Brian Roy’s Blog

Phoenix Startup Weekend

Tuesday, September 30th, 2008 | AZ Small Business, AZ Tech, Experimentation, Innovation | Comments

UPDATE: 10/17/08 - I’ve set up a FriendFeed room enable everyone to live blog the event - see this post for details.

The whole reason I’m going on vacation tomorrow (back next Tuesday) is to rest up for Phoenix Startup Weekend… well not really…

If you have not checked it out - you should. If you aren’t already signed up… you should.

See you there:

Marketers, Web designers, legal experts and others will convene in PhoenixOct. 17-19 to pull off what sounds like an impossible task: develop a product in one weekend from scratch.

The event is called Startup Weekend. It’s the brainchild of technology entrepreneurs Andrew Hyde and Michael Gruen, who operate Startup Weekend LLC. The company organizes the collaborative events in cities across the U.S.

Startup Weekend has a Web site set up for details of the Phoenix event, but it’s currently down.

details of the Phoenix event [From Want to build a product in one weekend?]

Tags: AZ, AZ Tech, development, phoenix startup weekend

PodCampAZ 2008 - Have you signed up yet?

Tuesday, September 23rd, 2008 | AZ Tech | Comments

November 1st and 2nd I’ll be at PodCampAZ. Will you?

Sign up here

Tags: AZ, AZ Tech, PodCampAZ 2008

AZ Governor innovation finalists announced

Monday, September 22nd, 2008 | AZ Tech, Innovation, Regulation | Comments

Congratulations to the winners listed below.

I’m glad to see the state government recognizing innovation in Arizona. Now we just need to convince our legislators to get serious about passing the legislation needed to attract capital investment in Arizona startups.

Winners in categories including Community Service Leader of the Year, Young Innovator of the Year and Green Innovator of the Year - new for this year’s contest - will be announced at a awards banquet on Nov. 13 at the Dodge Theatre in downtown Phoenix.

The other finalists are:

William F. McWhortor Community Service Leader of the Year:

- Daniel D. Von Hoff, MD, TGen Clinical Research Services at Scottsdale Healthcare

- Jeff Morhet, InNexus Biotechnology Inc.

- Terree Parlett Wasley, ASU Technopolis

Ed Denison Business Leader of the Year:

- Steve Irons, ImageTag, Inc.

- Roy Vallee, Avnet, Inc.

- Jeff Morhet, InNexus Biotechnology Inc.

Pioneering Innovation:

- Telesphere

- Aviation Communication & Surveillance Systems

- Microsoft Corp.

Green Innovator of the Year:

- i-Linc

- Trilogy by Shea Homes

- Global Research Technologies LLC

Innovator of the Year (small company):

- Succeed Corp.

- Kutta TechnologiesInc.

- Infusionsoft

Innovator of the Year (large company):

- Raytheon Missile Systems

- IBM Corp.

Innovator of the Year (academia):

- Phoenix Mars Mission (University of Arizona)

- Arizona Biodesign Institute (Arizona State University)

- Center for Applied Nanobioscience (Arizona State University)

“Best of the Best” of the Arizona Engineering and Science Fairs (grades 9-12):

- Steven Fan, Tucson High Magnet School

- Shemonti Hasan, Hamilton High School

- Adrian Laurenzi, Tucson High Magnet School

- Smitha Ramakrishna, Coronoa del Sol High School

Teacher of the Year Award Winner:

- Kenneth Zeigler, Eagle Point School

[From Governor's innovation finalists announced]

Tags: AZ, AZ Tech, innovator

AZ Should be Trumpeting this from every rooftop - Phoenix Lander Has Touched Martian Water For the First Time

Thursday, July 31st, 2008 | The Future | Comments

Everyone (and there are A LOT of them) who say Arizona is a engineering, math and science wasteland should read this and understand just how big of a deal for Arizona this is. The UofA is leading this entire mission from Tucson - for the first time in the history of NASA. The mission has been wildly successful and many, many Arizona educated engineers and scientists were at the fore.

Congrats to everyone down at UofA - and thanks for reminding us (Arizona), the US and the world that the future in AZ is bright (not just sunny).

NASA just announced that the Phoenix Lander has successfully scooped up a Martian water ice sample and placed it in its oven for scientific analysis. “Mars Odyssey discovered this ice six years ago, but we’ve now touched it and tasted it, which is something that hasn’t been done before,” said a scientist at today’s press conference. The sample has been dubbed the “Wicked Witch” (because it’s meeeelting, meeeelting—get it?) and it will continue to be analyzed over the course of the coming weeks as data trickles in. Exciting, exciting stuff from this very successful mission. More details are rolling out right now.

The team has also decided to extend the mission to the end of the fiscal year, to a full 126 martian Sols (was scheduled for 90 sols initially). A new full-color, 360° panorama should hit the web soon as well. [NASA]

[From Phoenix Lander Has Touched Martian Water For the First Time [Water On Mars]]

Tags: AZ, AZ Tech, Tech