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Earnings January 17, 2020

Reorganizing MSC, Park stumble in latest quarterlies

  PARK AEROSPACE CORP. Headquarters: Westbury Industry: Composites manufacturing NYSE: PKE Reporting Date: Jan. 9, 2020 Reporting Quarter: 3Q FY2020 Quarter Ended: Dec. 1, 2019 Numbers: Third-quarter sales were reported as $15.8 million, a 23.4 percent jump from the $12.8 million reported for the same quarter last fiscal year. But quarterly net earnings took a hit – falling from $3.69 million in FY2019 to $2.44 million, a 33.8 percent plunge – and both basic and…

Voices January 17, 2020

As resolutions crumble, dishing on doomed diets

By AMBROSE CLANCY // How’s that New Year’s diet going? What? You’re back to Danish and bacon for breakfast, chicken nuggets for lunch and beers and pizza-with-extra-cheese (you know, with the gang) for dinner? And who’s the evil person who left black-and-white cookies in the break room? Don’t they know you’ve become a healthy, weight-conscious person? What happened? Simple, according to Mag Selig, writing in Psychology Today: “Diets don’t work!” But you’re not alone in…

Clean Energy January 16, 2020

Island schools to run $20M institute for wind-farmers

By GREGORY ZELLER // The winds of workforce development are blowing again through Long Island’s leading academic institutions, two of which will anchor a new state-sanctioned project targeting the offshore wind industry. Farmingdale State College and Stony Brook University will leverage a $20 million New York State Energy Research and Development Authority grant to create the Offshore Wind Training Institute, a worker-readiness effort focused on the burgeoning clean-gen industry, which looms large over future regional…

Opinion January 16, 2020

Sound investments, on an Island filled with Wonder

 By TOM MARINER // A “blast from the past” from your most recent newsletter: A few years after Ray Kurzweil introduced the first Reading Machine, he cranked out his first “music synthesizer” with Stevie Wonder – a product of Kurzweil’s fertile brain and (in theory) a bet between the two that electronic stuff could not sound like a concert grand piano. The technical challenge was that large memory chips that digitally hold millions of pieces…

Calendar January 16, 2020

Stuff we’re thinking about going to

  January 21 Starting a Successful Small Business 7-8:30 p.m., Longwood Public Library, Middle Island  Nonprofit mentoring group SCORE-Long Island presents an interactive discussion for entrepreneurs, discussing the do’s and don’ts of startups and small-business success. Admission is free but pre-registration is required. Registration and more information January 22  ACIT Executive Business Breakfast 8 a.m., Crest Hollow Country Club, Woodbury  The business-networking organization Advancement for Commerce, Industry and Technology presents its first Executive Business Breakfast…

Opinion January 15, 2020

A simple code for collegians: programming for all

By MATTHEW WRIGHT // Has higher education gone soft on coding? Isolated in our computer science departments, it’s not reaching the wider student audience I believe it should. At Adelphi University, where I chair the Physics Department, teaching coding to all students – STEM majors, humanities majors and health-profession majors – is an experiment I have tried and have personally seen succeed. Computer programming is in high demand in the workplace, and it’s a 21st…

News January 14, 2020

At NYIT, a science lab also working on the workforce

By GREGORY ZELLER // New York Institute of Technology’s brightest will multiply their minds in the university’s new Biomedical Sciences and Bioengineering Laboratory, where biology times engineering equals 21st century opportunity. A bevy of state and local officials joined New York Tech President Hank Foley Monday to cut the ribbon on the new lab, occupying 1,000 square feet inside the Theobald Science Center on the university’s Old Westbury campus. Principally focused on four primary objectives…

Biotech January 13, 2020

Codagenix scores big with $20M Series B round

By GREGORY ZELLER // A stellar $20 million investment round has blasted a Long Island biotech into the stratosphere, and a new tax bracket. Farmingdale-based Codagenix Inc., a 2012 startup launched by Stony Brook University assistant research professor Steffan Mueller and Farmingdale State College biology professor J. Robert Coleman, has closed a $20 million Series B investment round, led by Adjuvant Capital, a New York City/San Francisco venture capital firm focused on life sciences. Also…

The Debrief January 13, 2020

Debrief: Abiding Kevin Law, as LI collides with destiny

  Hard to believe, but it’s been five long years since Innovate LI last Debriefed Kevin Law, who’s now logged a full decade as President and CEO of the Long Island Association. As 2020 dawns, the primary influencer and leading architect of regional socioeconomics is enjoying another “Top Performer” effort by the Long Island Regional Economic Development Council (the council, which Law co-chairs with Hofstra University President Stuart Rabinowitz, snagged $87.9 million in Albany’s ninth-annual…

Voices January 10, 2020

In 2020, integration is key to brand communication

By DAVID A. CHAUVIN // It’s believed humans have been making annual resolutions for over four millennia, all the way back to the ancient Babylonians making yearly promises to the gods to pay off debts or settle old grudges. I’m fortunate enough to owe no outstanding debts to Marduk or Nergal, currently, though I certainly like to set few new goals each January. Any custom that’s been around that long must have something going for…

Invention January 9, 2020

Now batting for Hoplite Power, an innovation veteran

By GREGORY ZELLER // A regional rookie with major-league aspirations – literally – has teamed up with a heavy-hitting innovation all-star to knock its next-gen “power hubs” out of the park. Actually, into the park. Hoplite Power, a Long Island City-based startup and client of Stony Brook University’s Clean Energy Business Incubation Program, has enlisted the help of Hauppauge-based product-design expert Intelligent Product Solutions – specifically, IPS President Mitch Maiman – as it prepares to…

Startups January 8, 2020

After successful seed, Qunnect set for ludicrous speed

By GREGORY ZELLER // Marking another quantum leap for cybersecure long-distance communications, a high-tech Stony Brook University spinoff has completed a key financing round. Qunnect LLC, a 2017 startup launched by a Stony Brook PhD and the head of the university’s Quantum Information Technology Group, has closed its $800,000 seed round, an oversubscribed financing cycle backed by the Accelerate NY Seed Fund, French venture-capital fund Quantonation – the first VC fund dedicated to quantum technologies…

Health January 7, 2020

With Makos circling, feeling better about joint surgery

By GREGORY ZELLER // Just when you thought it was safe to check in for joint-replacement surgeries – actually, it’s a lot safer now, with these Makos swimming around. Innovation dives deeper at four Northwell Health Long Island hospitals, where the Mako device, a robotic assistant for total joint-replacement procedures, has surfaced. Manufactured by Michigan-based medical-device multinational Stryker, the interactive robotic arm gives human specialists new levels of surgical precision, helping to reduce recovery times…

Voices January 3, 2020

Online hiring practices, 2020 Census loom large for LI

By ROSALIE DRAGO // Ah, the start of a new year, when people (and companies) consider some major decisions that could improve both prosperity and quality of life (or business). If entire regions could make New Year’s Resolutions, I’d recommend these two workforce development-related commitments for Long Island: develop and deploy an Island-wide strategy that helps employers clear barriers created by online applications (more skills-based hiring, less “degree inflation”), and leverage the networking capabilities of…

Voices December 20, 2019

For struggling students, recovery where credit is due

By HARRY AURORA // Educators are keenly aware that the underachievement of a student isn’t always a true representation of the student’s capabilities. Poor academic performance, sporadic attendance and antisocial behavior aren’t habits that develop overnight, nor is any student wholly responsible for finding him or herself in that situation. Research has indicated that students develop poor academic and social habits at a young age. Therefore, educators have a profound responsibility to identify, understand and…