Startup Talk: Innovation Hub’s Launch Pad Guru Lands In The White House

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INNOVATION HUB’S LAUNCH PAD GURU LANDS IN THE WHITE HOUSE
Joel Gordon, director of The Launch Pad at the Arkansas Regional Innovation Hub, visited Washington, D.C. this week as a representative of the North Little Rock nonprofit to an invitation-only maker roundtable at the White House on May 11.

The meeting was organized by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. It convened leaders in the maker movement, including representatives of NASA, Cornell University, Qualcomm and delegates of cities from New York to Los Angeles. Discussions focused on how to integrate and leverage the maker movement to advance education, entrepreneurship and manufacturing.

North Little Rock recently hosted central Arkansas’ first Maker Faire festival, the fast-growing, tech-inspired movement that bills itself as the “greatest show (and tell) on earth.” The one-day science, art and technology-focused event was held on May 2 in the city’s Argenta area, where the list of creative projects ranged from robots, trains and things that fly to crafts, artisans and good and beer vendors.

NASA OFFERS FREE CODE, SOFTWARE TO SUPPORT STARTUPS, HIGH-GROWTH BUSINESSES
NASA released its second annual Software Catalog, a giant compendium of over 1,000 programs available for free to industry, government agencies, and the general public.

The Software Catalog contains the actual advanced engineering and aeronautics codes that NASA engineers purposely built for their daily work, according to a blog post Tuesday by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.

The Software Catalog stemmed from the October 28, 2011 Presidential Memorandum on accelerating the commercialization of federal research in support of high-growth businesses, in which the President challenged all federal agencies to find new ways to increase the efficiency and economic impact of their technology transfer activities.

In response to this call to action, NASA developed a five-year plan for accelerating technology transfer with several high-level objectives, one of which was to locate, collect and make accessible all of the agency’s software.

The result was its comprehensive offering of all of NASA’s releasable software, including programs designated as open-source, codes-restricted, and government-use. The first edition of the Software Catalog, published in May 2014, has been downloaded over 100,000 times, and the Software Catalog website has received millions of visitors. So far, NASA is the first and only federal agency to offer this comprehensive collection of free software tools.

1 MILLION CUPS HITS ONE YEAR OLD, READY TO MOVE TO NEXT LEVEL
Just a year after the first 1 Million Cups forum landed in Little Rock, local officials are encouraged by the emergence of the program as a key player in the state and region’s flourishing startup community – yet they’re hopeful for an even bigger payoff in the future.

Started in 2012 in Kansas City, 1 Million Cups (1MC) is a weekly national program designed to “educate, engage and connect entrepreneurs” that has expanded to 66 cities as of January 2015. Developed by the Kansas City-based Kauffman Foundation, the weekly events across the U.S. build on the idea of bringing entrepreneurs together to brainstorm, discuss business plans and network over a cup of coffee.

Read more on this enterprise look at Central Arkansas’ emerging entrepreneurial space in this feature article from TB&P.

VENTURE CENTER TO HOLD SPECIAL MIXER TO ENCOURAGE ENTREPRENEURIAL ‘COLLISIONS’
The Little Rock Venture Center is holding a special evening mixer on Thursday (May 14) that officials said they hope will be a showcase event for the city’s burgeoning startup and tech community in the downtown area. The mixer will take place from 5:30 to 7:00 p.m. at the Venture Center, located at 107 E. Markham, across from the Statehouse Convention Center. Admission is free, but registration is requested. Learn more here.