Biotech, Pain, Regenerative Medicine Luke Timmerman wrote: Biogen Idec’s scientists have a vision for regenerative medicine, and it has nothing to do with what’s been written and said about embryonic stem cells. Deep in Biogen’s pipeline, on the verge of entering clinical trials, are a pair of regenerative medicines that the company hopes will beco…

cleantech, energy, Solar Luke Timmerman wrote: The global cleantech industry stayed on a bull run despite a shaky economy in 2008, but the momentum is bound to slow down this year. That was the key finding from a report released yesterday by Portland, OR-based Clean Edge, a consulting firm. The three major clean energy sectors—solar photovoltaics, …

IT, market research, product development Wade Roush wrote: Focus groups are such a standard part of our market-driven culture that they’ve long since become the subject of parody. Decision-makers are seen as being afraid to act without consulting them; surely, no political party would pick a candidate, no legislator would introduce a big policy ini…

wireless, South Korea, regulation Bruce V. Bigelow wrote: Qualcomm said today the Korean Fair Trade Commission has made allegations about “the lawfulness of certain business practices.” The company says the allegations, set forth in a case examiner’s report, relate to Qualcomm’s integration of multimedia technologies into its chipsets, which are wi…

startups, VC, Awards Gregory T. Huang wrote: Entrepreneur resource site Seattle 2.0 has announced it is hosting a startup awards ceremony on May 7 at the Pacific Science Center in Seattle. Nominations are open from now until March 25 in 10 categories including best startup, best venture capitalist, best angel investor, and best startup technologist…

Biotech, Stem Cells, Politics Randall Moon wrote: The Obama campaign, and subsequently his administration, had been hinting for a long time that it would allow researchers to use federal funds to study human embryonic stem cell “lines” which had, under the policies of President Bush, been legal to study only with private funding. Considering the re…

deals, VC, healthcare Gregory T. Huang wrote: Enclarity, a healthcare IT company based in Aliso Viejo, CA, announced today it has closed a $5.5 million Series C round led by Bellevue, WA-based Ignition Partners and Boston, MA-based Bain Capital Ventures. The funds will be used for R&D and product development. Enclarity makes software that helps com…

survey, Software. Internet, Communications Juha-Pekka Tikka wrote: A survey released today by Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) says San Diego is the best midsize city in the United States for remote working. The nationwide survey commissioned by the Redmond, WA, software giant found that U.S. employers generally support remote-working programs, although ju…

Life Sciences, bioassays, pharmaceuticals Wade Roush wrote: Seahorse Bioscience, a North Billerica, MA-based maker of instruments for studying mitochondrial function in cells from people with various health problems, announced yesterday that it has acquired BioProcessors Corp., a Woburn, MA, company that makes automated cell-culture equipment for p…

Stem Cells, funding, Life Sciences Bruce V. Bigelow wrote: [Updated at 2:30 pm with additional commentary. See details below] After President Barack Obama signed a new executive order yesterday that clears the way to resume federal funding for stem cell research, we asked some local Xconomists and other biotech leaders for their reaction. The presi…

Roundup, deals, VC Gregory T. Huang wrote: It was a very quiet week for deals in the Northwest, with just a trickle of activity in software, security, and biotech. —Seattle-based Haute Secure, a software firm focused on computer security against malware, raised about $1.6 million in Series A funding. Investors in the round included Silicon Valley f…

people, Internet, Entrepreneurship Robert Buderi wrote: For entrepreneurs and investors alike, it was a sad day back in January, when Y Combinator founder Paul Graham announced he would stay in Silicon Valley year round and give up splitting his startup incubation activities between Mountain View and Cambridge, MA, where Y Combinator has traditiona…

Biotech, cancer, vaccines Luke Timmerman wrote: Flameouts are the norm for any company that dares to try to stimulate the body’s immune system to fight cancer cells. Cell Genesys, Genitope, Favrille, and Antigenics have been added to the long list of companies that have stumbled in this promising field that hasn’t yet produced a single FDA-approved…

Mobile TV, Digital TV Conversion, wireless Bruce V. Bigelow wrote: The digital broadcast center for Qualcomm’s MediaFLO mobile TV service is a hushed, dimly lit room in San Diego that is dominated by 24 flat-screen, rear-projection screens mounted along one wall. The engineers in the room face these ever-changing displays at work stations equipped …

Life Sciences, consulting, management Wade Roush wrote: The old joke about management consultants is that they’ll look at your watch, tell you what time it is, and hand you a bill for $50,000. But if you’re a healthcare company and you hire Scientia Advisors, here’s what’s more likely to happen: they’ll look at your watch, notice that it’s running …

Mobile Mapping, wireless, Web 3.0 Juha-Pekka Tikka wrote: In Finland I am a reporter for Ilta-Sanomat, Helsinki’s second-largest newspaper. I write about Finland’s Nokia a lot, so I may have a different perspective on Qualcomm, the San Diego-based chipset maker. For us Finns, Nokia is a larger-than-life, close-to-home success story. We speak the sa…

wireless, 3G, Broadband Juha-Pekka Tikka wrote: San Diego-based Leap Wireless (NASDAQ: LEAP) today is launching its Cricket unlimited wireless service in the greater Philadelphia area. That’s the second major market the low-cost wireless provider has entered since January, when Cricket began service in Chicago. The company, which announced its move…

cleantech, Biofuels, energy Luke Timmerman wrote: Lots of creative entrepreneurs are popping up in the Northwest cleantech business, so we invited three of them to explain their ideas at our upcoming Xconomy Forum, The Rise of Cleantech in the Northwest, on March 26. These new special guests will offer up expertise in biofuels, energy storage, and …

Software, products, Social Networking Gregory T. Huang wrote: In the burgeoning software hub of Portland, OR, one company is breaking new ground today. Jive Software, a maker of “social business software” that helps employees communicate with each other and manage their work information, is releasing a new product called SBS 3.0. The software is ta…

IT, Software, innovation Wade Roush wrote: Henry Chesbrough, the UC Berkeley business professor who wrote the influential 2003 book Open Innovation, argued that companies need to do a better job of incubating, cataloguing, and licensing the knowledge and inventions they have in-house, and of bringing in intellectual property from outside, if that’s…