Flint’s Water, Wicab, & New Leaders: This Week’s Wisconsin Watchlist
The water quandary in Flint, MI, funding bulletins, and personnel adjustments are among these up to date headlines from Wisconsin’s innovation neighborhood:
—The doctor who detected problems with Flint’s water provide and escalated her findings, bringing to light the town’s current water obstacle, did so the use of instrument developed by using Verona-primarily based Epic methods, the Wisconsin State Journal said. Mona Hanna-Attisha, a pediatrician at Hurley scientific center in Flint, examined results of blood tests on kids that had been stored in her business enterprise’s Epic health data database. “If we were still on paper, it might have taken without end to get these results,” Hanna-Attisha advised the State Journal.
—Middleton-primarily based Wicab, whose “BrainPort” tool permits blind individuals to, in a method, “see” the sector around them by using substituting touch for sight, has raised $ 975,000 in equity financing, in keeping with a regulatory filing. using a small digicam fastened to sun shades, the tool converts video indicators to electronic impulses that are felt on the consumer’s tongue. In June, the FDA gave Wicab the green light to begin selling the BrainPort in the U.S.
—BluDiagnostics, a Madison-primarily based startup that remaining month raised $ 600,000 as part of a seed funding spherical, has now raised another $ 550,000, according to an SEC submitting. The three-person startup is growing a saliva-based fertility test for women, and a complementary app that displays results to patients and physicians.
—Jason Weaver has back to Madison to join unhealthy Donkey Social (BDS) mobile, a startup that says it’s growing technology to permit users to embed branded content within textual content messages. In 2004, Weaver based Shoutlet, which sells cloud-based totally tool that helps corporations measure the impact of internet affiliate marketing campaigns; Shoutlet used to be based totally in Madison sooner than being obtained via Austin, TX-primarily based Spredfast ultimate August. Weaver left Shoutlet in 2013 and later become CEO of Nashville-primarily based Spendsetter, BDS stated.
—Douglas Jermasek has replaced Hector DeLuca as CEO of Madison-based Deltanoid prescribed drugs, which is developing a nutrition D-based drug to treat a common hormonal side effect of dialysis. DeLuca, who co-founded Deltanoid greater than a decade in the past and has spent his life getting to know vitamin D and building corporations based on the compound, will now be Deltanoid’s president, chairman, and COO. Jermasek previously served as an government at Cambridge, MA-primarily based Genzyme, Deltanoid said.
—speaking of management modifications, Murfie co-founders Matt Younkle and Preston Austin are stepping except for the startup’s day-do-day operations, but will remain “strategic advisors,” Younkle said in an e mail. Madison-primarily based Murfie, an internet song market in an effort to convert collections of compact discs and vinyl information into top of the range digital audio recordsdata, has named Chris Wheeler as its new CEO.
—The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel profiled Granular, a Milwaukee-primarily based startup that helps companies situation advertisements in line with queries entered into search engines. Jordon Meyer launched Granular in 2014 with help from Scott Alderton, a founding partner at Epuipatron, a Mequon-based vendor of engines and energy tools. Granular has helped considered one of its shoppers, the FM station 88Nine Radio Milwaukee, elevate its internet traffic increase sixfold, the Journal Sentinel said.
—Madison-based totally HealthMyne was once selected because the “Most Promising company” on the customized drugs World conference in Silicon Valley; HealthMyne was the first trade from the Midwest to win the award, firm spokesman Del Coufal said in an e-mail. The startup’s tool integrates medical imaging knowledge and data from sufferers’ digital well being information, and items the results to radiologists and oncologists. HealthMyne used to be based in 2013 through a group of successful, Madison-primarily based serial entrepreneurs who wanted to launch a healthtech company.
—Virent, a Madison-based cleantech company that’s creating biofuels it says can replace crude oil, inked a partnership with Tesoro (NYSE: TSO), a San Antonio-based totally petroleum refiner. below the terms of the deal, Tesoro will provide funding to lend a hand further increase—and, sooner or later, commercialize—bio-based fuels and chemical compounds made the usage of Virent’s expertise. Virent CEO Lee Edwards declined to share financial phrases of the tie-up, however said it will resemble Virent’s royalty-based settlement with another energy massive, Royal Dutch Shell.
—The Wisconsin financial development Corp. mentioned it has awarded a $ 750,000 furnish to support the renovation of a building bought final July by means of an possession team that features The Water Council, which based totally in Milwaukee. The building is being referred to as “global Water center II,” and the challenge is scheduled to be achieved in January 2017. The furnish will permit The Water Council to rent 11,728 square ft for 3 years at lower than 1/2 the market rate, the WEDC said.
—Madison-based totally EatStreet has solid a partnership with Uber geared toward bettering meals delivery in selected cities, beginning with Chicago. San Francisco-based Uber is most well known for its ride-hailing app, however has expanded into different areas, together with UberRush, a supply carrier. UberRush will begin turning in orders placed using EatStreet’s know-how later this month, said EatStreet co-founder and CEO Matt Howard.
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