The Nubrella

Alan Kaufman has reinvented the umbrella with a product he calls the Nubrella.  It is a wearable umbrella. (It kind of resembles your own portable plastic biosphere.) ”It rests on your shoulders, and straps under your arms,” Kaufman says. “You can ride a scooter with it on, or walk around in 40 mile-per-hour winds. It also blocks the wind chill and keeps you warmer.”

On January 29th, Kaufman, will present his $49 Nubrella to the investors on ABC’s reality show “Shark Tank.” (The show features a panel of five investors who listen to short presentations by entrepreneurs, ask tough questions, and sometimes agree to put money in after a bit of hard-nosed negotiation.)

A regular umbrella on some days just does not work well. In the true spirit of an entrepreneur, Kaufman may have a good idea. Would you be willing to give a Nubrella a try?

Solar Carports?

Suffolk County, New York is exploring the possibility of adding solar carports to county owned parking lots as a way to add more renewable energy to the Long Island Power Authority grid.

In the Southhampton Press, Suffolk County Executive Steve Levy stated utilizing solar carports is “… a win for everybody-as not only do solar carports generate clean energy, but they provide a convenient shelter from hot sun or inclement weather for driver.”

It would be nice to get into a vehicle that is not blazing hot in the summer or covered in snow in the winter, while helping generate clean energy at the same time.

See the artist rendering of what the carport will look like in the Southhampton Press link.

What do you think are solar carports an idea worth exploring for local governments?

Positive News!

Just some positive Buffalo area news that you might have missed. The items below come from Buffalo Business First.

• Concord Textile Care Products is spending $1.1 million dollars to renovate an 88,000 square-foot building on Urban Street, off Fillmore Ave. in Buffalo. Concord Textile is a manufacturer in the garment-cleaning industry and will be producing a new line of green “wet-cleaning” products. The company plans to add 80 jobs with an average annual salary of $36,000.

• Industrial Support Inc., was started in 1996 with just four employees by David Sullivan. The company located at 36 Depot Street in the city of Buffalo provides a diverse range of products in metal fabricating, welding, packaging along with designing and building displays for stores such as Wegmans and Tops. The company has revenues of $7 million and employs 60 people.

• Multisorb Technologies International located in Buffalo makes products to assist with packaging and shipping food, beverages, electronics and healthcare items. The company increased revenues from $52 million in 2007 to $81 million in 2008 and expects to finish 2009 even stronger despite the recession. The company added 70 employees in 2008, bringing total employment to 500.

• Hamburg based K-Technologies is spending $3 million to move to a new Hamburg location 10 times the size of their current 5,400 square-foot building. K-Technologies makes electronic components, cables and harnesses for defense and aerospace contractors. Revenues have grown from $2 million in 2004 to $5 million in 2009. The company plans on hiring 32 employees over the next five years.

Paterson’s Ideas For Change

An editorial in the New York Times highlights some of the ideas Gov. Paterson mentioned in his appearance before the New York State Legislature. Paterson is a desperate man seeking to survive his upcoming election. If desperation and fear is what it takes for people to advocate reform, that’s fine by me.

Some of the ideas proposed by Gov. Paterson are:

• A spending cap
• The creation of a four-year budget, which will assist local governments, instead of a yearly budget
• Eliminating the costly and ineffective Empire Zone economic development program
• Term limits for state elected officials
• Campaign finance reform by limiting contributions to $1,000 instead of the current limit of $55,900 for state races. Limiting lobbyists to $250, end the practice of writing checks to political parties that have no limits at all. Phasing in public financing for campaigns.

• Ban all contributions from corporations, ban transfers from committee to committee, which allows politicians to pile money from various sources into one campaign. He wants to limit personal use of campaign dollars, finally, and he wants to increase penalties for violations of this new law.
• Require everybody earning public money to disclose all outside business income in detail. His bill would even require lawyers to itemize their income and clients.
• Creating a board of financial experts to help oversee the state pension fund. The comptroller is now the sole trustee of $126 billion in pensions.
• End double-dipping by closing a 1995 loophole that permits legislators to collect a state pension along with their legislative salary.
• Proposed a truly independent ethics commission to oversee all branches of the government.

What do you think of Paterson’s ideas?

Gaughan Keeps Pushing

Kevin Gaughan has had great success in shrinking the size of town boards through down sizing ballot initiatives. Shrinking the size of government is a worthwhile goal but I think even more important is reinventing how we govern. Gaughan has now created a committee consisting of town supervisors, board members and citizens to as stated in the Buffalo News, come up with “a fresh approach to how we conduct meetings and how we govern ourselves.”

I attended the first meeting of the committee, which was open to the public. Gaughan’s point is that many town board meetings have huge agendas that go on for hours because they micromanage every little detail without delegating items to department heads or utilizing citizen volunteers. Gaughan had a copy of a recent Amherst town board meeting agenda with attachments that totaled 384 pages!

The Common Council of the City of Buffalo spends time approving banners to advertise events, used car dealer licenses, deli store licenses, items that could be delegated to department heads. One area town board with a $40 million budget, requires town board approval of any expenditure over $1,700. Town boards and city councils should be focusing on big picture items such as establishing policies and monitoring their implementation , not micromanaging every little detail and talking about those details for hours. Gaughan has attended 272 town, village and city council meetings, where he has observed long debates about whether town buildings should have their thermostats at 71 degrees or 72 degrees and how much road salt to buy. It would be great to have elected officials discuss and debate how to attract jobs, and talented people to our area but they are too wrapped up in small time items.

Among the items Gaughan and his committee are looking into are:

• The redesign of town board meeting rooms so that members no longer sit on a raised platform but are placed at desks directly in front and surrounded by citizens. The idea is to reduce residents’ sense that they’re attending a lecture and make them feel that they’re part of a conversation.

• Increase public input by allowing residents to speak when an issue is before the town board. The public can usually speak only at the begining or end of a meeting, leaving residents with the sense that they have no real role in the outcome of an issue.

The design of the Buffalo City Council Chambers is not conducive to making citizens feel involved and part of the conversation when it comes to city government. Councilmembers sit with their backs to the public facing the Council President who sits on a large platform lording over the Chambers. When department heads or members of the public speak, they speak to the backs of Councilmembers. The seating arrangement of the Council Chambers should be changed so that communication with the public can at least occur face to face.

What do you think about attempting to change the focus of governmental board meetings and involving the public more?

Anger Release Machine

Releasing anger at least in appropriate ways is necessary and healthy at times. Some people use stress balls, punching bags, blog posts etc. to release stress.

Well two artists Katja Kublitz and Ronnie Yarisal have actually invented a vending machine to release anger called the Anger Release Machine. Put your money in and select the glassware or china that you want to shatter and break inside the machine. The coils push the item forward and drop it like a bag of chips, except the item loudly shatters and breaks.

While it is an interesting idea, watching something fall and break just does not do it for me as far as releasing anger or stress, the physical act of throwing or smashing something is an important part of releasing anger or stress.

What do you think about this idea and how could it be improved?

Creativity, Meet Destruction

Scott Thurm of the Wall Street Journal recently wrote an interesting article titled Creativity, Meet Destruction. In the article Thurm highlights some of the key changes that occurred in the world of business due to the Web, Globalization and the collapse of two bubbles. While a lot of businesses were destroyed a great deal of creativity also took place.

Consider the following:

• Companies that no longer exist- Anheuser-Busch, Compaq, Gillette, Enron, Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch, WorldCom.
• Google was a mere 15 months old at the beginning of the decade
• Apple’s iPod and iTunes reshaped the music industry and the iPhone revolutionized communications by opening itself to independent innovators

• Ten years ago seven of the world’s 10 most valuable companies were based in the U.S. today only four are, three are based in China, and one each in Brazil, Australia and the U.K.
• GE in 2007 for the first time recorded more revenue from outside the U.S. than inside, joining Coca-Cola and Procter & Gamble
• In 2008, Japan’s Toyota Motor Corp. knocked General Motors Corp. from its 77-year reign as the world’s leading auto maker by units sold. This year, there will be more cars sold in China than in the U.S.

• Oil, selling for $25 a barrel 10 years ago, topped $140 in mid-2008, before retreating
• At decade’s close, the U.S. government owns about 60% of GM, 38% of Citigroup Inc. and 80% of American International Group Inc.

Cool Business Ideas!

Forbes Magazine has released their ten Break Out Business Ideas of 2009.

Invisible speakers. Detergent-strength tap water. Landmine-sniffing rats. Instant whiteboards. A description of five of the top ideas with video links follow. Which idea do you like the best?

Ice Cream On Demand

Moobella, Taunton, Mass. Skip the ice cream parlor with 31 flavors. Moobella’s vending machine pumps out scoops, in 96 flavors, on-demand, in about 45 seconds. This patented technique for churning and freezing ice cream from a room-temperature dairy mix has been 17 years–and nearly $50 million in R&D–in the making. Two prototypes are running at Northeastern University in Boston and Worcester Polytechnic University. Pinnacle Food Services will market the machines mainly to cafeterias in universities, parks and zoos. Cost: $400 per month, plus ingredients. Moobella raised another $18 million in venture funding in September.

See the Moobella video here.

Invisible Speakers

Emo Labs, Waltham, Mass.Emo figured out a way to embed .02-inch-thick-speakers into the edges of televisions and computer screens. Instead of the cones, magnets and voice coils that move sound through traditional speakers, the speakers create sound using small movements and a voltage. The company is still securing partnerships with manufacturers. Target date in stores: end of 2010.

See the Emo Labs video here.

Detergent-Strength Tap Water

Activeion, Rogers, Minn. Faced with the holiday-party aftermath and out of cleaning fluids? Just fill up a bottle with plain old tap water and spray it on the stain. When you press the trigger, Activeion’s bottles move tap water through a small electrical charge that separates the molecules into positive and negative charges and creates bubbles. This bubbly water lifts dirt and bacteria from any surface like a magnet, making it easy to wipe away dirt and grease. Originally aimed at professional cleaning companies, Activeion recently released a home version, retailing for $169 for a 12-oz. bottle.

See the Activeion video here.

Writing On The Wall

IdeaPaint, Cambridge, Mass. Want to spur innovation? Turn every wall, no matter the surface, into a whiteboard. Three recent Babson College graduates created a paint that dries to create a surface that does just that, and any dry-erase marker wipes it completely clean. The paint sells for $3.50 to $4.00 per square foot of coating. After closing a $5 million venture round in December 2009 (following a $5 million round in November 2008), the founders plan to have it in at least one big-box store in early 2010.

See the IdeaPaint video here.

Landmine- and Disease-Sniffing Rats

APOPO, Antwerp, Belgium/ Morogoro, Tanzania. Bart Weetjens spent 10 years learning how to train giant African rats (three feet in length) to detect landmines. His regimen includes clicking noises and food rewards over an eight-month period. While huge by rat standards, the animals are too light to set off the charges and can cover 1,200 square feet in 20 minutes, double the area swept via a metal detector in a day. He’s also figured out how to teach rats to sniff tuberculosis in blood samples. APOPO works with governments in Colombia and Thailand, and with mining companies in Mozambique.

See the APOPO video here.

Video: Best Of BreakOut! 2009

In Pictures: 10 Breakout Business Ideas Of 2009

Video Game Education

Parade Magazine had an interesting article titled Can Video Games Teach Kids? A school in New York City named Quest to Learn, is the first school ever in the U.S. built on the approach of utilizing games as a tool for learning. The entire curriculum of the school, which currently has 72 sixth-grade students is focused on learning via video games instead of textbooks and lectures. The school will add a grade every year until it reaches 12th grade. The students are not just playing fun video games, but games designed to encourage learning. The school is a collaboration between the Parsons School for Design, New Visions for Public Schools and the Institute of Play.

Edward O. Wilson, a respected professor of biology at Harvard recently stated that “Games are the future in education.” Ginger Stevens one of the schools teachers says “Students now live to play games and are immersed in technology, it makes sense to tap into that enthusiasm. Instead of forcing an old model on them, we’re looking at where students are coming from and building a program around that.”

The mother of one of the students indicates in the article that her son who has attention-deficit disorder had difficulty at his previous schools, but is more engaged with his schoolwork than ever before. She states “It’s a great match for him. He’s really enthused about learning, but she admits that as a parent “you have to take a leap of faith” regarding the schools approach.

Quest to Learn has its critics and its approach is not for everyone, but I give them credit for taking a new and innovative approach to education that is a good fit for some students. What do you think about using video games as a learning tool?

Tim Tielman Has A Point

I love people who are dedicated and passionate about what they do. Tim Tielman is passionate about Buffalo’s past and future. The latest web issue of the Planning Commissioner’s Journal features a 7 minute video created by Tielman as he points out some interesting flaws in the design of buildings located in the Buffalo Medical Campus. There are some great things happening at the Medical Campus in terms of new inventions and job creation.

Tielman points out that building design is critical in creating an open inviting visual sense of place that encourages pedestrian activity and economic development. I know some view Tielman as an obstructionist who opposes everything. However, in the video I think Tielman makes excellent points about the design of  Medical Campus buildings. Incorporating Tielman’s ideas in my opinionwould have made a positive improvement to the Medical Campus and the area surrounding it.

Watch the seven minute video with an open mind and comment as to whether you agree or disagree with the points made by Tielman

.http://www.planetizen.com/node/42028