Startup Talk: LR Tech Park gives executive director 15% pay raise

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TECH PARK BOARD GIVES EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR 15% RAISE, SALARY NOW SET AT $120,000
The Little Rock Technology Park Authority (LRTPA) on Wednesday voted unanimously to give its lone employee, Executive Director Brent Birch, a 15% raise with only three months before the downtown business incubator is expected to begin leasing office space to local startups, entrepreneurs and emerging tech-oriented business.

Last month, the Tech Park board met in executive session to consider Birch’s salary, but deferred a final decision until Chairman Kevin Zaffaroni had a one-on-one opportunity to review Birch’s performance. Birch’s new salary of $120,000 was set retroactively to Oct. 1. The Tech Park chief executive received a 5% raise nearly a year ago, and was hired as the authority’s lone employee in July 2014 at an annual salary of $100,000.

In other Tech Park business, Birch said the authority expects to receive the second installment of tax proceeds from the City of Little Rock in early 2017. The first installment of $6.8 million was allocated to LRTPA in July 2015 from dollars already accrued by the Little Rock 3/8th cent sales tax, voted in by city residents in 2012. When the sales tax was voted on, $22 million was set aside for Tech Park purposes. Birch said city officials have projected the disbursement from Little Rock sales tax receipts in 2016 at nearly $1.38 million.

DENSO ENTERS PACK WITH CALIFORNIA STARTUP WITH TECHNOLOGY THAT REPLICATES HUMAN VISION
Denso International America Inc., a subsidiary of Japanese auto supplier Denso Corp., said it has entered into an investment agreement with THINCI Inc., a California startup developing machine learning technology that replicates human vision.

With this investment, Denso said it is looking to accelerate the final development and integration of THINCI’s innovative silicon and software technology into electronic systems that help enable driver assistance and autonomous driving, improve the efficiency of thermal systems, and optimize the productivity of the vehicle’s powertrain.

THINCI’s technology can be integrated into a wide range of applications, including advanced driver assistance systems in automobiles, personal electronics and smart home automation systems. The West Coast startup developed a silicon architecture capable of processing extremely large amounts of data as fast as a human would, as well as the software infrastructure needed for the silicon to process this data.

THINCI’s deep learning and vision processing replicates human vision. Denso Manufacturing, a sister company of Denso International, operates a 500-employee HVAC manufacturing facility in Osceola.

VIRTUAL REALITY ENTERTAINMENT MARKET TO HIT $3.3 BILLION BY 2020
Aggressive promotional activity from smartphone vendors and the launch of premium smartphone VR solutions, including Google’s Daydream View, will help drive the installed base of VR headsets from 4 million in 2015 to 81 million in 2020. That same year, consumer spending on VR headsets will reach $7.9 billion and spending on VR entertainment will hit $3.3 billion.

New analysis and forecasts on the VR market were released by IHS Markit the new Virtual Reality Market Opportunity Report 2016, which you can access here.

Consumer spending on VR headsets will be $1.6 billion in 2016, bolstered heavily by the launch of high-end headsets from Oculus, HTC and Sony. This will drive average sales price of all headsets to close to $85 from $26 in 2015. The average selling price is expected to climb sharply once again in 2017 to $191 as high-end headsets sell more, the IHS Technology report said.