World's Coolest Cities for Innovation

The "Innovation ACT" program for 2010 was launched last night at "spacedock" (aka John Curtin School of Medical Research), Australian National University, Canberra. The keynote speaker was Glenn Dickins, Senior Staff Research Engineer at Dolby and entrepreneur, who has an ANU PHD in Engineering. Glenn talked about how to be an entrepreneur, including the pleasures of being able to innovate in the coolest cities in the world, nominating Helsinki at the top.

Innovation ACT allows ANU and University of Canberra students to learn to innovate, taking their ideas from research to the market. The program does not cover for-profit ideas but also those for the public good.

Professor Shannon from UoC talked at the launch. Innovation ACT has distributed more than $100,000 so far. Professor Mick Cardew-Hall spoke next, commenting that the program is run by students for students.

One problem I have with the Innovation ACT program is that it is not part of formal ANU or UoC courses. However, there was mention at the launch of a "certificate in commercialisation", where for ANU and UoC students can suspend studies for six months. Unfortunately no further details were given and it was not clear tio me why the students had to suspend their studies for this, rather than have it opart of their program.

The 2010 logo for Innovation ACT is an old fashioned light bulb with a wind turbine instead of a filament. I have no idea what this is intended to represent. You can follow Innovation ACT on Twitter.

Creative Ecologies and New Business Models

John Howkins, author of "The Creative Economy: How People Make Money from Ideas" (2002) and the forthcoming "Creative Ecologies: Where Thinking is a Proper Job" (UQ Press, April 2010) will talk on "Creative Ecologies and New Business Models", in Canberra, 26 November 2009:

How can we harness creative ecologies and discover the business environments in which creativity and innovation best thrive?

The Creative Industries Innovation Centre, in partnership with the University of Canberra, invites you to attend a special event by world-renowned creative industry expert, John Howkins. He will be joined by University of Canberra graduate, Michael Tear, who is a member of the CIIC Advisory Board and Managing Director of Bearcage Productions.

"Creative Ecologies and New Business Models"

Thursday 26 November 2009
4.30pm start for 5pm-7pm

The University of Canberra
Innovation Centre Foyer
Building 22
University Drive South

RSVP: Tracy Doherty
Email: events@canberra.edu.au

Phone: (02) 6201 5995
Disability access is available.

Parking information: Parking is available in the car park directly across from the Innovation
Centre (see map attached).

http://www.canberra.edu.au/university/maps

Social Networking for Teaching Innovation

InnovationACT is a program for Australian National University and University of Canberra students to learn entrepreneurship.
The ACT Department of Business and Industry Development has funded a new web portal, to be launched 27th October 2009 at 6pm in the Finkel Lecture Theatre at The John Curtin School of Medical Research. The web portal will use social networking for teaching innovation. For catering purposes please RSVP to InnovationACT@gmail.com

Innovation and carbon emissions

Greetings from Innovation ACT at the Finkel Lecture Theatre, John Curtin School of Medical Research, ANU campus, Canberra. Staff and students of the Australian National University and the University of Canberra are learning how to turn their inventions into products and services. I will be talking at about 7pm on "Innovating to lower costs and carbon emissions with ICT". The session is being recorded and will be available via the Innovation ACT web site. Also I am trying to use a Web Meeting for this.

Innovating to lower costs and carbon emissions with ICT

I will be talking on "Innovating to lower costs and carbon emissions with ICT" at the Innovation ACT Seminar , 6pm, 3 June 2009 at the Finkel Lecture Theatre, John Curtin School of Medical Research, ANU campus, Canberra (Map). For catering purposes please RSVP to InnovationACT@gmail.com. This is a free event sponsored by the Australian National University and the University of Canberra:

Innovation ACT promotes the learning and understanding necessary for the development and commercialisation of a viable product. One area entrepreneurs can seek to commercialise are socially and environmentally sustainable business practices. An example of this are new methods, ideas and products which can reduce carbon emissions by the use of computers and telecommunications (ICT).

The generally accepted figure is that ICT contributes 2% of carbon emissions, but could achieve a 15% reduction in overall emissions by 2020. The ANU will be teaching Masters students how to do this from July 2009, in the course COMP7310: Green ICT Strategies Students can do the course from anywhere in the world, via the web.

About Innovation ACT:

All University staff and students are invited to attend seminars on commercialisation and business planning given by invited speakers from the business community in the ACT and NSW.

We encourage all everyone to come along to learn about all aspects of business and commercialisation.

Participating teams are required to register and are assigned a business leader as a mentor. Interdisciplinary teams are encouraged and a team formation evening - in the form of a speed dating evening will be held. So come along and find a team to offer your services to.

Each team will produce an executive summary and a professional business plan under the guidance of their mentor and will submit this to be judged. Two opportunities are also given to present their ideas in the form of an elevator pitch, where the teams are given a few minutes to pitch their idea, and a longer presentation prior to awards being given.

All aspects of commericalisation and business planning will be covered during the program. Seminars will be provided on the following topics:
- Introduction to Innovation
- Intellectual Property
- Product Definition
- Market Sizing and Validation
- Taxation and Company Structures
- Financials and Resources
- Environmental and Social Sustainability
- Business plan writing and presentation

Additionally, web based resources will be provided throughout the program.

Innovation ACT Launch

Greetings from the launch of Innovation ACT at "spacedock" (aka John Curtin School of Medical Research) the Australian National University in Canberra. This is a program to teach innovation to students at the ANU and University of Canberra. The guest speaker was fabric artist Benjamin Shine, with hsi work including a portrait of President Barack Obama. As well as art, Benjamin does commercial design work, including the logo for the Aphasia Alliance (a topic I was lecturing on today). After a series of seminars on how to turn an invention into a product or service, the students (and staff) from teams, prepare proposals and compete. The winners receive practical experience to implement their idea. One innovation with the program is that it is no confined to profit making patented idea, but can include non-profit open source community benefit idea. John H. Howard, author of Innovation, Creativity and Leadership talked at the launch. The program events are open and a entertaining as well as informative. As part of the program I will be speaking at the "Environmental and Social Sustainable Seminar",6pm, ednesday, 3rd June. My postings from last year's program are also available.

Date	Event	Speaker
30th April	Introduction to Innovation Seminar	Benjamin Shine
6th May	Intellectual Property for Innovation Seminar	Robert Miller (Spruson and Ferguson)
13th May	Team Formation Evening
20th May	Product and Market Definition Seminar	John Hemphill (Pyksis)
27th May	Financial and Resource Management Seminar	Nick McNaughton (Blue Cove Ventures)
3rd June	Environmental and Social Sustainable Seminar	ANU Green
10th June	Business Plan Writing and Presentation Seminar	Lachlan James
1st July	Elevator Pitch Competition
Monday 20th July	Business Plans and Presentations Due
22nd July	Business Plan Presentations
29th July	Gala Awards Dinner

From: Schedule, InnovationACT, 2009