HINDSIGHT - WRITE SOMETHING WORTH READING ABOUT OR DO SOMETHING WORTH WRITING ABOUT
Thursday, May 22, 2014
Wednesday, May 21, 2014
1871 CEO Howard Tullman Speaking at Colorado Innovation Network Summit
 
Colorado Innovation Network announces
speaker lineup for 3rd annual Innovation Summit
|
|
DENVER - Wednesday, May 21,
2014 - The
Colorado Innovation Network (COIN) today announced the speaker lineup for the
3rd annual Innovation Summit, which will be held in Denver, CO on August
26-27 as part of Colorado Innovation Week. The Summit helps elevate the
state's innovation climate, with two days of dialogue and networking focused
on sharing innovative best practices and creating relationships that can
propel Colorado forward.
Hosted by Governor John W. Hickenlooper as part of Colorado
Innovation Week, the COIN Summit speakers include local, national and global
innovation leaders who will speak to the event theme of "Redefining
Connections". Keynote speakers include General Electric Chairman and
CEO Jeff Immelt, Oracle President and CFO Safra
Catz and Code for America Founder and United States Deputy
Chief Technology Officer Jennifer Pahlka.
"We are thrilled and grateful to have such brilliant minds and fantastic energy coming to Colorado," said Gov. Hickenlooper. "When we created the COIN Summit, our primary goal was to bring together innovative leaders from around the globe, here in Colorado, to build relationships, to spark ideas and to help foster a forward-thinking business environment in this state that will endure far beyond the two day event; every one of these speakers is a dynamo." Speakers and participants of the Summit will explore topics such as Internet of Things: Applications That Will Change the World; The Neuroscience of Creativity; Disrupting Ownership: The New Collaborative Economy; Is There a Growing Innovation Deficit?; The Impact of Innovation Hubs; and The Intersection of Music and Technology. Additionally, the Summit will feature global speakers such as Uri Adoni, Partner at Jerusalem Venture Partners (JVP) Media Labs, Mark Gazit, CEO of ThetaRay from Israel, and Founder of Start-Up Chile Nicolas Shae, as well as prominent local leadership including the State's Chief Innovation Officer Mark Sirangelo, IHS Executive Chairman Jerre Stead and Liberty Media President and CEO Greg Maffei. "The innovation ecosystem in Colorado was one of many attractions that brought Charles Schwab to Colorado," said Brian McDonald, SVP and senior site leader in Denver. "Our ability to actively support this ecosystem by being a presenting sponsor is a great way to engage with local and national thought leaders and support the Colorado Innovation Network." COIN Summit Speakers: * John W. Hickenlooper, Governor, Colorado * Safra Catz, President and CFO, Oracle * Jeff Immelt, Chairman and CEO, General Electric Company * Uri Adoni, Partner, Jerusalem Venture Partners (JVP) Media Labs, Israel * Kenneth Arkind, Author; Executive Director, Minor Disturbance * Dean L. Bartles, Ph. D., Executive Director, Digital Manufacturing and Design Innovation Institute, UI Labs * Mitra Best, US Innovation Leader, PwC * Robert Bilder, Director, Tennenbaum Center for the Biology of Creativity, and Chief of Medical Psychology-Neuropsychology, University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) Semel Institute * Colonel Ronald J. Garan Jr., NASA Space Station and Shuttle Astronaut, Aquanaut, Test and Fighter Pilot, Social Entrepreneur * Eric Garland, General Manager, Live Nation Digital, Live Nation Entertainment * Mark Gazit, CEO, ThetaRay, Israel * Andy Gill, EVP Investor Services, Charles Schwab * Bobby Lefebre, Word Architect and Performing Artist * Donna Lynne, Executive Vice President, Kaiser Foundation Hospitals and Health Plan, Inc.; Group President, Kaiser Permanente Colorado, Northwest and Georgia; President, Kaiser Foundation Health Plan of Colorado * Lia Kislev, Founder, Wishi, Israel * Greg Maffei, President and CEO, Liberty Media * Meredith O'Connor, International Director, Jones Lang LaSalle; Former Director, World Business Chicago * Jeremiah Owyang, Chief Catalyst, Crowd Companies * Jennifer Pahlka, Founder, Code for America; United States Deputy Chief Technology Officer * Michael Park, Partner, McKinsey & Company * Chris Rezendes, Founder and President, Inex Advisors * Andrew Rosenthal, Sr. Product Engineer for Wellness, Jawbone * Nicolas Shae, Founder, Start-up Chile * Mark Sirangelo, Chief Innovation Officer; Corporate Vice President, Sierra Nevada Space Systems * Geoff Smart, Ph. D., Chairman, ghSmart; Author The Who: The A Method for Hiring * Jerre Stead, Executive Chairman, IHS, Inc. * Gary Swart, former CEO, oDesk * Howard Tullman, CEO, 1871 * Ruth Vitale, Executive Director, CreativeFuture * Phil Weiser, Dean of the Law School, University of Colorado Boulder; Executive Director and Founder, Silicon Flatirons Center for Law, Technology, and Entrepreneurship, University of Colorado Additional speakers will be announced as the summit nears.
The summit delegation is made up of innovation leaders from
around the state and country, representing business and industry, nonprofit,
research labs, academia, government and entrepreneurs. In an effort to curate
a diverse delegation, this is an invite-only event. Delegate nominations are
currently being accepted on the COIN Summit website www.coloradoinnovationnetwork.com.
Sponsors of the COIN Summit - Presenting Sponsor: Charles Schwab. Platinum Sponsor: Comcast. Gold Sponsors: General Electric Company, IHS, Inc., Liberty Media, PwC, Western Union and WhiteWave Foods. Silver Sponsors: CenturyLink, The Coca-Cola Company, Colorado Impact Fund, Colorado State University, DigitalGlobe, Google and tw telecom. Patron Scholar Sponsors: Bryan Cave, LLC; Metro Denver Economic Development Corporation; and Pinnacol Assurance. Additional event partners include PostModern and Zenman. COIN was launched by Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper with the mission to make Colorado the most innovative state in the nation, and is a public-private partnership housed in the Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade. COIN acts as a convener for leaders in our innovation ecosystem. To learn more about the Colorado Innovation Network visit www.coloradoinnovationnetwork.com. |
Tuesday, May 20, 2014
Monday, May 19, 2014
Mark Cuban’s Foray Into the Edtech Industry
Mark Cuban’s Foray Into the Edtech Industry
This article is written by Katrina Stevens, educational consultant and journalist with over 20 years experience as a teacher and administrator.
“When faced with a choice among colleges, go with the least expensive option,” Mark Cuban suggests. “Most 18-year-olds don’t know what they want to do with their life, nor do most 22-year-olds. Saddling graduates with high debt makes no sense.”
Before a panel with Keith Clougherty (CEO, Copley Retention Services) and Dr. Sara Goldrick Rab (Professor of educational policy studies and sociology, University of Wisconsin Madison) at the ASU+GSV Education Innovation Summit, Cuban shared with EdSurge his motivations for investing in the education space.
A savvy entrepreneur, Cuban has a history of getting in trouble with authorities for challenging rules that he doesn’t agree with and finds inefficient. Recently, he’s put money on several startups looking to shake up the higher education industry: Copley Retention Services, Ranku, Packback and Degreed.
“[Higher education] is a business that doesn’t know it’s going out of business,” says the graduate from Indiana University. “Colleges have been caught up with trying to keep up with the Jones’ instead of focusing on their customer. They’ve been too concerned with looking and sounding good instead of delivering a product.”
It’s no secret that universities spend millions on things that have nothing to do with student outcomes. Extreme examples can easily be found in the billions of dollars that top-tier sports programs spend to attract star athletes. (Cuban says he’s refused to fund an arena at his alma mater because he believes this is not what universities should be spending their money on–instead they should be focused on supporting student outcomes.)
Historically, Cuban says, colleges have catered to a particular segment of students who willingly pay full tuition for things like swanky cafeterias, climbing walls, and other amenities unrelated to educational outcomes. But he believes these students, “who will continue to get smarter about real value” will no longer be willing to pay for–let alone afford–such things.
“As the market begins to shift towards outcome-based [goals], colleges will have to change,” comments Cuban. Pushback against high tuitions from students and parents, along with increased scrutiny from the government (seen in efforts like President Obama’s proposed college ratings system), will force colleges to rethink what value they’re really bringing to the table–or go out of business. In five years, he expects some schools to close up shop and others to change their models radically.
Easy access to money for college is also part of the problem, he says. Cuban believes the industry is currently propped up by government loans which has skewed the higher education business model. Cuban would like to see loan limits capped at $10K.
Cuban admits that he’s not an expert in higher education, but his gut feeling tells him “it’s broken.” His investment decisions, he says, depend “on relationships with people he can trust.” And he only picks entrepreneurs who develop relationships with their first customers and build slowly, instead of focusing on raising capital too soon.
He is bearish on the proliferation of accelerators and incubators: “Entrepreneurs shouldn’t participate. These programs focus entrepreneurs on raising money and not on building a business.”
“Incubators can become an easy crutch that get in the way of the entrepreneur,” he adds, arguing that every entrepreneur has to find his or her own way rather than following templates that worked for other companies in the past.
His deals aren’t limited to the higher-ed space. On last Friday’s episodeof the popular show, Shark Tank, Cuban committed $250K to Zoobean, an app that curates books and learning apps for children.
“I look for inflection points in the industry and I look for products that can scale,” he adds.
“When faced with a choice among colleges, go with the least expensive option,” Mark Cuban suggests. “Most 18-year-olds don’t know what they want to do with their life, nor do most 22-year-olds. Saddling graduates with high debt makes no sense.”
Before a panel with Keith Clougherty (CEO, Copley Retention Services) and Dr. Sara Goldrick Rab (Professor of educational policy studies and sociology, University of Wisconsin Madison) at the ASU+GSV Education Innovation Summit, Cuban shared with EdSurge his motivations for investing in the education space.
A savvy entrepreneur, Cuban has a history of getting in trouble with authorities for challenging rules that he doesn’t agree with and finds inefficient. Recently, he’s put money on several startups looking to shake up the higher education industry: Copley Retention Services, Ranku, Packback and Degreed.
“[Higher education] is a business that doesn’t know it’s going out of business,” says the graduate from Indiana University. “Colleges have been caught up with trying to keep up with the Jones’ instead of focusing on their customer. They’ve been too concerned with looking and sounding good instead of delivering a product.”
It’s no secret that universities spend millions on things that have nothing to do with student outcomes. Extreme examples can easily be found in the billions of dollars that top-tier sports programs spend to attract star athletes. (Cuban says he’s refused to fund an arena at his alma mater because he believes this is not what universities should be spending their money on–instead they should be focused on supporting student outcomes.)
Historically, Cuban says, colleges have catered to a particular segment of students who willingly pay full tuition for things like swanky cafeterias, climbing walls, and other amenities unrelated to educational outcomes. But he believes these students, “who will continue to get smarter about real value” will no longer be willing to pay for–let alone afford–such things.
“As the market begins to shift towards outcome-based [goals], colleges will have to change,” comments Cuban. Pushback against high tuitions from students and parents, along with increased scrutiny from the government (seen in efforts like President Obama’s proposed college ratings system), will force colleges to rethink what value they’re really bringing to the table–or go out of business. In five years, he expects some schools to close up shop and others to change their models radically.
Easy access to money for college is also part of the problem, he says. Cuban believes the industry is currently propped up by government loans which has skewed the higher education business model. Cuban would like to see loan limits capped at $10K.
Cuban admits that he’s not an expert in higher education, but his gut feeling tells him “it’s broken.” His investment decisions, he says, depend “on relationships with people he can trust.” And he only picks entrepreneurs who develop relationships with their first customers and build slowly, instead of focusing on raising capital too soon.
He is bearish on the proliferation of accelerators and incubators: “Entrepreneurs shouldn’t participate. These programs focus entrepreneurs on raising money and not on building a business.”
“Incubators can become an easy crutch that get in the way of the entrepreneur,” he adds, arguing that every entrepreneur has to find his or her own way rather than following templates that worked for other companies in the past.
His deals aren’t limited to the higher-ed space. On last Friday’s episodeof the popular show, Shark Tank, Cuban committed $250K to Zoobean, an app that curates books and learning apps for children.
“I look for inflection points in the industry and I look for products that can scale,” he adds.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)