The Big Idea CONNECTpreneur Forum is a Community of over 3500 Business leaders, CEOs, Entrepreneurs, VCs and angels in the Mid-Atlantic Region.

Each quarterly CONNECTpreneur Forum mashes up 350+ top founders, angels, CXOs, VCs, and business leaders for a morning breakfast event featuring awesome networking, newsmaking speakers, and a showcase of 6-7 exciting companies.

This UNIQUE EVENT is like NONE OTHER in our region, due to the high quality of our attendees and participants, as well as our programming and unprecedented networking.

TriFusion Devices from Texas A&M University emerged as the top startup company in the Rice Business Plan Competition (RBPC) tonight at Rice University’s Jones Graduate School of Business. The annual event is the world’s richest and largest student startup competition.

Selected by 275 judges from the investment sector as representing the best investment opportunity and taking home nearly $400,000 in cash and prizes, TriFusion Devices bested 41 other competitors hailing from some of the world’s top universities. TriFusion Devices offers breakthrough 3-D printed products and services aimed at revolutionizing the health care and sports-equipment industries in powerful and profitable ways.

Significant new prizes this year and the teams that won them include the following:

* $25,000 Rice Brown School of Engineering Tech Innovation Prize – Leuko, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

* $100,000, Cisco Internet of Everything Innovation Challenge Prize – Neopenda, Columbia University.

Join our monthly funding briefing to learn details about TEDCO's 8 funding programs. Get insights on:

• navigating through TEDCO's funding resources,
• the application process and deadlines,
• what the reviewers are looking for,
• how your company can take advantage of TEDCO supporting programs

More than 700 leaders from life science companies, academic institutions, nonprofit organizations, investment funds and government entities across Maryland, Virginia and Washington, D.C. (MD-VA-DC) will convene today and tomorrow for the second annual Regional BioTech Forum. The event will showcase the region’s biotechnology accomplishments and its commitment to advancing cutting-edge research in the MD-VA-DC corridor. Notable speakers will include: Dr. Francis Collins, Director, National Institutes of Health; Maryland Governor Larry Hogan; Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe; and Congressman John Delaney.

Illumina is committing $100 million over 10 years to a new venture capital firm whose investment priorities will be in line with the company’s vision.

Illumina said the new firm—to be called Illumina Ventures—will be managed independently of the sequencing giant. However, Illumina will be the majority limited partner in the firm’s first fund as a result of its commitment.

The Washington, D.C. mayor has called for a vote this year on statehood for the nation’s capital.

Speaking Friday at an event commemorating the district’s emancipation from slavery, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser said, “I propose we take another bold step toward democracy in the District of Columbia,” according to the Washington Post. “It’s going to require that we send a bold message to the Congress and the rest of the country, that we demand not only a vote in the House of Representatives. We demand two senators—the full rights of citizenship in this great nation.”

Each spring Johns Hopkins honors exceptional graduate students and postdoctoral fellows at the annual Young Investigators’ Day celebration. The day is meant to celebrate the achievement and hard work of not only the award winners, but of all Johns Hopkins’ research trainees. This year two BME PhD candidates and a BME MD PhD candidate were selected to receive distinguished awards. The awards, named after notable researchers, including many who were former faculty members or graduate students at The Johns Hopkins University, were granted in recognition of outstanding research

You probably know Steve Case best as the man responsible for America Online. But two decades later, Case is continuing the charge to help the new generation of technology and business leaders define the critical path of Internet and innovation to become much more useful to society.

Precision for Medicine, part of the Precision Medicine Group, announced today that it has executed a binding agreement to acquire ACT Oncology, the leading contract research organization (CRO) specializing exclusively in the field of oncology. ACT Oncology provides drug development services focused on the design and execution of clinical trials on behalf of innovative life sciences companies and not-for-profit patient organizations.

Pharma Major Lupin Limited (Lupin) announced today that its US subsidiary, Lupin Pharmaceuticals Inc. has launched its Donepezil Hydrochloride Tablets, 23 mg having received approval from the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) earlier to market a generic equivalent of Eisai Inc's Aricept® Tablets, 23mg.

Nearly 50 new medicines are projected to be launched each year by 2020, a new report from the IMS Institute for Healthcare Informatics says. As such, a number of new drug brands will be available on the market. The majority, unsurprisingly, will be designed to treat cancer.

At the MedCity INVEST conference this week, a panel made up of two CEOs who took their companies public and a couple of venture investors talked about the advantages and drawbacks of going public compared with a strategic acquisition. They also drew attention to what’s changing in the marketplace.

This ranking is based on eight metrics, organized into four categories: concentration, which is the number of software developers per 1,000 workers in the metro area; prosperity, as measured by the regional price parity-adjusted average salary for developers in the area, the growth of wages from 2010-14, and job growth over the same span; talent, based on the number computer science degrees awarded per 10,000 workers, the percentage of of the over-25 population with computer or math degrees, and the replacement rate of IT degree holders in 2014; and the amount of venture capital investment per employee in 2015. Concentration received a 30% weighting with the remaining seven factors being equal at a 10% weighting. The study was conducted by BW Research Partnership for the San Diego Regional Economic Development Corp.

No. 6: Baltimore-Towson, MD Concentration: 13.0 software developers per 1,000 employees

Lazy is a small, Rockville, Md.-based startup that competes in the extremely lucrative healthcare IT market, which is poised to be valued in excess of $228 billion by 2020 according to MarketsandMarkets. Co-founded by Chris Millet, Bobby Jones and Dolly Singh, the small company recently graduated from the newly established Relevant Health business accelerator.

Maryland Governor Larry Hogan visited United Therapeutics headquarters in Silver Spring on Thursday afternoon.

He was joined by Montgomery County Council President Nancy Floreen and Council member Tom Hucker.

QIAGEN N.V. today announced introduction of its unique RNA-seq Explorer Solution, a bioinformatics-driven approach to analysis and interpretation of "omics" data from liquid biopsy-based research. RNA-seq Explorer Solution is a new tool which integrates Ingenuity® Pathway Analysis™, Biomedical Genomics Workbench® and other QIAGEN bioinformatics solutions to generate clear insights for research into improved detection, diagnosis and treatment of cancer. The solution will be demonstrated at the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Annual Meeting in New Orleans.

Montgomery County Department of Economic Development has played an active role in the cultivation of new and innovative technologies developed in federal laboratories and academia, known as technology transfer.

Chris Vizas, Chairman of SmartSenseCom, Inc., wraps up DED's Tech Transfer Speakers Series The term “technology transfer” entered the public lexicon in 1986 through the Technology Transfer Act. This vehicle gave promise to millions of scientists and entrepreneurs who wanted to work with these innovative and sometimes disruptive technologies to commercialize them and bring them to the marketplace.

Cydan Development, Inc. raised $31 million in Series A funding from New Enterprise Associates, Pfizer Venture Investments, Lundbeckfond Ventures, Bay City Capital and Alexandria Venture Investments. Cydan raised the capital to launch Imara, Inc., which is developing treatment for sickle cell disease.

The Tom Tom Founders Festival held a Youth Summit at the Paramount Theater Thursday to support and highlight local student innovation.

The summit featured student-led presentations and several student entrepreneurial competitions. Wes Bellamy, vice-mayor of Charlottesville, gave the keynote address, and Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe signed a bill to protect the rights of student innovators.

Baltimore-area companies accounted for eight of the 10 biggest venture capital deals in the state during the first quarter of 2016.

Maryland companies raised a total of $109.8 million in 19 deals during the first quarter, up from $97 million invested in 14 deals the same quarter last year, according to a MoneyTree Report by PricewaterhouseCoopers and the National Venture Capital Association, based on data from Thomson Reuters. The amount invested in Maryland is up 13 percent and the number of deals is up 36 percent, compared to the year-ago quarter.

Maryland legislators recently approved a $42.3 billion fiscal year 2017 spending bill that incorporates many of the funding levels included in Gov. Larry Hogan’s proposal. Gov. Hogan made education a main focus of his proposal, and the final bill would hold university tuition increases to no more than 2 percent. In addition, legislators formalized the growing strategic partnership between University of Maryland campuses in Baltimore and College Park. The unification is intended to bolster the state’s research profile, and drive high-tech industries in the Baltimore region.

Much has been made of China’s efforts to close the gap between western high technology sectors, and in the case of certain spaces, to actually bridge the gap and become a global leader.  In form, these efforts represent the potential – but not the inevitability – of similar outcomes in other high technology sectors.  One of the sectors that has received significant interest by the Chinese government are life sciences; however, as we found in a nearly two year survey of various Chinese officials, entrepreneurs and multinationals, the unique requirements to re-create the innovative ecosystem for the life science space remain immature in China.  While the potential for China to disrupt how and where life science innovation takes place globally, there are reasons to believe the country’s policies to develop domestic success stories may fall short of similar endeavors in other high technology segments such as clean-technology.

Epigenomics AG (Frankfurt Prime Standard: ECX, OTCQX: EPGNY), the German-American cancer molecular diagnostics company, today announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has approved the Company’s lead product, Epi proColon® , the first and only FDA-approved blood-based colorectal cancer screening test.

May 23-25, 2016 - Washington, DC

SBIR/STTR programs are the nation's largest source of early stage / high risk R&D funding for small business. At this conference you’ll learn how to participate and compete for funding in these two programs that encourage small businesses to engage in Federal Research/Research and Development (R/R&D) and to commercialize your technological innovations.

The fastest-growing sector in Greater Washington is business and financial services jobs, which grew by 39 percent between 2003 and 2014. And nearly 1 in 12 jobs in the region in 2014 was in information technology.

A cadre of venture investors speaking on a panel at this week’s INVEST conference in Chicago aren’t particularly concerned about the gyrations in the life sciences public markets. Venture capital remains fairly agnostic of the troughs and peaks of the stock market, and life sciences investment will likely continue on at a strong pace, they said – largely because of the quality of the science.

Cancer doctor Cassian Yee remembers how in 2010 he was called to Los Angeles to meet the Internet billionaire Sean Parker. Parker wanted Yee to help the Hollywood producer Laura Ziskin, then fighting breast cancer, with an immune-cell treatment never before used to treat that condition. “We’ll give you whatever you need, we’ll put you on an island to do it,” Parker told Yee. A few weeks later a very big check arrived by mail to buy some crucial equipment.

Angel investors are moving upstream. So where do they get their early-stage dealflow?

Dan Kincaid, a member of Queen City Angels in Cincinnati, said his organization is making-early stage bets by helping hatch companies through increased collaboration with local technology accelerators and tech transfer offices.

In a commentary published today by Bloomberg View, Johns Hopkins University President Ronald J. Daniels calls attention to increasing strain being placed on America's public research universities, a fact that Daniels says has left them less well positioned to fulfill their traditional missions.

A team of scientists unveiled a new tree of life on Monday, a diagram outlining the evolution of all living things. The researchers found that bacteria make up most of life’s branches. And they found that much of that diversity has been waiting in plain sight to be discovered, dwelling in river mud and meadow soils.

The way drugs are made is dangerously outdated. While many industries have gotten much more efficient at manufacturing, pharmaceutical companies rely on an old-fashioned approach that is slow, inflexible, and prone to breakdowns. A new refrigerator-sized apparatus that can take in a set of ingredients and quickly produce four common pharmaceuticals is the most advanced demonstration yet of a potential new strategy for drug making that is more flexible, efficient, and reliable.

The year 2015 has come and gone, and despite Back to the Future’s predictions, there are still no flying cars. However, University of Maryland researchers have been working to make the world a better place through new innovations focused on health, security, energy efficiency and other areas that address global challenges. 

These new inventions will be honored at a special Celebration of Innovation and Partnerships event on May 9 as part of the University of Maryland’s “30 Days of EnTERPreneurship.” Each year, UMD honors exceptional inventions that have the potential to make an important impact on science, society, and the free market. The Invention of the Year award nominees come from three categories: Physical Sciences, Life Sciences, and Information Sciences. One invention from each category is selected to win the Invention of the Year Award.

Two key supporters of Baltimore health startups are putting resources into a new accelerator.

The partnership between Johns Hopkins Tech Ventures and the Abell Foundation that earned support from Village Capital is set to develop a new health-focused startup accelerator in Baltimore.

Startup founders will have another tool for raising early stage capital starting next month. On May 16, the SEC is allowing companies to use crowdfunding to raise money.

The greater Washington region has an accelerator problem and we have to fix it if we want to grow the next generation of technology businesses.

A business accelerator is a term used to describe a broad range of business models that share characteristics: assisting a founder form a new businesses through mentorship, partnership connections, access to related expertise (for example, how to set up a limited liability company or a sales team) and access to investors.