TECHNICIAN
tuesday september
25 2012
Raleigh, North Carolina
technicianonline.com
Startups recruit students Jake Moser Staff Writer
COURTESY OF JIM COLMAN
A Scientist at ImagineOptix, a company of the Fast Fifteen, demonstrates new optical thin film technology that may be applied to create battery-efficient projectors.
Prompting innovation on campus
Mark Herring Editor-in-Chief
Chancellor Randy Woodson’s final 2011-2020 strategic plan committed N.C. State to doubling the number of startup companies that come out of the University from about five to 10. At the time, there was no overseeing body dedicated to managing University startups, but the Office of Technology Transfer accepted Woodson’s challenge to prompt local economic development. N.C. State’s reputation as a pow-
erhouse for technological research made the University a licensing giant in the past, according to Wade Fulghum, assistant director of New Venture Services, the department OTT formed in response to Woodson’s Springboard Innovation Partnership Portal. Fulghum said while licensing and patenting technology reflects the innovative clout of any institution, the local community couldn’t directly benefit from the breakthroughs in technology. “From an economic development perspective, the real win is to have
deep roots to the local community,” Fulghum said. “If we have technology to license that to a worldwide company, that doesn’t really create jobs here.” Fulghum said startups are much more difficult—they don’t have the financial backing a lot of key licensees would have. “It’s hard to get the right team together, the investments, find the right market and start a company,” Fulghum said. Fulghum and his director, Russell Thomas, are responsible for seeing through the development of the
startups. To heed the Chancellor’s expectation, New Venture Services created the Five Fifteen, a class of 15 startups. “The idea was, if we had a highlighted portfolio of 15 companies that received a yearlong customized support from New Venture Services and all the network we could bring to bear on these companies, hopefully eight would make it through that first year and have a much better chance of commercialization,”
FAST 15 continued page 2
As governor’s race heats up, so do independents
Venture for America is a new nonprofit organization that is using college graduates and entrepreneurship in an effort to revitalize the country’s economy. VFA is a two-year fellowship program that matches college graduates so they can learn about entrepreneurship and eventually create their own businesses. The program centers its efforts on startup companies in growing cities with low costs of living. The program has gained a lot of attention this year, and was the subject of a recent New York Times article. VFA was founded by Andrew Yang, a Yale law school graduate, after noticing many students from top schools choose careers at consulting and banking firms because they are traditional paths to success. Yang did not see this as meaningful work, and wanted to create a formal path to entrepreneurship instead. Steven Mazur, a senior in chemical engineering, is an intern and campus ambassador for VFA whose job is to spread the word about the new program. The main goal for VFA is to improve the economy by creating 100,000 jobs by 2025, according to Mazur. “The ultimate goal is job creation,” Mazur said. “They truly believe, and I agree, that this is the way America can be revitalized and improved.” VFA also deals with startups in struggling cities – like Detroit and New Orleans – that do not have a big entrepreneurial presence. However, the program also includes cities that have a low cost of living because this is encouraging to small startup
VENTURE continued page 2
insidetechnician WALTER DALTON:
PAT MCCROY:
BARBARA HOWE:
DONALD KREAMER:
Website: www.daltonformc.com Twitter: @walterdalton Facebook: WalterDaltonNC
Website: www.patmccory.com Facebook: PatMcCroryNC Phone: 919-424-7128
Website: www.barbarahowe.net Twitter: @Howe4Governor Facebook: howe4governor Phone: (919) 690-1423
Website: www.kreamer2012.org Facebook: donald.kreamer Phone: 919-213-0913 Email: kreamer2012@gmail.com
Elizabeth Moomey Staff Writer
Donald Kreamer, a write-in candidate for North Carolina governor, is providing a break from the typical two-party system — which is what 68 percent of voters want, according to his website. Kreamer is basing his platform on three essential ideas: the economy, education and unemployment. He is concentrating on the education of high school and elementary school students, but not college students. “We have a pretty good college education system. Just getting them there is the problem,” Kreamer said. The drop-out rate is high in North Carolina, where 27 percent of students leave school without getting a diploma compared to the national average of 28 percent, according to BoostUp.org. The high drop-out rate affects the unemployment rate as well, which is an important component of Kreamer’s platform. High school dropouts
have a 72 percent greater chance of fund, so he has had to be socially being unemployed than high school responsible. “I have a website and videos on graduates, according to a study by YouTube,” Kreamer said. “We are the U.S. Department of Labor. Kreamer also emphasizes the im- not the ‘1 percent-ers;’ we don’t have portance of small businesses in re- the money, so we are using modern storing North Carolina’s economy, technology.” While the state typically has saying they are the backbone. He candidates from said he hopes to two parties in an “level out the playelection, the active ing field” and make candidates running them more comfor North Carolina petitive with larger governor the eleccorporations. tion are RepubliKreamer considcan Pat McCrory, ers himself a midDemocrat Walter dle-of-the-road Dalton and Libcandidate, not conDonald Kreamer, indepedent ertarian Barbara servative or liberal, candidate for governor Howe. because of his expePat McCror y’s rience of leading a campaign does not seem to be fazed business for at-risk teens. “I have worked with everyone,” by Kreamer because it is has a more Kreamer said. “Being homeless is diverse base. “We are focusing on republicans, just the same as having a million democrats, unaffiliated and first dollars.” Kreamer has had to personally fi- time voters,” Ricky Diaz, Pat Mcnance the majority of his campaign Crory’s press secretary, said.
“We have a pretty good college system. Just getting there is the problem.”
McCrory’s platform emphasizes fixing the economy, making the government more responsive to businesses, updating the tax code, unleashing the state’s energy resources, creating a future vision for transportation and infrastructure, reforming education, and giving more opportunities to key industries, according to his website. Dalton’s campaign emphasizes the need of creating jobs, keeping families safe, restoring education funding, treating teachers as professionals, modernizing the classrooms and cleaning up Raleigh, according to his website. Howe’s platform supports promoting jobs instead of getting in the way, empowering parents to educate their children, ending corporate welfare, instituting the end of the death penalty and protecting individual rights. Write-in candidates generally run because they think the main
RACE continued page 2
Few surprises at this year’s Emmys See page 5.
Freshman deserves chance to state See page 8.
viewpoint features classifieds sports
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