Peas in a pod: Cast aside all doubts, dear readers – innovation is alive and well on Long Island, and we can prove it.
Today, we light up Spark: The Innovate Long Island Podcast – one small step for Innovate LI, one giant leap for the regional innovation economy. More below.
Spring bloom: Wheeled floats, shoulder-borne portable shrines and marionette performances mark the annual Takayama Spring Festival.
Spanning the globe: It’s April 14 out there, and konnichiwa to our many readers across Japan, where you’re enjoying the first day of the beautiful Takayama Spring Festival.
Here in the States and in several national neighbors, today is Pan American Day, when North and South American cultures show a little unity.
Assorted nuts: Exclusively in the USA, you can also choose between National Pecan Day and National Ex-Spouse Day.
Fire in the sky: Speaking of nuts, on April 14, 1561, hundreds of people in Nuremberg, Germany, witnessed an hour-long aerial battle between flying discs, spheres, cylinders and a giant black triangle, all blasting fire in broad daylight.
While modern scientists theorize everything from sunspots to psychedelic mushrooms, ufologists consider the Nuremberg Celestial Phenomenon – documented by dozens of artists and writers of the day – proof-positive of alien activity on Earth.
J.C. Penney’s worth: Future department store magnate James Cash Penney Jr. opened his first store, a Wyoming dry-goods franchise, on this date in 1902.
Penney passed in 1971 – and in 2020, citing the pandemic and other woes, the shrinking J.C. Penney Company filed for bankruptcy protection.
Tower of power: The Cockcroft-Walton generator, remade.
Split decision: Confirming Einstein’s famous theory that E=mc2, British physicists (and soon-to-be Nobel Laureates) Ernest Walton and Sir John Douglas Cockcroft split an atom with a proton beam on April 14, 1932 – officially, the world’s first nuclear particle accelerator.
The grapes that spoke: Still a principal example of The Great American Novel, John Steinbeck’s “The Grapes of Wrath” was first published 82 years ago today.
Let’s go to the videotape: And the first practical video recorder was demonstrated on this date in 1956 at a Chicago broadcaster’s convention.
A technician secretly recorded the convention’s keynote address and then immediately played it back on 20 small monitors positioned around the room, stunning the audience and causing a spontaneous five-minute ovation.
Surgical precision: British physiologist Sir Victor Horsley (1857-1916) – a groundbreaking neurosurgeon who pioneered brain and spine surgeries and was the first to successfully remove a spinal tumor – would be 164 years old today.
Lynn-sanity: Loretta, still bringing it.
Also born on April 14 were Dutch mathematician and physicist Christiaan Huygens (1629-1695), who cracked the nature of light and made major astronomical discoveries; English ethnologist and Army officer Augustus Henry Lane-Fox Pitt-Rivers (1827-1900), the “father of British archaeology”; American electrical engineer Harold Stephen Black (1898-1983), who developed the negative-feedback amplifier; Dutch geologist Reinout Willem Van Bemmelen (1904-1983), who significantly advanced the sciences of volcanology and tectonics; and British stage and screen legend Sir John Gielgud (1904-2000).
Woman enough: And take a bow, Loretta Lynn! The American singer-songwriter – whose Grammy-heavy, gold album-filled country music career spans six decades-plus (her 50th studio album dropped in March) – turns 89 today.
Wish the Coal Miner’s Daughter well at editor@innovateli.com, where (We) Can’t Love You Enough when you send news tips, and your calendar events are a Sweet Thang (even on The Darkest Day).
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BUT FIRST, THIS
Machine learning: Robotics teams from across Long Island have advanced to the regional round of the FIRST Tech Challenge, a national robo-competition for middle and high schoolers.
Two robotics teams from Half Hollow Hills High School West – Team Rise and Team Wise – emerged victorious from the FTC’s Long Island Qualifier No. 1, held in early March, while the RoboPandas of Floral Park’s Sewanhaka High School and the Stony Brook School Bears captured top honors at Long Island Qualifier No. 2. Two teams representing Syosset High School, the ELITE and the Syosset Nebula, turned the trick in Qualifier No 3; not to be outdone, Half Hollow Hills High School West netted another win in last week’s “remote” competition round, along with another qualifier from the Stony Brook School.
Hosted by the 501(c)3 nonprofit School-Business Partnerships of Long Island, the regional competitions – which require teams to code robots to operate by remote control and operate autonomously, and to submit detailed engineering portfolios – concludes the week of April 19 with the Long Island Championships, next step on the road to the nationals.
Water win: The Water Authority of Western Nassau County has scored a major state grant.
Pooled resources: Albany has approved more than $48.9 million in funding to support clean-water initiatives across the state, including roughly $5 million for upgrades at a critical Nassau County water-treatment facility.
The Water Authority of Western Nassau County received a $4.93 million Emerging Contaminants Grant April 8, when the New York State Environmental Facilities Corp. announced its latest funding round. The grant will cover installation of a new granular-activated carbon-filtration system, designed specifically to remove perfluorooctanoic acid and other contaminants, in large wells serviced by the authority’s Water Treatment Plant.
The $48.9 million in Environmental Facilities Corp. funding – including grants, interest-free loans and low-cost loans – is part of $500 million in appropriations earmarked in the state’s FY 2022 budget for clean-water projects. “By approving these grants and low-cost financing for critical water-infrastructure work, the EFC Board of Directors has ensured that communities statewide can cost-effectively undertake important projects that help protect our precious water resources,” noted EFC President and CEO Joseph Rabito.
POD PEOPLE
Introducing Spark: The Innovate Long Island Podcast, our first foray into the wide world of podcasting, featuring in-depth conversations with leaders from across the regional innovation economy.
To break in our new weekly feature, a two-fer: Innovate LI President Marlene McDonnell christens the series, followed by the official Episode 1, featuring the unique perspectives of a mic’d-up, gloves-off Michael Dowling, president & CEO of the immense Northwell Health system. Welcome to the show!
TOP OF THE SITE
Aiming carefully: A Northwell-led national coalition won’t gun for the Second Amendment, but it will target best practices for reducing gun violence.
Listen up: With podcasts now in the mix, don’t you think it’s time your entire innovation team subscribed to our free, rather brilliant e-newsletters? Of course it is.
Innovation in the Age of Coronavirus: A major vaccination plateau, a COVID crisis hotline and a commencement ceremony on wheels – rolling on with Long Island’s one-and-only pandemic primer.
VOICES
Healthcare providers can’t do it all – but they’ll play a huge role in the development of new, community-based initiatives promoting broader health equity, according to Voices healthcare anchor Terry Lynam, communications consultant and former senior vice president/chief public relations officer for Northwell Health.
STUFF WE’RE READING
Thankless: Vice President Harris braves “the graveyard of politics.” Yahoo News follows.
Thanks for your business: Innovative brick-and-mortar retailers are luring back customers. CNBC shops around.
Thanks for nothing: Grateful just to have a job? Your emotions may be misguided. The BBC brings all the feels.
RECENT FUNDINGS
+ Vesta Healthcare, a New York City-based digital health platform for clinical providers, raised $65 million in growth funding led by Deerfield Management Company, Oak HC/FT, Kaiser Permanente Ventures, Lux Capital, Generator Ventures, Nationwide, CareCentrix and others.
+ Syzygy Plasmonics, a Texas-based tech firm developing a photocatalyst for the industrial gas, chemical and energy industries, raised $23 million in Series B financing led by Horizons Ventures, with participation from Equinor Ventures, The Engine, GOOSE Capital and Evok Innovations.
+ LineVision, a Massachusetts-based provider of non-contact overhead powerline sensor solutions, closed its $12.5 million Series B financing round led by UP Partners, with participation from National Grid Partners and Clean Energy Ventures.
+ Volastra Therapeutics, a NYC-based biotech developing novel therapies for the prevention and treatment of metastatic cancer, extended its original seed round to a total of $44 million. New investors Vida Ventures and Catalio Capital Management joined a syndicate that includes Polaris Partners, Droia Ventures, ARCH Venture Partners and Quark Venture.
+ Cyble, a Georgia-based global cyber-intelligence firm specializing in early threat detection, raised $4 million in seed funding led by Blackbird Ventures, Spider Capital, Xoogler Ventures, Picus Capital and Cathexis Ventures.
+ MarketSpark, a California-based provider of managed wireless services for Plain Old Telephone Service replacement, completed a $7 million Series B financing round led by IDT Corp., with participation from Goldie Group and Klein Enterprises.
BELOW THE FOLD (Vaccination Nation Edition)
Full stop: Six out of 6 million was a clot to worry about.
Long shot: Why 6,000,000-to-1 odds were enough to pause Johnson & Johnson vaccinations.
Good bet: Companies are likely to begin requiring proof of vaccination from employees and customers.
Beating the odds: How New Mexico – among the poorest U.S. states – is leading the vaccination race.
Mortal lock: Please continue supporting the amazing firms that support Innovate LI, including Sahn Ward, where experienced real estate and land-use attorneys never play games with your corporate success. Check them out.
