Innovation + Job News

A combination of public and private initiatives led to the announcement of thousands of new jobs in the Baltimore area's innovation and technology-based industries in 2010, according to a newly released report. Those jobs will continue to affect Maryland's employment trends in 2011.

Middle River Aircraft Systems, based in Baltimore County, announced 200 new jobs last year, and Ball Aerospace & Technologies in Prince George's County rolled out plans for 300 new positions.

The federal Base Realignment and Closure plan (BRAC) has taken shape to the Baltimore area's benefit also, transferring some 4,380 jobs in the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) to Anne Arundel County from Virginia. DISA will join the newly created U.S. Cyber Command (CYBERCOM) in Anne Arundel, which is expected to create 1,000 jobs as it ramps up operations.

The 2010 New and Expanding Businesses in Maryland report highlights several companies and state agencies for their contributions to job growth in greater Baltimore and the state and federal incentives like the Maryland Job Creation and Recovery Tax Credit that facilitate job creation by employers. Altogether, the report presents an investment scenario based on 2010 announcements where $4 billion in investment will flow into the local employment and services market in the near future.
 
Writer: Sam Hopkins
Source: Maryland Department of Business and Economic Development, Office of Research

Sometimes scaling back one plan can mean expansion of others. In the case of the Senator Theatre, a North Baltimore landmark with a recent history often centering on uncertainty, a recent change of plans will shift the 1939 art-deco building from mixed-use entertainment site with one movie screen to a multi-screen movie house with a smaller amount of dedicated space for eating and drinking.

On Saturday, March 19, operators James "Buzz" Cusack and Kathleen Cusack announced that 307 new cinema seats will be spread among three new theaters in the building just south of the intersection of York Road and Northern Parkway. Instead of previous plans for a small-plates restaurant in the large contiguous space north of the current movie auditorium, the building will be segmented to allow for a variety of first-run movies with different target audiences to be shown. There is also potential for new screening technology to be rolled out in the smaller boutique theaters, following the Senator's selection for a THX audio overhaul in 2003 that never completely came to pass.

"We're trying to get our hands on a digital 3-D projector for the summer when we're still just a single screen, but they're hard to come by and they're expensive," Kathleen Cusack says. All of the Senator's new equipment will be digital, which marks a major change from its current 35 mm and 70 mm film equipment.

Despite scrapping plans for a full restaurant on the site, the Senator will still add a wine bar and Sofi's Crepes, which also has a location in the Charles Theatre in the Station North neighborhood. The Charles is also operated by the Cusacks, who hold a 40-year lease on the city-owned Senator Theatre.
 
Writer: Sam Hopkins
Source: Kathleen Cusack, Senator Theatre operator

While most University of Baltimore students take a vacation and some diligent ones hit the books during spring break this March, a gathering of dignitaries and businesspeople from southern Europe will convene at the UB midtown campus to talk about Maryland as their primary point of contact with the American business world. On March 23 and 24, the US-Balkans Business Summit will welcome top-level officials from seven countries in the region of the former Yugoslavia to Charm City. Among the most prominent attendees will be Bakir Izetbegovic, one of the three presidents of Bosnia-Herzegovina's tripartite executive, and Filip Vuljanovic, President of Montenegro.

Charles Dillon, President of the US-Balkans Business Alliance, says that Balkan heads of state and commercial powers are "looking to Maryland as a gateway to enter the U.S. marketplace." In addition to officials, Dillon says that close to sixty private companies from the Balkans will come to Baltimore for the forum. The event builds on standing relationships between Maryland and the region: Maryland National Guard forces have engaged in over 200 joint training exercises with soldiers from Bosnia-Herzegovina since a "sister state" partnership was established in 2003, and the state operates a trade office for the western Balkans in Podgorica, the capital of Montenegro, under the auspices of the Department of Business and Economic Development. US-Balkans Business Summit staff will assist attendees in arranging business-to-business meetings and business-to-government meetings over the course of the two-day event, with the goal of establishing lasting ties between Maryland and the Balkans.


Writer: Sam Hopkins
Source: Charles Dillon, Esq.

Dr. Kenneth P. Johnson, longtime head of neurology at the University of Maryland-Baltimore, joined representatives of international pharmaceutical giant Teva at the UMB BioPark on February 24 to talk about advances in the treatment of the autoimmune disease multiple sclerosis (MS) that took place as a result of research at Israel's Weizmann Institute of Science and UMB.

Dr. Johnson spearheaded efforts to ease self-injection of Copaxone by MS patients, and pointed out Baltimore's unique status in life sciences and more specifically in medicine: "There are a few primary places on the map, one being Baltimore, where you can expect new development and superior patient care." Across Maryland, the region's advantage is even heavier: "Between Johns Hopkins, UMB, and the National Institutes of Health [in Bethesda], very few places in the country even come close to what is available here."

The Maryland/Israel Development Center, which promotes bilateral trade and encourages Israeli companies to establish their North American bases in Maryland, sponsored the event. John Hassler, VP of Marketing at Teva Neuroscience, also spoke about Teva's dual role as both the largest manufacturer of generic drugs in the world -- one in every six U.S. prescriptions is filled with a Teva product -- and maker of branded treatments like Copaxone. Teva worked with Dr. Johnson to make Copaxone easy to use, and the company achieved positive results over the years for consistent treatment by introducing nurses as trainers and assuring proper administration through consultation with physicians.

"One of the key issues with MS is that we don't know what causes it, so there are multiple methods of treating it," Hassler said.

Over 2.5 million people are affected by MS worldwide.

Writer: Sam Hopkins
Sources: Dr. Kenneth Johnson, UMB, John Hassler, Teva Neuroscience

A Columbia company is using $1.1 million in Maryland Energy Administration grant funding that originated as federal stimulus money to build devices that will make solar power generation more efficient. Advanced Technology & Research Corp. (ATR) plans to use GPS-based controllers to nudge its Solar Pole Tracker systems and the panels they move in the direction of sunlight, optimizing electricity production throughout the day.

The pole-mounted module will first be attached to vertical surfaces such as parking lot light posts that are already connected to the grid. With MEA funding contingent on production of 1200 units by March 2012, ATR is working to make the product more affordable and predicts a five-year payback period when state and federal clean energy incentives are taken into account. The Solar Pole Tracker hub also has space for advertisements, which could make them profitable for operators of distributed power generation systems such as parking lots with multiple solar panels mounted on light poles.

ATR also wants to make Solar Pole Trackers for wind turbines for doubled clean energy impact. "President Obama and Governor O'Malley know how important it is to stimulate American innovation and bring manufacturing back to the U.S. to generate new jobs," says Rob Lundahl, ATR's vice president for automation systems. ATR expects to create dozens of green jobs in Maryland as production of the Solar Pole Tracker and related devices increases.

Writer: Sam Hopkins
Source: Rob Lundahl, ATR

On February 16th entrepreneurs and business interests convened in Annapolis to show of support for the InvestMaryland bill. The legislation, spearheaded by Governor O'Malley, would act as a fund for state investment into the startup economy.

The bill would allow insurance companies to forward-pay their tax liabilities at discounted rates and thereby replenish the Maryland Venture Fund. The hundred-million dollar fund would then be invested as venture capital into Maryland startups. In his testimony, O'Malley said this fund would "help our businesses create thousands of jobs, injecting hundreds of millions of dollars into Maryland's innovation economy."

The legislation addresses a disparity between Maryland's economic potential and its available investment capital. "Great research, great technology, great innovation but we rank very low when it comes to availability of venture capital. So InvestMaryland is an effort to get venture capital flowing," said O'Malley.

Panel member David Troy said, "One of the great things about this bill is it will provide opportunities for parallel and future private investment and that's terrific. Anything that can prompt investors to get into the market is great in my book."

Questions, however, remain regarding the best methods of the fund's allocation. "The Department of Business and Economic Development has indicated a preference not to segment it, and I agree with that decision. There is no reason to create legislative lock-in for one sector vs. another; that would only serve to limit emerging opportunities," said Troy.
Mike Brenner co-organizer of Startup Baltimore said about the allocation, "I think the bill is great for small startups as long as it's distributed amongst a large number of businesses.  I'm not really in favor of seeing $30 million of this fund go right to one company."

Writer: Ryan LeRoy Kleeberger
Sources: David Troy, Mike Brenner, Karl Gurntow, Governer O'Malley, Christian Johansson, The Milken Institute

University of Maryland and Mtech are holding their annual 75K Business Plan Competition. This year marks the competition's eleventh year.

Dean Cheng, Director of Mtech's venture program, said, "Winning the competition, which is judged by leaders in the region's entrepreneurial community, is some measure of validation that a company's technology and plan to execute as a business are promising."

Past winners, most notably Lurn Inc and Squarespace, have since become some of the fastest growing companies in the U.S.

Lurn Inc founder and CEO Anik said, "Being a winner in this competition was huge for us for many reasons. We were dealing with professionals that really know what they're talking about - their insights are great. Winning was a great validation."

The competition fits into a larger economic picture. Cheng said. "The Business Plan Competition on its own is an excellent educational and networking tool for the teams that enter. However, our bigger goal is to help create high growth, successful companies based on the numerous inventions and innovations that come out of the half billion dollars of research here at UMD each year."

Writer: Ryan LeRoy Kleeberger
Sources: Dean Cheng, UMD, Mtech, Anik Singal

Speaking at the Johns Hopkins Carey Business School on February 16, Veolia Transportation CEO Mark Joseph highlighted the past and present of his company's involvement in Baltimore transportation, and what other cities are doing with technology to improve mobility. Veolia operates the Johns Hopkins shuttle, the city's free downtown Circulator buses, airport Super Shuttle service, and the city's Yellow Cab, which is the oldest in the United States.

Veolia also operates the T system in Boston and the Las Vegas bus system, which has been one of the most successful models nationwide for getting tourists to ride buses. Joseph says that as 2-way radio enabled faster pickups of cab fares and replaced hub-based taxi dispatch systems, greater data availability via GPS is leading to more efficient public transportation. Veolia plans to make an increasing amount of data on its Baltimore operations available over the internet in the near future.

In the larger market of Boston, iPhone app developers and other technologists have taken hold of Veolia and Massachusetts Department of Transportation data to provide precise location services to transit riders and cab customers. In addition to smart phones with app capabilities, any SMS-enabled phone can send and receive information about T service in Boston via resources like T Tracker, and nearby taxis are now visible to customers with Taxi Magic. Baltimore's public transportation efforts are likely to get a boost in 2011 from greater open-source development of similar tools and Veolia's work to make transit data more transparent.

Writer: Sam Hopkins
Source: Veolia

What do you do when household energy is deregulated but most households don't know how to take advantage? In the case of Viridian Energy, you adopt an Amway-style approach of spreading the word.

Ed Kenny helped Viridian from its Connecticut base to Maryland in 2009. Since then, over 1800 associates have begun operating in Maryland to convert electricity bills from BGE power supply to Viridian's sources, which comprise a larger portion of clean energy than the dominant Baltimore-area utility. Viridian customers can choose to have 20% of their power come from renewable resources like wind and solar power, which is higher than the 7.5% mandated for Maryland utilities. 83% of Viridian customers opt for the 20% contribution, and the other 17% go for 100%, meaning all of their household power can be traced back to clean energy resources. Those customers generally pay about the same cost as their typical BGE bill, Kenny says. And that's where the case-by-case sales come in.

"We employ a direct-selling business model," Kenny says, "which basically means that I get involved as a distributor and inform my family and friends about deregulation and their choices." Individual Viridian associates earn residual income when their contacts switch suppliers, and over 600 Maryland non-profits also participate by getting members of congregations and organizations to switch. Viridian hopes to create a bottom-up benefit in the energy market and on the Maryland jobs scene--though most associates represent Viridian as a part-time gig, close to thirty Marylanders have already made Viridian their full-time job.

Writer: Sam Hopkins
Source: Ed Kenny, Viridian Energy

Michael Spinosa is a high-tech guy with his own company, Unleashed Technologies, developing web solutions in Columbia, Maryland. But his preferred tool for making a mark on the IT industry sounds decidedly low-tech: "It's like Play-Doh; it's amazing what you can do with it."

He's describing Drupal, a free software system that allows developers to customize content management and delivery through open-source architecture. It's also enabling Unleashed to add to its team in 2011. From its founding in 2007 with two employees and barely $1000 of working capital, Unleashed is riding $1.6 million in revenue in 2010 and hoping to double its current staff to 30 with $3 million by the end of this year. "I'm looking for good people and we are hiring very actively," Spinosa says.

In addition to individual personnel additions, Unleashed is acquiring the operations of some smaller area tech firms whose own endeavors haven't been as successful or satisfying as they would like. "We're always on the lookout for small web firms where maybe it's four or five guys who aren't enjoying the ride but who want to do great work." With new versions of Drupal and open-source e-commerce platform Magento -- which Unleashed also uses to build its products -- now hitting the net, Unleashed and its employees are eager to keep tinkering and growing.

Writer: Sam Hopkins
Source: Michael Spinosa, Unleashed Technologies

Open Society Institute-Baltimore, a non-profit organization specializing in issues surrounding drug addiction, educational success, and incarceration, estimates that every year 9,000 individuals are re-absorbed into the Baltimore community following prison sentences. However, those ex-offenders often have difficulty emerging into employment and economic activity after their time is served. One key factor affecting successful integration into outside life for former prisoners is access to financial institutions and credit.

Annie Spain, manager of PNC Bank's Charles Village branch, has linked up with the Prisoners Aid Association of Maryland to provide ex-offenders with classes on money management, checking accounts, and secured credit cards that allow them to get back on the grid and into good standing. Solid credit opens up home ownership and educational opportunities, and even eases employment searches. Having worked at another bank previously, Spain says she liked what PNC was doing in the community: "It matched my personality."

Prisoners Aid head Michael Brown likes what PNC is doing in his neighborhood as well. As to the importance of banking access, Brown says simply, "It's invaluable." Many low to moderate income households--with or without criminal records--do not hold bank accounts and therefore must use check-cashing businesses that charge high interest rates. Others had good credit at one time but saw their finances ravaged by addiction and incarceration. By promoting financial literacy combined with available banking resources, Brown says PNC's work in Charles Village and surrounding neighborhoods has been "healthy and good for [his] clients."

Writer: Sam Hopkins
Sources: Annie Spain, Branch Manager, Charles Village PNC; Michael Brown, Executive Director, Prisoners Aid Association of Maryland

A team of African-American scientists and entrepreneurs is making Baltimore city its base of operations for space-bound technologies. Housed at the Emerging Technology Center at the former site of Eastern High School on 33rd Street in Waverly, Phezu Space, LLC aims to capitalize on government-led trends that will strengthen Maryland as a hub for advances in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) education, while creating marketable technology to serve a growing private space flight industry that is developing across the nation.

Jayfus Doswell is the Vice President of Research and Development at Phezu, and he is also the President & CEO of Juxtopia, a Baltimore-based company that develops biomedical and information-technology (BIO-IT) interfaces for medical and manufacturing applications. For example, Juxtopia aims to make medical procedures safer by incorporating advanced optics and software that complement expert physicians and their skills.

Phezu is building on the research base of historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) like Morgan State, Bowie State, Coppin State, and University of Maryland-Eastern Shore to give students hands-on experience with products under development, while also reducing the rate at which the start-up space company uses its cash resources. With existing facilities at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center focused on satellite servicing and Senator Barbara Mikulski standing as a champion of ongoing research into in-orbit maintenance, Dr. Doswell says the company's first product will be a spacecraft that facilitates maintenance of satellites and other devices that were launched months or years before. Robotic arm operations will incorporate Juxtopia technology for remote work.

Though the products will eventually be applied far away from Charm City, Phezu is locking in the company's coordinates here. "We are making the commitment to keep production in Baltimore city," Dr. Doswell says. The company plans for its first prototype to be completed by the first quarter of 2012.

Writer: Sam Hopkins
Source: Dr. Jayfus Doswell, Phezu Space LLC

After over a year of intense involvement in founding a technology startup firm in Baltimore, Brian Sierakowski has gotten to a promising point: "We have more opportunities than time or resources," says Sierakowski, whose collaborative web platform www.cahoots.co is based in the Emerging Technology Center in Canton. He and his partners were happy to hear Gov. Martin O'Malley encourage legislators to set aside $100 million to help such startups out with the resource side of the entrepreneurial equation on Thursday, Feb. 3 in his annual State of the State address.

Cahoots is still in the market research stage, with a three-person team now stabilized for over half a year after several personnel switches in the company's initial months. "There aren't too many people out there who individually have the full skill set to take a company to where they want it to be," the Cahoots founder says. Prototyping and strategy development are next steps that can be facilitated by greater availability of funds for startups statewide. For example, web-based companies like Cahoots need to demonstrate their services and accommodate users, which requires buying bandwidth. Removal of anxiety about basic costs through help from Annapolis funds could be the rising tide that lifts all ships in Baltimore's digital harbor.

O'Malley wants the next "world-changing company" to start in Maryland, and Sierakowski says dozens of potentially successful local startups could be incubated with the same $100 million that might make up only a portion of larger traditional jobs projects. Sierakowski also says that money can make planned small-business expansion go faster. "Putting money into the system and making assistance available speeds the process; what would otherwise take a year may take just three months with the right resources."

Writer: Sam Hopkins
Source: Brian Sierakowski, Cahoots

The Enoch Pratt Free Library's Forest Park branch re-opened Monday, Feb. 7 with design renovations and six times as many computers as it previously had. Located at 3023 Garrison Blvd. in northwest Baltimore, the library will now provide online access to more community members conducting employment research and filing paperwork as they find potential work.

John Damond, manager of the Business, Science, and Technology center at the Enoch Pratt central branch on Cathedral Street in Mount Vernon, expects the thirty-two new computers at the Forest Park location will see heavy use. "There has definitely been an increase in searching for jobs and job application" using public PCs at the central library, he says.

Many companies that are hiring refer candidates to local public libraries for computer use, and since many human resource departments now operate exclusively online, these services are essential. In the central branch's PC Commons and Public Computer Center, as well as in subject departments and the dedicated Jobs & Career Center, Damond estimates that there are 75-100 computer workstations at his location. Newly overhauled branches like Forest Park, which now has 32 computers, or the Edmondson Avenue branch that reopened in June 2010, generally have dozens of options for job-seekers to get online and get back to work.

Organizational support for the city library system's expansion of computer services has come from the Bank of America Charitable Foundation, the Jacob and Hilda Blaustein Foundation, and the David and Barbara B. Hirschorn Foundation.

Writer: Sam Hopkins
Source: John Damond, Enoch Pratt Free Library

Though inclement winter weather sometimes prevents thousands of Baltimoreans from getting to work, the snow is a boon to many small enterprises, like Ray Hill's Hill Gardens & Landscaping.

When a big storm is forecast, Ray doubles his standard staff of five to between ten and twelve people. That spike in shovel-pushers and plow-drivers may not last long enough to change statewide job numbers, but such seasonal business bumps can provide much needed short-term stimulus. Sometimes, when Old Man Winter hangs around, the jobs stick as long as the snow and ice do.

"We work a storm until it's done," Hill says. With three plow trucks and one front-end loader, this crew and others like it spread out all over the area to allow others get back to school and their jobs. Working from sunrise to sunset is tough, and some people just aren't cut out for it. But Hill is willing to give a shot to students, construction workers, or anyone else who will do an honest day's hard work in the freezing cold. "If they work out, we love to have them back." 

Writer: Sam Hopkins
Source: Ray Hill, Ray Hill's Gardens & Landscaping