(EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the first article in a two-part series focused on Memphis-based AgLaunch and the non-profit organization’s rapidly evolving programming.) By Tom Ballard, Chief Alliance Officer, PYA You don’t have to be around Pete Nelson very long to feel his genuine passion for the agricultural sector and the

Five experts on various aspects of cybersecurity shared their thoughts, insights and suggestions about operating in the cloud during the Knoxville Technology Council’s (KTech) “lunch and learn” yesterday. It was the newly-launched  KTech’s third event this month that started with the PolitiCode educational session on Election Day (click here to

With our feature post today spotlighting AgLaunch, we thought readers might be interested in a 16,000-square foot food processing and product development facility that opened last week on the 350-acre NC Research Campus in Kannapolis, NC. It represents a nearly $11 million investment. While other innovation labs or similar facilities

Speaking of agriculturally-focused entrepreneurship, the University of Georgia College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences has an initiative called FABricate. It is an entrepreneurship competition and course for students who want to develop and implement ideas in a way that can help feed a growing population. Students develop personal and professional

(EDITOR’S NOTE: This is another in a series of seven articles spotlighting the start-ups that comprise Cohort 3 of Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s “Innovation Crossroads” program.) By Tom Ballard, Chief Alliance Officer, PYA William Fitzhugh recalls that, as an undergraduate student at the University of Colorado Denver, carbon nanotubes were

Two familiar faces to the Knoxville entrepreneurial community are among seven people named to Knoxville Mayor-elect Indya Kincannon’s Transition Team. They are the co-hosts of the annual “Startup Day” – Cortney Piper, Founder of Piper Communications, and Brandon Bruce, Co-Founder of Cirrus Insight and the Knoxville Technology Council and the

Here’s a statistic we have not seen before . . . number of start-ups per 1,000 population. It is part of an initiative that Maryann Feldman, Research Director at the Kenan Institute of Private Enterprise at the University of North Carolina is leading. “It’s sort of a surprise that we

A new PitchBook and All Raise report, “Women in the VC Ecosystem,” found that in 2018, female founders generated $26.3 billion when they exited their companies either through acquisitions or IPOs. The report further noted that, although the percentage is slim, companies with at least one female founder are getting there

XLerateHealth, the Louisville, KY-based nationally-recognized incubator for start-up and early stage healthcare companies, has opened a second operation in downtown Flint, MI. The second location is funded by the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation and 100K Ideas, a non-profit housed in the same building as XLerateHealth and focused on helping would-be

The Tennessee Department of Economic and Community Development has contracted with RTI International to examine the life science sector in the state and present a strategy for its growth by early next year. Jennifer Ozawa, a Senior Economist with RTI, is conducting the study, and she was in Nashville last