excel most at is bringing you advantages that don’t exist in the offline world. So, for example, there’s no bar that you could walk into in Boston and see thousands of people, along with profiles. And while sites like eHarmony act as mutual friends, they know far more single people than anyone’s real friends could. So that’s their advantage.
 
Piskorski says that when people ask him what sites give them the best chance of finding a long-term partner, he recommends sticking with the sites that limit the number of contacts you get and help you navigate the process — like eHarmony or Chemistry.com. The idea is that bar-type sites can do people a disservice because people come in thinking that they want to go out with someone who looks a certain way. But real attraction is often unexpected, so being willing to break out of the mold that you initially think is essential can end up being very effective in online dating.

 
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — Who are the companies that will make or break the Boston tech scene? Well, if you look at private companies that have raised more than $50 million in venture capital, a few stand out. There’s HubSpot in online marketing, Jumptap in mobile advertising, Veracode in software security and Wayfair in e-retail. They’re all pretty far along, and all are trying to transform their sectors or create new markets. Together, they’ll help define the future of the tech industry in Massachusetts — whether or not they succeed.
 
Meanwhile, in life sciences news, Waltham-based ImmunoGen has started human trials of a new treatment for ovarian cancer. The company has plenty of big pharmaceutical partners like Genentech, but it owns the new drug all by itself.
 
Our deal of the week is a $12 million venture round for Paydiant, a mobile software startup in Wellesley, Mass., that helps banks and retailers handle transactions by cell phone.
 
And lastly, one more make-or-break company from the local tech scene. Kayak, the online travel firm based in Connecticut and Concord, Mass., is getting ready to raise more than $80 million in an IPO that could hit as early as next week. Let’s hope there are no more sharks in the water by then.
 

The weekly roundup of business, technology and life science news from our partners at Xconomy.com airs every Friday on 89.7 Boston Public Radio.

 

At 101 years old, Florence Detlor is one of the oldest people on Facebook. She says she's always been someone who wants to keep up on the cutting edge of technology.

"Because that's what makes one time different from another," she says.

When Detlor was born, in 1911, the telephone was a futuristic, fringe technology. These days, she reads novels on her Kindle and updates her Facebook timeline on her third computer. She's an exceptional person — but not as exceptional as you might think.

"For the first time, half of adults 65 and older are online," says Mary Madden, a researcher at the Pew Center's Internet and American Life Project.

That's up from just 14 percent in 2000, when the project started. She says the number of seniors online has really taken off in the past year, and the biggest driver is happening offline, in outreach. That outreach includes classes like the one librarian Josh Soule teaches.

Soule's "Facebook for Seniors" class is usually full, with students who have never used the website before. Henriette Bard doesn't even own a computer.

"I made a big mistake in my life when I should have learned about computers years ago, when my husband was alive," she says. "I didn't, and now I started at 92, just started to learn how to use a computer."

Most of the hourlong class is spent limiting the amount of personal information that's shared on the site. Sharing too much makes these seniors nervous; they're used to socializing one-on-one.

"I imagine it's like talking to people, like email," Bard says.

She learns that it's more complicated than that: Even with privacy settings, most of the action on Facebook is out in front of all of your friends at once. That makes seniors like Tina Santorineou uncomfortable.

"You miss the personal touch, you know," she says. "You don't connect with this person, you connect with everybody. But I don't want to do that."

But like most seniors, she appreciates that younger users do, like her 14-year-old grandniece.

"If you go to her wall, you can see thousands of — or I don't know how many — pictures she has. It's amazing," Santorineou says.

Grandkids — and their pictures — are a magnet for seniors, pulling them into a new social space at a time when most of them are socializing less.

"People actually narrow down their social networks as they grow older," says Shyam Sundar, professor of communications at Penn State.

Sundar thinks websites like Facebook can help seniors fight that isolation. He compares the sites to an ongoing Thanksgiving dinner. However, that only works for people who already have friends and family to fill the seats at the table — people like Detlor, the 101-year-old.

"Family is there, friends are there. I think maybe more friends than family," she says.

In the past couple of months, she's added more than 200 new Facebook friends.

Copyright 2012 WNYC Radio. To see more, visit http://www.wnyc.com/.

Ads, ads, everywhere. (Jumptap)

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — There’s a lot of activity in mobile advertising again. Jumptap, a Boston-area mobile tech company, has raised a new venture round that brings its total funding to over $120 million. The rumor around town is that the company will either go public or get acquired by someone like Amazon.com. In the past 5 years, Boston has seen a number of big mobile-ad acquisitions, such as AOL buying Third Screen Media, Apple buying Quattro Wireless and PayPal buying Where.
 
Speaking of mobile ads, we’re keeping an eye on a new crop of local startups in the sector, including Session M, Adelphic Mobile, Celtra and CraveLabs, which helps businesses create mobile ads through Facebook status updates.
 
Our two deals of the week have to do with building the data center of the future. Burlington-based DynamicOps, an IT spinout from Credit Suisse, is being acquired by virtualization giant VMware. And on the networking side, Nashua, N.H.– and Cambridge-based startup Plexxi has raised a total of almost $50 million in VC funding as it goes after big players like Cisco and HP.
 
Finally, Avid, the Burlington audio and video tech firm, is selling off its consumer product lines to companies in R.I. and Canada. Counting a round of layoffs, Avid will lose 20 percent of its staff, or about 350 employees.

The weekly roundup of business, technology and life science news from our partners at Xconomy.com airs every Friday on 89.7 Boston Public Radio.

The National Weather Service says that this year, it will begin pushing text notifications to cellphones that alert users to hazardous weather conditions.

The text notifications will be sent to those people within the location of the severe weather. The Weather Emergency Alerts could also be used for local emergencies that require evacuation, AMBER alerts and presidential alerts "during a national emergency," the Weather Service said.

Tech site The Verge reports:

"The Wireless Emergency Alerts system will notify people of approaching tornadoes, hurricanes, typhoons, tsunamis, flash floods, extreme winds, blizzards and ice and dust storms by sending an up-to-90 character message to their smartphone. The system is only compatible with newer devices, and will not be available in all areas, but the NWS says that "millions of smartphone users" will start receiving messages soon. Apple intends to support the service this fall, but it's not clear whether the support will be limited to new hardware, or if all its devices will receive an update."

The Weather Service says users can opt out of the service.

The CTIA says that AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and Verizon are all participating in the system. They have more information on whether your phone is supported at their website.

Copyright 2012 National Public Radio. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.

 
BOSTON — Everyone knows what happens once you’re inside a taxi. You might gaze out the window, check your phone or watch what’s on the little television screen. Every now and then, you lean over to take a peek at the meter to get an idea of what the tally is.

Now think about that taxi ride experience as a blind passenger.

In God we trust; all others pay fare

Jim Denham described the problem: “Finding a cab that knows the route, trusting a cab driver ... You have to really trust them because you can’t read that meter."

Denham is blind. He is also the director of assistive technology at the Perkins School for the Blind. He’s got all sorts of smartphone apps and gadgets that help him get around. But even with all those apps and gadgets, he still needs to rely entirely on the cab driver to know what his fare is.

“Making sure that they are taking you the same route that you think you should take, that they’re not going to drive around the block just to run up their meter a bit — it’s just something to be cautious about," Denham said.

The bigger benefit is that it’s a step closer to independence. Even something as simple as knowing your fare is empowering. And soon, in the City of Boston, blind passengers will get some help. Thanks to new technology, that television screen in the back of the cab will soon be talking to the visually impaired.

The technological solution

A CMT card for blind taxi passengers. (Danielle Dreilinger/WGBH)

“We said let’s take the existing technology and see if we can extend it and come up with a solution for the visually impaired," said Jesse Davis, CEO of Creative Mobile Technologies, a New York–based company that makes those TVs that are in the backseats of taxis in major cities all over the country.

“When you hear the frustration out of the community about something as simple as going to the ATM or how intimidating it can be if you are in a cab to make sure that you really are paying the proper amount — I mean, it’s an extremely unnerving position to be in," said Davis.

In collaboration with advocacy group Lighthouse International, CMT devised a way to turn those televisions into touch screens with audio capability for the blind. Here’s how it works: Lighthouse International issues cards that look like credit cards, with a magnetic strip. Inside the cab, the passenger swipes the card through the credit card slot. That activates the TV screen, turning it into a touch screen, and the audio prompt greets the passenger and tells the rider how to operate the device.

I asked Denham to go for a ride to test out this new technology.
 
The system in action

Once we step inside the cab, Denham feels around and immediately finds the credit card machine. He swipes the card through, and the TV screen suddenly greets us with a wobbly automated voice: “Welcome. You’ve entered Cab B0321.” On the screen, four large squares replace the weather forecast and stock market figures. The voice prompt instructs us on how to control volume settings by tapping certain sections of the screen.

So far, Denham is pleased.

“I like how they’re using the corner of the screen to quickly identify things. And it makes it easy to find the different pieces of information, but the speech is a little difficult to understand. They could use a better speech synthesizer. But still, it’s not horrible. It’s nice getting the fare — it’s nice to be able to quickly identify that," Denham says.

I think the automated voice sounds British, but Denham disagrees, contending, "I don’t know if that’s a British voice. I think that’s just one of the synthesizers that’s out there."

The screen after a passenger has swiped the CMT card. (Cristina Quinn/WGBH)

While Denham and I politely avoid a debate over the dialect of the software, he feels his way around the screen.

“I’m surprised there’s not a headphone jack. But it’s really nice that when I swiped the card, it immediately started talking. That’s a really nice feature. I mean just to know, ‘Hey, the system is working,’" says Denham.

The screen is connected to the meter so as our ride continues, the voice states the fare increases. When we pull into the parking lot at Perkins, it tells us how much we owe and the prompt allows Denham to decide how much he wants to tip and guides us through the payment process.

CMT’s software gets an overall thumbs-up from Denham: “That was some neat technology. I think it is a great thing. It fosters independence. Minor improvements could be made; I think the speech could be a little clearer. But I think it’s a great system, and I’m really happy that it’s going into more cabs.”

With the technology down, the logistics

But the next part is pretty tricky: how to distribute all those cards out to the blind community. This is something Kim Charlson, first vice president of the American Council of the Blind, is concerned about.

“It is a challenge to reach people blind or visually impaired because they don’t use the traditional newspapers and mail and things like that," said Charlson. At her office inside the Talking Book Library at Perkins, her guide dog German Shepherd Dolly rests at her feet, under her desk.

“We have to use alternative ways to communicate — through agencies and organizations of the blind, including information in newsletters, audio, Braille, large print so that we can get the word out to people," Charlson said.

The technology is already up and running in New York City and San Francisco. Currently there are 1200 cabs in the city with CMT technology. It will be a few months before it’s launched full-scale in Boston: City officials here want to work out the kinks. When they do, it’ll be a major step toward greater independence for the blind community and a life with fewer boundaries.
 
 

 
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — Companies are going public in Massachusetts. In fact, the first IPOs to list on the Nasdaq since Facebook are Bay State companies Tesaro, a cancer drug developer, and Exa, a maker of design software for vehicles. Both had modest debuts this week. But meanwhile, another recently minted public company is trying to create the future of retail. Burlington-based Demandware makes software designed to help brands and retailers reach more shoppers online. The company, which is valued at over $700 million, is going after fashion and luxury brands — avoiding low-end commodities, where Amazon is dominant.
 
In other innovation news …
 
A new report shows that in the first quarter of 2012, venture investing by corporations hit its lowest dollar sum in over a year. Massachusetts saw the majority of corporate VC money go to its health care startups.
 
Our deal of the week goes to Cambridge-based Seaside Therapeutics. The company has a new partnership with Swiss pharmaceutical giant Roche to develop drugs for autism spectrum disorders.
 
And fellow Cambridge startup Nara Logics has launched a website that’s designed to work like the human brain. It adapts to consumers’ preferences to help them discover new restaurants. Sounds like it could ­help us all branch out a bit this weekend.
 

The weekly roundup of business, technology and life science news from our partners at Xconomy.com airs every Friday on 89.7 Boston Public Radio.

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — Can playing video games make you healthier? That’s the idea behind the “gamification” of health care, a big trend we’re seeing in the Boston tech scene and beyond. Companies and apps are using techniques from the gaming world to help people improve their health and fitness. For example, GymPact uses cash to motivate people to exercise. Healthrageous helps companies provide personalized fitness advice. And MeYou Health uses social-gaming rewards to help employers promote healthy behaviors. If all else fails, of course, you can try eating right and working out more.
 
Speaking of health care, the Biotechnology Industry Organization reports that the number of life sciences jobs in Massachusetts rose 3.4 percent from 2007 to 2010, even as national employment in the industry fell by 1.4 percent during the recession.
 
Our deal of the week is a $30 million funding round for Rethink Robotics, formerly known as Heartland Robotics. The Boston startup has raised more than $60 million to develop a new type of robot for manufacturing.
 
And finally, a N.H. company called Juliet Marine Systems claims to have built the world’s fastest underwater vehicle. The ship uses “supercavitation” — a big bubble around its hull — to reduce friction and glide through the waves. Sounds like a pretty good way to beat the heat this week.

The weekly roundup of business, technology and life science news from our partners at Xconomy.com airs every Friday on 89.7 Boston Public Radio.

 
BOSTON — Massachusetts high school students will soon be required to take at least 3 years of lab-based science classes to get into the state's public universities. The Massachusetts Department of Higher Education announced the new entry requirements on June 19.
 
Currently, students looking to get into a four-year university in Massachusetts have to take 3 years of high school science but only 2 of them need to be lab-based. And those classes have to be in biology, physics or chemistry.
 
Starting in 2017, high school seniors will need to have 3 years of lab-based science courses instead of 2. And classes in computers, engineering and technology will count.
 
Massachusetts Education Secretary Paul Reville said the new entry requirements would better prepare Massachusetts college grads to compete in key industries.
 
“Engineering and technology should be a prominent part of our curriculum and part of our admissions requirements," he said. "Because that’s where the future is in terms of jobs that are coming to Massachusetts."
 
He added that the emphasis on experimentation and problem-solving would persuade more kids with scientific inclinations to stay in the sciences:
 
"We have what I call an 'inspiration gap' in Massachusetts. We do better than any other state on average in terms of student test scores in math and science. And yet when our students expressed what they’re interested in majoring in college, we are well below the national average in terms of interest expressed in STEM majors. Kids aren’t excited."
 
Reville said he worries traditional science education shuts out too many kids at a time when the state needs more scientists and lab technicians.
 

 
BOSTON — Do you remember Friday nights at the Museum of Science in high school and college? Laser lights, special effects and Pink Floyd and Zeppelin. This summer it's back — but with a local band and a 21st-century touch. 
 
"The technology is video projection, but like video projection on steroids," said David Rabkin, director of the Museum of Science planetarium.
 
To be exact, it isn't actually a laser show.
 
"It's all digital video, there's no lasers involved," he explained. "The range of colors and the detail and the motion that we can do now, there's just no comparison. It's a completely different media."
 
Using the same 3-D digital animation software that engineers at Pixar use, the Museum of Science staff have animated an album's worth of '70s-style rock music by the band Ghosts of Jupiter.
 
The result is a trippy movement through space, the human body and whirling geometric shapes. At times it can even induce a little vertigo.
 
The show is purely entertainment, Rabkin said, in keeping with the previous, popular laser shows.
 
"It was sort of this cultural icon, and I think sort of a rite of passage is a good way to think about it. Sort of a touchpoint in Boston," he said.
 
Rabkin called this the most technologically advanced digital theater in New England, thanks to a $9 million renovation that was completed last year and funded through the Charles Hayden Foundation and private donations.
 
And he was eager to point out that the museum isn't just for children. The new animation and other planetarium shows are attracting lots of adults, including Ghosts of Jupiter guitarist Johnny Trama.
 
"When I first came to town I think I was here every weekend. That's why this is like really cool," Trama said. "Back then it was just a couple of squiggly lines in the dark. Now it's — I mean, you're literally flying through space. It's pretty cool."
 
 
"The Ghosts of Jupiter: Music Experience" opens June 22 at the Museum of Science.

Twenty-three years ago, MIT wanted to find the very best start-up ideas out there. What new companies were waiting to be born? What inventions could change our lives?

Today, the winners of MIT’s 100K Entrepreneurship Competition have, together, created businesses worth $16 billion and generated nearly 5,000 new jobs.

A screen shot from filepickr.io, the first product from the team that created CloudTop, this year's MIT 100K winner.

But the competition is stiff. 

This weekend, we meet the winners of this year's challenge, who may have started the next big thing — while trying to finish their homework. And we'll hear about some fascinating entrants in the competition, like Liquiglide -- which promises to help you get that last bit of ketchup or mayonnaise out of the bottle -- and IoVista, a small device which helps residents of poor countries get a prescription for glasses.

Guests:  

• Alice Francis, co-managing director, MIT's $100K Entrepreneurship Competition

• Brett van Zuiden, co-founder, CloudTop

• Liyan David Chang, co-founder, CloudTop

Crews set up for the conference on June 14, 2012. (BIO)

BOSTON — Boston is the hub of biotech, says Geoff MacKay, president and CEO of Organogenesis. But as the Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO) International Convention starts on June 18, some people are expressing doubts as to whether the sector is really creating jobs in the region and whether other parts of the world are catching up.

MacKay talked to WGBH News about the convention, innovative developments in biotech, potential job growth and how Boston can stay on top in the industry.
 
On why the convention is returning to Boston after 5 years
 
"Each year they go to a different city. It hasn’t been too long since they were in Boston. The reason for the quick return is just that it is the city that is the most successful for the event. We anticipate over 15,000 industry leaders and representation from almost every state in the country and 65 other countries. When you compare that to some of the previous states it just hasn’t been as big a draw."
 
On how biotech has created jobs
 
"Today we have 48,000 employees that come from 500 companies in the state working in the biotech industry … over the last decade, that’s a 50 percent increase in job growth. The ecosystem … is vibrant. It includes world-class academic institutions, medical centers and a venture capital community that puts hundreds of millions of dollars back into the community, investing in risky, innovative adventures every year."
 
On the problems faced when bringing new drugs to the market
 
"There are always challenges bringing these to market. If you look at the cost of getting a new drug to market, depending on the methodology of how you evaluate it, it’s anywhere from $500 million to $2 billion to get a drug candidate through the incredibly arduous pre-clinical, clinical and regulatory process just to demonstrate safety efficacy and tolerability to the satisfaction of the FDA. And that can take 10 to 15 years."
 
On innovative developments
 
"The thing that excites me more than anything is finally the arrival of personalized medicine — targeted treatments in cancer and other areas. The second area, which is more near and dear to my heart, is stem cells and regenerative medicine, which is what as an Organogenesis employee is what I focus on."
 
On Boston maintaining its prominent position in biotech
 
"The most important way it can hold on is to realize just how critical it is to the Massachusetts state system…It’s important that the message isn’t lost, we are in an ultra-competitive industry, biotechnology life science, and that we’re winning — by any measure, Massachusetts is the winner…We’re winning but it’s so fragile and the root cause of why Massachusetts is in the lead is because it’s the healthy cross section between industry, venture capital, academia, and government. And so what can we do? We have to foster that interaction."
 
On why the biotech industry is “fragile”
"It’s fragile because of the competition…I think some of the infrastructure that exists isn’t going to go away —the best schools, the best hospitals, the critical mass of industry… So I think we have to really look at the value proposition offered by Massachusetts and ask ourselves how can we continue to be the most competitive environment for young high-growth companies. The flattening of the world is and opportunity but it’s also a risk for us because the companies are more mobile than they’ve ever been before."
 

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — Can anyone make a battery that’s durable and lasts longer than the status quo? A123 Systems thinks it can — and just in time. The Boston-area cleantech company has been struggling with layoffs and lost revenues, but says it has a new lithium-ion battery that is better and cheaper for electric vehicles. The technology could also be used to store energy for the electric grid. A123 plans to hire 400 new workers in Michigan, as it ramps up production in a tough climate for energy companies.
 
In other innovation news…
 
Waltham-based Constant Contact is expanding in Web marketing with its acquisition of New York startup SinglePlatform, which helps restaurants and businesses list their menus and products online. The acquisition could be worth up to $100 million including earn-outs.
 
Our deal of the week goes to Boston-based Rhythm Pharmaceuticals, a developer of drugs for diabetes and obesity. The two-year-old company has raised $25 million in new venture funding.
 
And Ministry of Supply, a startup out of MIT, has launched a campaign on the Kickstarter website to support production of its high-tech, thermal-regulating dress shirts. It joins Blank Label as another local apparel company using crowd-sourced funding to roll out new products. 
 

The weekly roundup of business, technology and life science news from our partners at Xconomy.com airs every Friday on 89.7 Boston Public Radio.

This week, we look at the power of crowdsourcing. What happens you pool wisdom, ideas, solutions — even money?

First, we look at the crowdsourcing phenomenon, Kickstarter. A company started less than three years ago by a few guys who thought that people might be able to get friends and colleagues to fund each other’s projects.

"It's a website where people raise money for creative projects. People make films, they make records, they do art, photography, food -- any sort of thing that springs from the imagination. Someone comes on, and they say what they want to do, and they invite the public and their network to contribute money to their project," explained co-founder Yancey Strickler.

Users set a funding goal when they start their project, and donors' credit cards are only charged if the money is raised.

"It's all or nothing," Strickler said.

We're joined by two inventors and a professor who know Kickstarter well.

Guests:

• John Kestner, co-founder, Supermechanical

• Slava Menn, co-founder, Bike Gotham

• Karim R. Lakhani, assistant professor, Harvard Business School; director, Harvard-NASA Tournament Laboratory

Crowdsourcing for Science, Medicine and Government

Part 2:

The power of crowdsourcing isn't limited to start-ups. Next, we explore the role it plays in science, medicine and even municipal affairs.

Many CEO's are expected to solve problems. But we talk with one whose goal is to find them — medical, environmental, and technical — and send them out to the crowd.

One of those problems was finding a biomarker for Lou Gehrig’s Disease, which would allow scientists to begin working on a cure. And a scientists found it.

Plus, we explore how more cities are using crowdsourcing to identify and solve local problems.

Guests:

• Dwayne Spradlin, CEO, Innocentive

• Nigel Jacob, co-chair, Boston's New Office of Urban Mechanics

• Melanie Leitner, chief scientific officer, Prize4Life