TechTour Day Eleven: Hail, hail to University of Michigan technology The general purpose of the Great Lakes IT Report's twice-a-year Tech Tour is to get your humble narrator out of the Detroit area and into the other half of Michigan -- where just as much cool tech entrepreneurship is going on as is happening in the Lower Peninsula's southeast corner. And sure, I could go to the University of Michigan whenever I feel like it. It's less than a half hour drive from my house, maybe 40 minutes from my office. But there's just no way to ignore Michigan's 800-pound university research gorilla just because it's in nearby Ann Arbor. UM announced last week that its research spending topped $875 million in the 2007-08 fiscal year, a record, and including $100 million in private sector funding. Its tech transfer operation is large, sophisticated and growing. And its spinoff effect in the Ann Arbor area is obvious and indisputable. Friday, I got a look at all three. More.
Compuware stock dives after earnings miss Stock in Compuware Corp. plunged 17.7 percent Friday after the Detroit software and IT services giant said its financial results for its second fiscal quarter ended Sept. 30 would miss expectations. Compuware said some of its customers had deferred technology spending in the face of global economic uncertainty. More.
ReCellular expands phone auction platform
Dexter-based ReCellular Inc. Friday launched an expanded Web-based auction platform for wholesale customers. Every month, ReCellular's AcCellerate auction offers an average of 250,000 call-tested, high-quality, high-yield handsets compatible with GSM, CDMA, TDMA and G3 networks. The auction will now be expanded with offerings from ReCellular's industry partners, including wireless carriers and original equipment manufacturers, which could add another 250,000 additional handsets per month. More.
Diplomat Pharmacy wins spot in multiple sclerosis study
Swartz Creek-based Diplomat Specialty Pharmacy announced Friday that Teva Neuroscience has selected Diplomat Specialty Pharmacy to be one of only three sites to participate in a large scale, national therapy optimization study for multiple sclerosis. The goal of the two-year study is to examine the benefits of a specialty pharmacy therapy management program on compliance, adherence and patient outcomes. More.
Pioneer Surgical gets Chinese distributor
Marquette-based Pioneer Surgical Technology Inc. and Bonovo Orthopedics Inc., a Chinese manufacturer and distributor of orthopedic products, have signed a comprehensive agreement that effectively opens the Chinese market for the distribution and sale of Pioneer’s full portfolio of spine products. More.
The Week Ahead: Let's get creative, city, to attend everything
It's just another typically crazy busy week on the crowded Great Lakes IT Report Michigan IT Calendar, with an astounding 24 events listed this week on the state's most comprehensive IT events calendar, available here.
There's good stuff throughout, with the Creative Cities Summit meeting in Detroit Monday through Wednesday, the monthly meeting of Motor City Connect on Tuesday, a terrific-sounding sustainability event in Grand Rapids on Wednesday, the TM Group's Vision 2006 user event, an Online Technologies Corp. disaster recovery seminar and the Entrepreneurial Initiative for Southeast Michigan on Thursday, a huge eco-sustainability event in Detroit Friday and Saturday, and the "Arbcamp" e-publishing event in Ann Arbor Saturday.
And the following week looks just as busy, with the Convergence 2008 automotive technology conference in Detroit, a sustainability event in Muskegon, a fascinating Wayne State event on the local impacts of climate change, and the University of Michigan's annual IT security conference.
Hey, don't worry -- the holiday event doldrums will get here eventually. In the meantime -- see you out there!
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Economics Dept.: Walsh prof offers talk on market crisis If you're trying to figure out the current economic meltdown, this may be some help. Economist and Walsh College professor David Allardice will hold a conference call titled "The Economy in Crisis: An Economist’s Perspective” on Tuesday, Oct. 14 from 10 to 10:30 a.m. Details on how to listen in here.
GLITR Adopt-a-Family update Our early days of sponsoring Volunteers of America's Adopt A Family have produced good results. In the first official response, Ann Arbor Spark has agreed to sponsor three families under the GLITR push. ConnecTech, Automation Alley's association for technology professionals, has agreed to get behind the program. Compuware Corp., a longtime supporter, has agreed to a renewed push. Remember, for just $150, you can adopt a family of four for Christmas, giving a healthy dinner, toys and warm clothes to parents and kids who otherwise could afford very little in the way of holiday cheer. E-mail me at mnroush@cbs.com or check out this link. Let me know if you participate and get credit here!
CruiseCam bought out, plans move to California Birmingham-based CruiseCam International Inc. said Friday that a controlling interest in CruiseCam has been acquired by LDR Capital Investments LLC. Per the terms of the acquisition, Scott Watkins will be retained as CEO, two-thirds of CCMC’s board of directors will be replaced and a 40-1 reverse stock split has been instituted. The acquiring company is West Coast based and it is anticipated that CCMC’s legal headquarters, which are now in Florida, will be based in California by 2009. More.
THE WORLD IN TECH
Sony seeks to harmonize music, electronics Now that Sony Corp. and Bertelsmann AG have broken off their troubled relationship, known as Sony BMG, the Japanese company hopes to harmonize its consumer electronics and its music, a duo that was badly out of sync. The music business combination four years ago made Sony BMG the world's No. 2 record label, generating savings and pre-empting other industry consolidation. But the venture's cost-cutting didn't keep pace with falling CD sales, and the two companies' digital strategies didn't jibe. So they called it quits, and Sony bought out its partner for $900 million in a deal that closed Oct. 1. Selling its 50 percent stake will let Bertelsmann refocus on its growing TV, magazines and book publishing businesses. More.
Kenya's elephants send text messages to rangers The text message from the elephant flashed across Richard Lesowapir's screen: Kimani was heading for neighboring farms. The huge bull elephant had a long history of raiding villagers' crops during the harvest, sometimes wiping out six months of income at a time. But this time a mobile phone card inserted in his collar sent rangers a text message. Lesowapir, an armed guard and a driver arrived in a jeep bristling with spotlights to frighten Kimani back into the Ol Pejeta conservancy. Kenya is the first country to try elephant texting as a way to protect both a growing human population and the wild animals that now have less room to roam. More.
Flexible OLEDs could be big part of lighting's future On a bank of the Mohawk River, a windowless industrial building of corrugated steel hides something that could make floor lamps, bedside lamps, wall sconces and nearly every other household lamp obsolete. It's a machine that prints lights. The size of a semitrailer, it coats an 8-inch wide plastic film with chemicals, then seals them with a layer of metal foil. Apply electric current to the resulting sheet, and it lights up with a blue-white glow. You could tack that sheet to a wall, wrap it around a pillar or even take a translucent version and tape it to your windows. Unlike practically every other source of lighting, you wouldn't need a lamp or conventional fixture for these sheets, though you would need to plug them into an outlet. The sheets owe their luminance to compounds known as organic light-emitting diodes, or OLEDs. While there are plenty of problems to be worked out with the technology, it's not the dream of a wild-eyed startup. More.
Sinking shares could make Yahoo a target again When Yahoo Inc. co-founder and CEO Jerry Yang spurned Microsoft Corp.'s rich buyout offer this spring, he promised brighter days in Sunnyvale were just over the horizon. Now the market collapse has helped drive Yahoo's value to a fraction of what Microsoft originally bid. If Microsoft -- or another buyer -- were to float a new offer, the acquisition would come much cheaper, and Yahoo would likely be under even greater pressure to take it. More.
Stocks: Late tech gains lead Nasdaq up at market close
Technology stocks staged a late rally Friday as gains from Apple Inc. helped the Nasdaq Composite Index erase a nearly 100-point loss and financial leaders and central bankers met in Washington to discuss plans to combat the growing worldwide credit crisis. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index (COMP) ended with aq gain of 4.39 points or 0.3 percent to 1,649.51. The Dow Jones Industrial Average ($INDU) fell 128 points or 1.5 percent to 8,451.19. The Philadelphia Semiconductor Index ($SOX) fell 2.32 points or 0.9 percent to 246.11 and the Morgan Stanley High Tech 35 Index (MSH) fell 4.88 points or 1.3 percent to 363.35. The Amex Pharmaceutical Index ($DRG) fell 6.21 points or 2.55 percent to 237.48, while the Amex Biotech Index (BTK) fell 22.81 points or 3.6 percent to 618.33. The S&P 500 (SPX) fell 10.7 points, or 1.2 percent, to 899.22. For the Nasdaq, which fell 15.3 percent on the week, it was the fourth-worst weekly performance for the index in its history and the worst weekly drop since it fell 15.7 percent during the week of Sept. 21, 2001, which was the first full week of trading following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. A depressing mood engulfed the tech sector through most of the day Friday, as the Nasdaq tumbled by more than 6 percent early amid reports of new efforts by the U.S. government to rein in the worldwide credit crisis. The Wall Street Journal reported that the U.S. government is considering steps such as guaranteeing billions of dollars in bank debt and temporarily insuring all U.S. bank deposits to lend support to the financial sector. Additionally, finance ministers from the world's leading economies met in Washington to address the crisis.
Once again a whole raft of local extras, up to the 15-story limit: Verizon Wireless beefs up its coverage in Livonia, Farmington Hills, and the small town of Gaines; nominations for the Michigan Celebrates Small Business awards are open; a compromise appears near that would extend a $3-a-month tax for 911 service to cell phones; a spike in crop prices has biofuel plants going bust; Texas Instruments will show up big for the Convergence auto tech show; and Novi's Incat solves the problems of Autodesk Inventor. Elsewhere in Techland: IBM is investing in its business partners' training; the United States Navy charters a kite-powered cargo ship to deliver equipment; a new FCC report says those worries about interference from a new free wireless Internet system are groundless; one tip on surviving the downturn -- get profitable ASAP; an app called Bookmarklet converts Web pages to CD sleeves; the Electronic Frontier Foundation says Hollywood's RealDVD lawsuit is a smoke screen; Apple will repair MacBooks that have faulty Nvidia GPUs; an app called ChunkIt offers greater search clarity; the mantra of Oracle's Ellison is still spend, baby, spend; President Bush signs a broadband data collection bill; Microsoft is set to announce Silverlight 2.0; YouTube beams up 'Star Trek' and other shows for long-form video; Verizon Wireless considers an extra text fee; the World Bank appears to be under cyberattack; they've discovered the gene that causes baldness; this app will see your next meeting halfway; an Anchorage judge has ruled that Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin must save her Yahoo e-mails; the financial wreck can't keep down good Web developers; Yahoo's OneSearch 2.0 slowly spreads voice search; the discovery of 'black silicon' looks to advance imaging and solar energy; chip industry forecasts are heading south; the Soyuz mission to the International Space Station successfully lifts off; a robot that can detect and destroy breast cancer cells; and a list of 11 Web companies that could face trouble in the downturn.
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The general purpose of the Great Lakes IT Report's twice-a-year Tech Tour is to get your humble narrator out of the Detroit area and into the other half of Michigan -- where just as much cool tech entrepreneurship is going on as is happening in the Lower Peninsula's southeast corner. And sure, I could go to the University of Michigan whenever I feel like it. It's less than a half hour drive from my house, maybe 40 minutes from my office. But there's just no way to ignore Michigan's 800-pound university research gorilla just because it's in nearby Ann Arbor. UM announced last week that its research spending topped $875 million in the 2007-08 fiscal year, a record, and including $100 million in private sector funding. Its tech transfer operation is large, sophisticated and growing. And its spinoff effect in the Ann Arbor area is obvious and indisputable. Friday, I got a look at all three. 
The Week Ahead: Let's get creative, city, to attend everything
The text message from the elephant flashed across Richard Lesowapir's screen: Kimani was heading for neighboring farms. The huge bull elephant had a long history of raiding villagers' crops during the harvest, sometimes wiping out six months of income at a time. But this time a mobile phone card inserted in his collar sent rangers a text message. Lesowapir, an armed guard and a driver arrived in a jeep bristling with spotlights to frighten Kimani back into the Ol Pejeta conservancy. Kenya is the first country to try elephant texting as a way to protect both a growing human population and the wild animals that now have less room to roam. 
On a bank of the Mohawk River, a windowless industrial building of corrugated steel hides something that could make floor lamps, bedside lamps, wall sconces and nearly every other household lamp obsolete. It's a machine that prints lights. The size of a semitrailer, it coats an 8-inch wide plastic film with chemicals, then seals them with a layer of metal foil. Apply electric current to the resulting sheet, and it lights up with a blue-white glow. You could tack that sheet to a wall, wrap it around a pillar or even take a translucent version and tape it to your windows. Unlike practically every other source of lighting, you wouldn't need a lamp or conventional fixture for these sheets, though you would need to plug them into an outlet. The sheets owe their luminance to compounds known as organic light-emitting diodes, or OLEDs. While there are plenty of problems to be worked out with the technology, it's not the dream of a wild-eyed startup. 
