Technology
Picnik Wins Big
Youd think it was the late 90s and the dot-com bubble hadreinflated, the way the crowd was pumping hands and showing off innovativeproducts at the Pacific Science Center this past May. More than 300 entrepreneurs,employees of startups and others were celebrating the Seattle 2.0 Awards, whichhonored top vote-getters in categories ranging from Best Startup to…
Customer Service, With a Smile
Lonnie Benson, CEO ofHumanity Interactive LLC, hopes to bring realistic facial expressions to theweb. Even avatars can get emotional, it seems. At least, thatswhat Human Interactivity believes. The Kirkland-based company is betting it canbring more lifelike behavior to artificial intelligence. Or, more specifically,it wants to bring a smiling, talking and interactive human face to thosedigital…
Talking Points: Mike Kluse
Mike Kluse was appointeddirector of the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) in Richland in 2007. The lab, which has 4,300 employees (including 790PhDs) and a budget of nearly $1 billion, is one of nine multi-program national laboratorieswithin the U.S. Department of Energy. On the labs evolving priorities: When I came here in 1997,about half of…
Panning for Gold
As smartphones become smarter and handsets handier, businesses that seek to tap into the mobile market would benefit from more accurate data about their users. Seattle-based startup Ground Truth recognized this trend and is applying a new data collection method to find out exactly how people are using the mobile internet. Instead of culling information…
Talking Points: Matt McIlwain
Because his father moved a great deal in his work forGeneral Electric, Matt McIlwain grew up in a variety of places, from Miami toSingapore. With a masters in public policy and an MBA from Harvard, andexperience in both industry and on Wall Street, he has emerged as one of theNorthwests savviest venture capitalists. Work Experience:…
Fostering Inland Startups
Kim Zentz has turnedSpokanes SIRTI from just another government agency into a dynamic businessincubator, with success stories numbering among its clients. Kim Zentzs business cards should list Problem Solver asher official title. That, after all, is what she has successfully done time andagain during her 25-year career. And thats what shes doing now for astate-funded…
Remember Windows 1.0?
Tandy Trower recently left Microsoft after 28 years. At the Technologizer, he reveals the little-known past behind Windows. Trower (somewhat outdated bio here) was given the task of releasing Windows 1.0, a job that even inside Microsoft was considered to be a career-killer. In fact, in this article, he says he suspected he got the…
WTIA Award Winners Announced
The Washington Technology Industry Association handed out its annual Industry Achievement Awards Thursday night. Here’s a quick rundown of the winners: Commercial Product or Service of the Year: Talyst (Nominated for AutoCool)Consumer Product or Service of the Year: CoziBreakthrough Start-up of the Year: VholdRService Provider of the Year: Amazon Web ServicesInnovative Manufactured Product of the…
Order Out of Chaos
Inrix’s iPhone App uses predictive analytics software toforecast traffic information to help commuters better plan their trips. Predictive analytics: You might not know the term but it’s agood bet you’ve run across or been subjected to it. The recommendations for other books, CDs or movies you mightlike when you place an order with Amazon.com? Those…
Google vs Microsoft Battle Intensifies
The battle between the two great titans of the information world keeps spreading into new territory from search to mobile to cloud computing. Read Stuart Glascock’s take on the battle here. And you can read another take on the same battle from InfoWorld, Stuart’s former employer, which focuses on Ray Ozzies ambitious plan to take…
A Look Inside Myhrvold’s Invention Factory
The New York Times this morning has an good read on Nathan Myhrvold’s Intellectual Ventures, his Bellevue-based intellectual property firm that’s made the purchasing and licensing of patents into a billion-dollar business. The story gets into the nitty gritty of whether this constitutes ensuring that inventors get compensation for their creations (IV has paid out…
Fighting for Health
Both Microsoft and Google havelaunched products designed to collect and store personal health records online:Microsoft’s HealthVault and Google Health. Both offer online environmentswhere individuals can store personal records, retrieve information, selectdoctors, schedule medical appointments, manage prescriptions and supplements,communicate with providers and more. Google recently secured a bigpartnership and pilot program in eastern Washington. Inland Northwest…
Clash of the Titans
Seattle’s Fremont neighborhood,with its 18-foot-high bridge troll and seven-ton sculpture of Lenin, has billeditself as the Center of the Known Universe. Yet this funky nexus of vegetarianrestaurants and yoga studios has emerged as a focal point in a fierce battlefor dominance of a broad range of critical technologies. Google, the Master of theInternet, has a…