The business-incubation programs at the Polytechnic Institute of NYU (NYU-Poly) and SUNY Downstate Medical Center, both supporting members of our association, collaborated on hosting the 2010 annual members' meeting of our association. Several presentations and announcements are attached.

Building on a NYSERDA business-development program review we produced at NYU-Poly the previous day (those presentations will be posted in a few more days), our annual meeting was dedicated in part to exploring the question of how better to connect startup and early-stage companies statewide to the uniquely powerful financial and business resources of New York City.

A discussion panel of distinguished guests (see photo gallery) included:

• Kathryn Wylde, president and CEO of the Partnership for New York City;
• Steve Cohen, NYS deputy commissioner of economic development for economic empowerment and small business at Empire State Development;
• Brian McMahon, executive director of the New York State Economic Development Council; and
• Richard Honen, co-chair of the Capital and Innovation Group at Phillips Lytle LLP and managing director of the firm's Albany office.

More detail and presentations after the break. Read more

Steven Coker, who has experience owning a business in the South Side of the City of Syracuse, has been hired as the new coordinator of community outreach at our member the South Side Innovation Center (SSIC). For full background please see the attached press release. The SSIC and its several resident programs are projects of the Whitman School of Management at Syracuse University. 

B. Thomas Mancuso, CEO of our member Mancuso Business Development Group — a pioneer of business incubation worldwide and operator of nearly 3 million square feet of small-business space across a wide swath of upstate — was one of 23 alumni of the state's private colleges honored by the Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities. Tom is a graduate of the Rochester Institute of Technology. For the cIcu press release, follow the previous link or here for Tom's profile. Congratulations, Tom! 

 Business incubators and technology parks would play a key role in anchoring regional innovation clusters across New York State, according to a vision laid out in a report published recently by the Public Policy Institute (PPI), the research affiliate of the Business Council of New York State, Inc.

Entitled Transcending the Hamster Cage: Unfettering New York's Static Innovation Economy, the PPI report is available for download here with supporting data here.

The report includes both PPI's own recommendations and a series of personal essays, including a very interesting one signed by Alex Brownstein of Integrated Tissue Dynamics, LLC. Alex is the former manager of the incubator program at the SUNY Albany East Campus, and one of the original incorporators of this association. 

Nasir Ali, who five years ago started up our supporting member the the Tech Garden, will leave to team up with high-tech entrepreneur Martin Babinec on Upstate Venture Connect, an online community that will help connect upstate entrepreneurial resources with each other, and upstate "expats" worldwide to aspiring entrepreneurs upstate.

Incubation programs at the Syracuse Technology Garden will continue to be directed by Tech Garden Vice President of Entrepreneurial Services Paul Brooks, and the affiliated, NYSERDA-sponsored Cleantech Center by Executive Director Linda Dickerson Hartsock. Martin Babinec is a native of Little Falls who resettled upstate after a successful run as a Silicon Valley entrepreneur.

Please see the Tech Garden's complete press release for more background. News coverage in the Post-Standard here. Congratulations, Nasir!

Extending a series of recent articles touching on business incubators, the Rochester Democrat & Chronicle has published an excellent review of how Rochester's economic future will be determined by entrepreneurial startup companies of the kind found at business incubators.

The article quotes William Destler, president of Rochester Institute of Technology, where our supporting member the Venture Creations incubator has been the subject of two other recent stories in the D&C, and which hosted our association's annual meeting last year, bringing a small international trade delegation to Rochester.

It also quotes Jim Senall, the president of High Tech Rochester, the University of Rochester affiliate that owns and operates our member the Lennox Tech Enterprise Center and manages on behalf of UR another member, the wet-lab equipped Rochester BioVenture Center. Jim was also recently invited to Washington to participate in a dialogue on innovation and entrepreneurship. 

Robert (Bob) Herz, a former staffer at the New York State Senate, has been appointed the new director of our member the South Side Innovation Center, a microenterprise incubator sponsored by the Falcone Center for Entrepreneurship at Syracuse University's Whitman School of Management. 

While working for state Senator Martin Golden of Brooklyn, Bob was involved in structuring the future development of BioBAT, a project affiliated with our supporting member SUNY Downstate Advanced Biotechnology Incubator. We offer Bob a warm welcome to his new role at SSIC!

For more background, please see the university press release at the first link above or here.

James Senall — who as president of High Tech Rochester has oversight over two of our member incubators, the Lennox Tech Enterprise Center and Rochester BioVenture Center — participated by invitation in the Obama administration's Federal Interagency Roundtable on Regional Innovation Clusters and Entrepreneurship. The HTR website captures press coverage here.