Perpetual Innovation

Author: BizMan

  • Top 10 Crowdfunding Sites For Fundraising – Forbes

    Top 10 Crowdfunding Sites For Fundraising – Forbes:

    So you wanna get funding?

    The first and fastest way, always, is to go to friends and family. They know you after all, and in spite of that, they may — just may — be willing and able to invest.

    The next best way is to look around the channels of distribution for your product. They are the companies that will understand and appreciate your product/service fastest. Plus they might be able to profit from your addition/expansion in the market. Of course, they may also be in a position to cut you out of the idea entirely… This one of the many reasons for having strong IP (patent) protection.

    Loans from your friendly neighborhood bank might be possible, but usually they require a personal guarantee (of the house and kids), sooooo if you could get a second loan (HLOC) on the house, that would typically be the direct way to fund.

    Credit cards! Not so good an idea, maybe for some working capital.

    If all these fail, you might move on to crowd funding… Or even is some of the other funding approaches works… Crowd funding usually brings with it a degree of advertising and promotion of your concept. That’s good and bad. Now people know about your idea so they can consider investing. But now people know about your idea, so they can steal your idea, maybe. This one of the many reasons for having strong IP (patent) protection. But, I repeat myself, repeatedly.

    Either way, when you go to the crowds, you will definitely get feedback on your idea and how investable it may be.

    So, check out this cool article from Forbes and see what you think about going to the crowds (in the clouds) for (some) funding!?

    Here is a quick summary of the various ways to fund a business and funding methods/types.

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  • Phosphate World and Patent World. Sir John Bennet Lawes, Father of Fertilizer!

    Check out the post at our sister blog SustainZine.com: Phosphate World.

    This blog talks about the phosphate industry in Florida and the nice resort being built out of the rubble of past Phosphate mines over in the Tampa Bay area. That actually is pretty cool, but the point that phosphate fertilizer from mines is non-sustainable, and consequently is a broken business model. Peak Phosphate in the world could arrive by 2030.

    Innovation in preserving and recycling phosphate is critical. More sustainable uses of fertilizer is essential and a responsible way forward.

    But this blog looks at one of the key patents and technological breakthroughs that built the phosphate industry — and consequently, modern farming as we know it.

    Sir John Bennet Lawes is credited as the father of artificial fertilizer. He developed what is referred to as the superphospate fertilizer…. (Many politicians can make such a super fertilizer, only without the patented processes.)

    The inherited owner of the Rothamsted Manor in England, John Bennet Lawes, is credited with inventing the process for extracting useful phosphate from phosphate rock using sulfuric acid. In 1842 he obtained a patent on the process. (This must be only a UK patent since it seems hard to find in the USPTO.)

    Britannica had this to say about Sir John.
    “Lawes inherited his father’s estate, Rothamsted, in 1822. In 1842, after long experimentation with the effects of manures on potted plants and field crops on his estate, he patented a process for treating phosphate rock with sulfuric acid to produce superphosphate. That year he opened the first fertilizer factory, thus initiating the artificial fertilizer industry. The following year, the chemist J.H. (later Sir Henry) Gilbert joined him, and they began a collaboration lasting more than a half century; Lawes considered 1843 the year of the station’s foundation. Together, the pair studied the effects of different fertilizers on crops. They also researched animal nutrition, including the value of different fodders and the sources of animal fat.”

    There are several patents/applications within the last few years related to phosphate (fertilizer). Check out this one, first filed in China, related to extracting phosphate from low-grade rock using a microbial strain.

    And, of course, virtually all GMO seeds/plants are patented — Monsanto, Dupont, a university, etc. 

    Here’s a longer look at Sir John’s life history from Oxford’s DB.  The Rothamsted Research center is still active today, including GMO research.  

  • Google to sell Motorola to Lenovo for $2.91B – FierceWireless

    Google to sell Motorola to Lenovo for $2.91B – FierceWireless:

    This is a pretty good take on the strategic transaction that Google has entered into with Lenovo.

    The headlines will be very misleading related to the Motorola Wireless deal that Google just made for selling the handset division (hardware) to Lenovo. People will look at the almost $12.4B deal where Google bought some 17,000 and the Motorola wireless division that comes with it in May of 2012. and say that Google gooped up on this transaction. (Somewhat reminiscent of the Skype deals where Microsoft ended up with the technology at a small price compared to what eBay paid a few years earlier.)

    This is a very smart deal by Google. Google is apparently keeping all of the software patents. The licensing (cross-licensing) agreements will probably give Google freedom to do whatever they want in the space. It takes them out of the hardware business, which made handset makers nervous (as an unfair competition with the bundle of handsets with Android OS).

    When Google bought Motorola Mobility as a defensive maneuver. The problem is that Google’s “free” operating system and products tromp on thousands and thousands of patents (and copyrights). So they needed the patent portfolio to fight the patent war in computing and mobility. (Just as Microsoft needed the AOL patents.) Steve Jobs and Apple have been very irritated with Google giving away (their) technology; but it is a little more complicated to sue and make money from a product being sold for $0.00 per unit.

    Even though Google gives many of its products way for “free”, it does make quite a lot of money, primarily from advertising. About 70% of Google’s stock value is attributable to its advertising (about half PC and half mobile). Google now is at a market cap of $380B bringing it up quickly onto size of the two largest market cap companies in the world Apple ($450B) and ExxonMobil ($411B) as of Jan 30 2014.

    So now Google has the patent protection they had to have, and they have sold it too. Beautiful. Now they can move into the offensive position in the patent wars. This is a game of Risk, but with multiple dimensions like 3-level chess. There is what you see above the board, but what is below the board — where the patent portfolios live — is where the armies are being amassed.

    Make no doubt, small players will be crushed. Blackberry and maybe even Nokia will likely be completely isolated. Orphaned.

    This will give Samsung a little competition. Samsung dominates the cell phone market, especially among android phones. See add to Samsung Worries. Google can not afford to allow Samsung to get too big and too strong.

    From Googles perspective, this is a work of motion art. Beautiful.

    Other players, say Apple, may not appreciate the beauty of it so much.

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  • The Energy Roadmap – The Edison of our Age: Stan Ovshinsky … Who killed the Electric Car?… a who dun it of history.

    Ovshinsky is compared to Edison as a prolific inventor… He hold patents on NiMH batteries. His solar cells power the MIR space station.
    Good question on Cobasys and the restrictions on next-gen batteries by the patents held within the company.!:-) The batteries that have become so critical in the next generation of batteries, electric cars, etc. are subject to patents by Ovshinsky (and the Cobasys company).
    Cobasys is a 50/50 joint venture with Chevron/Texico and Ovonics. Ovonics has the Stan Ovshinsky inventions and GM now has a big ownership stake in that company.
    So let’s see, a BIG oil and a BIG auto have a BIG stake in the very batteries that make an electric car viable.
    Look at “Patent encumbrances” at Wikipedia. The discussion on “Who Killed the Electric Car?” seem far truer than I ever imagined. This whole topic requires a lot more reading. But before picking up the thread again, I want to watch the movie.
    Anybody out there have big ideas (substantiated by facts, I hope) on the issue.
    Keywords: electric car, EV, oil, auto, battery, patent, patent encumbrances, inventor, Ovshinsky 

    See similar blog over in www.SustainZine.com. 

  • References Cited Per Patent are up 250% in 10 years | Patently-O

    References Cited Per Patent | Patently-O:

    This is interesting how the number of issued patents cited have gone up from about 20 total patents references to about 50.  Over the last 10 years! WOW.

    The additional references from the examiner appears to be consistent at about 5 to 7; but as the comments indicate, some of those may already have already been mentioned in some form by the applicant.

    That is a 250% increase in the number of patents being mention in a patent application.

    Reasons are definitely up for debate!

    WOW!

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