Cincinnati : Innovation + Job News

In the world of Internet security, there's bravado . . . then there's Wiresoft's brand of bravado.

The Cincinnati-based network security provider, which markets its Firegate security platform as "the world's leading network security platform providing enterprise-level security at an affordable price," recently backed up those claims with a challenge.

Last December, the company made itself a target to hackers with its "Hack Us If You Can" dare, offering a $24,000 prize if anyone could break into their systems within a 24-hour period. If that wasn't gutsy enough, the company then kept the challenge going for 90 days.

In the end, no one � including former National Security Agency employees who tackled the challenge � was able to claim the prize money.

Wiresoft President and CEO Tom Schram says the contest proved Firegate was proven everything Wiresoft said it was � complete network protection at a price affordable enough for small- to mid-size companies.

"If you're not willing to put your money where your mouth is in this business, you should rethink what you're doing," Schram, a former Navy cryptologist, explains.

Launched in 2008 in the Cincinnati suburb of East Walnut Hills, Wiresoft is focused on network security and disaster recovery products. With prices that make the protection available to even small businesses, Wiresoft's client list is already into the "hundreds" according to Schram, with more signing on every day.

"What really sets us aside is that we a firewall that's never been broken. We've never had a virus get through, if its signature was known anywhere in the world. We offer a spam wall, content filtering and disaster recovery of information from an online archive. We've got 24-hour tech support doing constant updates," explains Schram. "Our competition can't say that. We can."

Source: Tom Schram, Wiresoft
Writer: Dave Malaska

Cincinnati's first-ever consumer marketing startup accelerator wants to make a deal with you entrepreneurs out there: $20,000 in startup funding in exchange for a 6 percent equity stake in your brand new company.

The Brandery is offering funding, mentoring and partnerships to local consumer marketing businesses. The Brandery's founders are Cincinnati digital marketing executive David Knox and serial entrepreneur J.B. Kropp, vice president of channel development at social media branding firm Vitrue.

The Brandery is now accepting applications for its 12-week program that will include that 20K grant upon completion. The founders also will set up meetings between entrepreneurs, potential partners and customers.

Once the program ends, the real works starts with a demo day that gives companies the chance to pitch to the press, angel investors, brand marketers and leading venture capitalists.

"The power of The Brandery is the collaboration between people and companies in our community," says Knox, brand manager of global branded entertainment at Procter & Gamble. "Entrepreneurs will benefit from a wide range of talented people in consumer marketing here as well as globally."

The Brandery is looking for tech-based, consumer businesses including Internet, media and entertainment companies. Companies can begin applying for the accelerator program immediately at Brandery.org. Deadline for submissions for this first session is Aug. 11, 2010. Five companies will be selected for the first session which will begin in late August.

CincyTech, a public-private venture development group, is funding those $20,000 grants through its Imagining Grant funds aimed at growing companies through the investment stage.

"Our hope is to create a whole new pipeline of startup companies that focus on consumer marketing, to complement our portfolio of companies in information technology, bioscience and advanced manufacturing," says CincyTech President Bob Coy. "Our mission is to grow jobs in thriving industries."

Source: CincyTech
Writer: Feoshia Henderson

In a competitive industry where it's hard to keep your footing, MilAIR has developed and manufactured cooling units for military use since 2006.

Revenues at this built-from-scratch company have jumped annually, from $233,000 in its first year to a projected $5 million in 2011, says Director of Sales John Lyons. The company currently employs 45 and plans to add new workers at a rate 10 percent each year as revenues continue to climb, Lyons says.

MilAIR manufactures heavy duty air conditioners, dehumidifiers, chillers, heat exchangers, generators and power converters for the military market. MilAIR moved to Milford, just northeast of Cincinnati, shortly after being broken from its parent company Burtek, Inc., in Michigan, which modifies trucks and other transportation equipment for the military. Burtek's former owner Bruce Burton also owns MilAir.

The company relocated from Michigan to Ohio largely on the strength of the area's workforce, Lyons says.

"There are a lot of people in the greater Cincinnati area that are very experienced in military air conditioning. So I thought, we should locate close to the people we want to hire," says Lyons, who is from the Cincinnati area and a 1977 graduate of Miami University College of Engineering. "Clermont County did give us some incentives and there is an ample supply of manufacturing space here, but workforce was the primary draw."

The company's innovation was recently recognized by Cincy Magazine with a 2010 Manny Award in manufacturing excellence. The magazine recognized the company's use of 3D computer-aided design (CAD) and computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) to better design refrigeration components in the desert.

Source: John Lyons, MilAIR
Writer: Feoshia Henderson

LSI Industries doesn't want you to light a candle or curse the darkness. Rather, it wants to illuminate the world in an energy-efficient way.

Founded in 1976 in a 1,200-square-foot facility, the Cincinnati-based company began with four employees determined to provide good lighting for service stations. Today, the company employs 1,400 at 14 facilities in the U.S. and Canada and specializes in solid-state LED (light-emitting diode) technology for indoor and outdoor lighting and graphics. 

LSI combines integrated technology, design, and manufacturing to supply lighting fixtures and graphics elements for applications in the commercial, retail and specialty niche markets. Its major markets are in commercial/industrial lighting, petroleum/convenience store, multi-site retail (including automobile dealerships, restaurants and national retail accounts), sports and entertainment.

LEDs, generally, are considered superior to traditional lighting because they generate less heat, fewer greenhouse gases, and last longer. LSI's award-winning, flagship technology is called SmartTec; it's used in a product line called Crossover.

"In less than three years, over 100,000 and growing Crossover LED fixtures have been installed in both new construction and retrofit applications, reducing energy consumption by 40% � 80% (depending upon the Crossover fixture) when compared to the traditional lamp alternatives," according to the company.

Source: LIS Industries
Writer: Gabriella Jacobs

The University of Cincinnati and Blue Ash-based Ethicon Endo-Surgery have pushed forward their research collaboration to better understand the mechanical, physical, and biochemical changes that happen when people undergo bariatric surgery.

The research goal is to better understand exactly how the procedure causes dramatic weight loss and develop less invasive surgical devices that make the process ultimately more effective and less painful.

Ethicon recently awarded UC's Metabolic Diseases Institute a $13.5 million, three-year research grant extension to study the physiological issues associated with the surgery that is increasingly common in treating obesity. The grant is part of Ethicon's Metabolic Applied Research Strategy (MARS), which also includes research from GI Metabolism Laboratory and Weight Center at the Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH).

Ethicon Endo-Surgery, Inc. develops advanced medical devices for minimally invasive and open surgeries. Its parent company is Johnson & Johnson. Including this new grant, the EES MARS initiative has invested more than $33 million with UC and the GI Metabolism Laboratory and Weight Center at the MGH.

"Ethicon Endo-Surgery is committed to collaborating with clinicians to develop new, comprehensive bariatric solutions while also ensuring that people with obesity have access to current treatment options that can help them achieve sustained weight loss and reduce co-morbidities," says Karen Licitra, Ethicon group Chairperson.

At UC, researchers are studying of why other metabolic procedures, such as vertical sleeve gastrectomy (VSG) and laparoscopic greater curvature plication (LGCP), work. These and other studies have been presented at prestigious national conferences, including most recently the American Diabetes Association Annual Meeting in Florida this past June.

Source: Ethicon Endo-Surgery
Writer: Feoshia Henderson

While the global economy has presented a rough road for many companies, Kendle International has managed not only to miss the potholes, but to pave its own way to growth. 

A leading global clinical research company, Kendle recently opened a new operations center in the Special Economic Zone (SEZ) of the Ahmedabad-Gandhinagar Knowledge Corridor in India.

"Growth in India is a key component of our strategy and will be very important to the future of Kendle" says Stephen Cutler, senior vice president and chief operating officer. "Our expanded presence in Asia, and in India in particular, creates efficiencies in the clinical development process for our customers worldwide."

Founded in Cincinnati in 1981 by Candace Kendle and Chris Bergen, Kendle was also ranked a top clinical research organization (CRO) to work with in the 2010 CenterWatch European Investigative Site Survey. Kendle is the only CRO to be ranked consistently among the top three providers for each of the past four years in the annual U.S. and European site surveys conducted by CenterWatch, a leading publishing and information services company focusing on the clinical trials industry.

"Kendle's ability to forge strong and collaborative relationships with investigative sites across the globe is key to our ability to deliver studies more efficiently and cost effectively for our customers, which is increasingly important in today's environment," says Cutler.

The company reported net income of $1.2 million for the first quarter 2010 compared with net income of $886,000 for the first quarter 2009.

Source: Stephen Cutler, Kendle International
Writer: Val Prevish

Formed on the heels of a Facebook group that grew to almost 20,000 members in less than two weeks, the Secret Cincinnati web portal is nearing official launch, chock full of submissions by "secret agents" about the best aspects of the city.

"The way this came about was kind of a . . . challenge that my business had constantly undergone," says Chris Ostoich, founder of Blackbook, a Cincinnati-based company that connects employees who are relocating to Cincinnati with the resources to make them feel at home. "As an example . . . we had a female Procter & Gamble brand manager that had made a very specific request through our platform, which was she was seeking an African-American OBGYN. That's just tough information to find."

Enter Joe Pantruso, a serial entrepreneur involved in Internet security businesses who gave Ostoich an article describing the explosive growth of a London-based Facebook page focused on the best-kept secrets of that city.

"That morning, probably 15 minutes after Joe gave me that article, I started the Facebook page Secret Cincinnati," Ostoich says.

That was in late February. In the coming days, when membership ballooned, it became evident that the Facebook group would be inadequate as an interactive medium. Ostoich, Pantruso and web developer Sean Biehle put out a call for those who were interested in "building a business over a weekend." More than 100 people applied; 25 were selected. The Secret Cincinnati web site was born.

Currently in beta testing with a tentative launch date of late May or early June, the site already has attracted interest from other cities "and we're trying to work out a licensing strategy right now for that," Biehle says.

Sources: Chris Ostoich, Joe Pantuso and Sean Biehle, Secret Cincinnati
Writer: Gene Monteith

Schools strapped for space and cash, but which have a growing need to provide science students with adequate, up-to-date laboratory equipment, can succeed if they have access to a specialized system that enables resource sharing. That's the theory behind MeasureNet Technology Ltd.'s patented networks.

The key to Measurenet's innovation is the belief that lab hardware and instrumentation don't have to be physically duplicated at each student's work station. The work stations can be networked to a single, centralized, system that allows users to monitor, collect, store, and disseminate laboratory data, as well as share specified laboratory instruments. The energy saving and environmentally friendly design MeasureNet created earned it an Ohio Governor's Award for Excellence in Energy Efficiency in 2002.

The network "makes it possible for students to do a lot of different operations they couldn't do before," says Measurenet's Estel Sprague. Plus, students can access what they need from the network when they are back in their dorms, the library, or elsewhere.

The Cincinnati-based company had its roots in the late 1990s, when Sprague and Robert Voorhees, working at the University of Cincinnati, became part of a team that devised a way to help undergraduate students in chemistry labs use electronic data collection and analysis. With early support coming from UC, the National Science Foundation, and Proctor & Gamble, the project was eventually spun off to become a private company and incubated at the Hamilton County Development Co. in Norwood.

Today, Voorhees and Sprague are Measurenet's president and vice president, respectively.

Customers include vocational and secondary schools throughout the U.S. and Puerto Rico, and even in Saudi Arabia. The company has one fulltime employee, several representatives, and uses co-op students as it continues to grow.

Source: Estel D. Sprague, MeasureNet Technology Ltd.
Writer: Gabriella Jacobs

It just got easier for Ohio colleges to collaborate with Procter & Gamble on research projects, thanks to a groundbreaking master agreement between P&G and Ohio's 14 state universities.

The agreement, announced April 22, is expected to lead to more P&G-university partnerships and increased commercialization of new technologies. But it also is seen as a template for agreements between the Ohio university system and other research-driven entities, says Noah Sudow, associate director economic advancement for the Ohio Board of Regents.

"I think our biggest next step is going to create that model that we can market to all business and say 'hey, we'll sign this with you right now,' Sudow says. "The goal is . . . to show how we can utilize the power of the university system to work with businesses."

The agreement, which governs treatment of intellectual property, licensing rights and when researchers can publish their findings, is the first of its kind in Ohio and may be the first in the nation, parties to the agreement say.

The five-year pact eliminates the need to negotiate agreements one-on-one with each university, drastically reducing the time needed up front, "where you could spend months negotiating (the rules) for what turned out to be two to three weeks of work," says P&G's Nick Nikolaides, university liaison for P&G global business development. "Getting rid of that up-front part and putting the focus on the project work really ought to catalyze more strategic collaborations in the long term."

The master agreement is patterned after a 2005 agreement with the University of Cincinnati.  Nikolaides says P&G invested nearly $20 million in university research projects across all business lines between 2006 and 2009, and the agreement should lead to additional investments with an increasing number of universities.

Sources: P&G: Nick Nikolaides, Chris Thoen (director, global open innovation) Rich Eggers (associate director global business development) and Mary Ralles (external relations manager, global business development); Board of Regents: Noah Sudow
 
Writer: Gene Monteith

The neon signs and posters at the bar? Those kitschy grocery store displays that highlight your favorite brew? They're often paid for by the beverage distributors.

Though all part of the cost of doing business, they can be pricey. So, it was only a matter of time before an entrepreneur found a way for businesses to recoup some of their expenses.

SignTrak, a Cincinnati software development company funded in part by CincyTech and Ohio Third Frontier money, has put the web to work to that end. The point-of-sale promotional items are often ordered by the same sales people who meet with bar owners, restaurateurs and grocery store buyers to take their beverage orders; they then relay sign orders to largely in-house print shops.

Before SignTrak, that sometimes left a long and error-prone paper trail.

"Without our software, it's a very manual process. Everything's on paper, which the salesperson has to take back and stuff into a slot, the print shop prints it and sends it out. 'Oops, there's an error.' And back it goes to the print shop," says SignTrak Executive Vice President Denis Clark.

Using SignTrak's web-based service, the customer can proof the point-of-sale promotional items online, cutting down on errors, and print shops can manage their workload better, boosting production by up to 20 percent, Clark adds.

The company's founder, Mark Fullerton, designed the first system in 2004 for Walton, Ky.-based Chas. Seligman Distributing Co. The distributorship's president, Jennifer Doering, was so impressed with the results, Clark says, she took it to an industry conference to show it to others.

SignTrak launched in 2007 and now counts seven of the 25-largest beer distributorships in the nation among its clients. It employs ten.

Source: Denis Clark, SignTrak
Writer: Dave Malaska

A new Ohio high-tech company aimed at helping osteoporosis patients soon will launch at Cincinnati's life science company incubator  BIOSTART.

OsteoDynamics, a partnership of Integrated BioScience Solutions, and BIOSTART, will build on new technology that two University of Cincinnati professors created to test bone strength.

Professors Amit Bhattacharya and Nelson Watts, who developed the technology based on the concept of "Bone Shock Absorbance," plan to advance a new diagnostic tool testing a patient's bone fracture risk.

In February, OsteoDynamics, which will be managed by Integrated BioScience Solutions, signed an agreement to license Bone Shock Absorbance technology from UC. OsteoDynamics also received $125,000 in seed financing from Southern Ohio Creates Companies. The company will be based at BIOSTART.

"This is a promising technology, developed through a productive partnership between Drs. Watts (M.D.) and Bhattacharya (Ph.D.) that draws on their respective clinical and engineering experience," says Carol Frankenstein, president of BIOSTART. "Their invention has the potential to improve treatment for women who suffer bone loss following menopause. BIOSTART is pleased to play a part in developing OsteoDynamics."

The noninvasive test measures how the energy from a heel strike is absorbed and dissipated. It's a new way of testing that measures bone quality and appears to be a better indicator of fracture risk than traditional tests.

"With that information, we can then provide them with more effective medications and other interventions that have already been proven to reduce fracture risk. Initial clinical data indicates that Bone Shock Absorbance may be the diagnostic technology that can achieve this goal," said Bhattacharya, a professor in the Department of Environmental Health.

Sources: University of Cincinnati, BIOSTART
Writer: Feoshia Henderson

Pop quiz: Frogs are good for making (choose one): (A) Handsome princes, (B) Muppets
(C)Biofuel. The answer, according to a University of Cincinnati research team, is (C). Sorry, Kermit.

The Cincinnati team used plant, bacterial, and fungal enzymes to make a special foam � like that made by the semi-tropical Tungara frog to develop tadpoles � to produce sugars from sunlight and carbon dioxide. Those sugars can be converted to ethanol.

This procedure may trump plant photosynthesis to create sugars because it uses no soil, and it can be used in highly enriched carbon dioxide environments.

The journal Nano Letters published these findings of UC College of Engineering and Applied Science Dean Carlo Montemagno, Research Assistant Professor David Wendell and student Jacob Todd online last month and plans to use it for a cover story this fall.

Other media attention is starting to steamroll. The research also has been featured on HeatingOil.com, PhysOrg.com and BioFuels Watch.com, to name a few.

Science blogger David Bois, writing on Tonic, called it "a breakthrough."

"The innovation, astonishingly, appears to be even more efficient than nature itself, at least in terms of the amount of solar energy going in compared to the amount of energy contained by the output hydrocarbons. . . . Actual plants are required to expend energy for reproduction and survival. The lab creation doesn't have such requirements, and accordingly can put all of the incoming solar energy work into making hydrocarbons."

Maybe it's easy being green after all.

Source: Wendy Beckman, University of Cincinnati
Writer: Gabriella Jacobs

The City of Cincinnati is emerging as a U.S. leader in tackling global climate change through its Green Cincinnati Action Plan, an effort to cut Greenhouse Gas emissions 8 percent by 2012 and 80 percent by 2050.

The plan, which City Council passed in 2008, recently got a major boost with a $500,000 Climate Showcase Community Award from the Environmental Protection Agency. The city's Office of Environmental Quality was awarded the highly competitive grant that will be paid out over three years. In addition, the EPA will highlight the city's efforts � which include 80 specific steps to reduce emissions � as an example for other cities looking for ways to clean up pollution. Currently more than 1,000 U.S. cities have some sort of plan to curb emissions.

"Our Green Cincinnati Action Plan is a collaboration among dedicated citizens, community organizations, and businesses in our region. Our partners all realize that making Cincinnati a 'Green City' is essential to making Cincinnati a successful city," said Cincinnati Mayor Mark Mallory.

Cincinnati was one of just 20 cities awarded the grant out of a total of 450 applicants. It will allow the city to continue to move forward on its ambitious plan. Recommendations include buying hybrid buses, encouraging car pooling, increased bus use and a regional rail system.

"This funding will provide a tremendous boost to fulfilling the vision and programs in the Green Cincinnati Action Plan" said Larry Falkin, director of the City of Cincinnati's Office of Environmental Quality.

Source: City of Cincinnati
Writer: Feoshia Henderson

Cincinnati Children's Hospital has opened a ground breaking $600,000 stem cell facility, in a 650-square-foot space that has room to grow.

The Pluripotent Stem Cell Facility opened in January, and is the first of its kind in Ohio, Indiana or Kentucky. Researchers from Cincinnati Children's and the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine are working together, studying the cause � and possible new organ and tissue replacement treatments � of a myriad of diseases.

Known as "induced pluripotent stem cells," these cells come from patients who have a disease. It's an emerging technology and these cells have the theoretical ability to become more than 200 different cell types found in humans.

"This technology is a bit like the internal combustion engine in terms of how it will drive future advances in stem cell biology," explains facility director James Wells. "It allows us to use cells from patients to study what goes wrong at the genetic and cellular level to cause their disease -- whether it's muscular dystrophy, diabetes or any number of degenerative diseases. This technology could allow us to fix genetic defects and use these cells to generate healthy cells and tissues to treat or cure the patient."

Researchers have already developed pancreatic cells that make insulin, retinal cells of the eye, nerve cells of the brain, intestinal cells, and liver cells.

The facility offers training in the generation and use of pluripotent stem cells for scientists to take to their own labs. It also offers cell line maintenance and other of pluripotent stem cell services. The facility is poised to grow along with demand for its services.

"Given the rapidly developing pace of this technology, it's easy to envision a day where pediatric hospitals like Cincinnati Children's will be able to provide services for generating and banking pluripotent stem cells from specific patients for future therapeutic use," Wells said.

Sources: Cincinnati Children's Hospital, University of Cincinnati College of Medicine
Writer: Feoshia Henderson

Deploying new technology for growing the world's longest carbon nanotubes has created a world of possibilities for Cincinnati-based General Nano LLC in the aerospace/defense, biomedical, electronics and sensor industries.

Created in 2007 to advance the commercial application of groundbreaking research at the University of Cincinnati Nanoworld and Smart Materials and Devices Laboratory, General Nano is hoping to tap into the commercial market for the lab's creation of the world's longest carbon nanotubes, 18 mm.

Because of their excellent properties of electrical conductivity, heat resistance and extremely light weight, the nanotubes have tremendous commercial potential in such industries as aerospace, where lightweight conductive devices are highly desirable, says General Nano President and CEO Joe Sprengard, Jr.

In fact, General Nano has received phase I and II grants from the U.S. Air Force Small Business and Innovation Research Program of $400,000, plus an Imagining Grant of $25,000 from CincyTech.

The nanotubes, which are less than the thickness of human hair and float on ambient air, could eventually replace copper wire on aircraft and satellites, making them much lighter and more efficient, says Sprengard.

"About 4,000 pounds of the weight of a jet fighter is copper wire. Nanotubes would be a small fraction of that weight."

General Nano has four employees now and expects to double that number next year as it begins commercial manufacturing of the nanotubes. Sprengard said in addition to the jobs created at General Nano itself, there will be many more jobs created through the contract manufacturers that are chosen for the project, although he cannot name them yet.

Source: Joe Sprengard, General Nano
Writer: Val Prevish