East Lansing-based Enliven Software has big plans. In the next year, the two-year-old company plans to raise $3 million and grow by 70 percent.

“In this difficult economy we’re finding great opportunity. Our software is really helping companies save money,” says Enliven CEO Bunmi Akinyemiju.
 
New contracts with national companies are growing, including one with the City of Aspen, and another with Skyventure, a recreational skydiving company and CB/USA, which serves a nationwide network of 1,100 custom builders.

Already with 10 employees and three contractors, the company—specializing in e-invoicing and e-payment for small to mid-size businesses—expects to hire a number of employees. Akinyemiju says the electronic system reduces postage and paper expenditures, and reduces error.

Enliven was created when Akinyemiju and his partner John Gilkey, bought Seattle-based Fidesic in 2007 and moved it to East Lansing. Fidesic was founded in 2000 by ex-Microsoft employees with deep experience in the online payment space.

Enliven is housed in the Technology Innovation Center in East Lansing.

Source: Bunmi Akinyemiju, Enliven Software

Gretchen Cochran, Innovation & Jobs editor, may be reached here.

JumpinJax Bounce Arena, the child-centered recreation business formed by two DeWitt moms, has been named the Best Small Business by the Michigan Small Business Technology Development Center (MSBTDC). It was selected from small businesses throughout the six counties surrounding the Capital region.

“There are so many people out there with great ideas who are actually working them, despite the economy,” says Kelly Ramirez, who owns the business with Joan Blackmer.

Ramirez and Blackmer are two such entrepreneurs, growing their indoor inflatables business to seven employees, showing 10 percent growth, and finally giving themselves small salaries.

They advertise mostly by word of mouth, apparently successfully. One day last winter, they had 150 people inside their bounce house at 1475 Lake Lansing Rd. and had to turn some away.

“When we moms get a hold of something good, we want everyone to know about it,” she says.

They plan to expand the 10,000 square-foot former hockey arena space and add more inflatables, but are moving cautiously.

Ramirez credits their husbands, a contractor and an attorney, with helping them get started, but it is Kellie Hanford, their counselor with the MSBTDC, who continues to advise them. Hanford was particularly welcoming to them as mothers, making their children comfortable at meetings.
 
“Being a mom entrepreneur is a struggle. While you’re building a business, you’re multitasking with your regular mom job.”

“We could not have done this without her.”

Source: Kelly Ramirez, JumpinJax Bounce Arena

Gretchen Cochran, Innovation & Jobs editor, may be reached here. 

All Photographs © Dave Trumpie

Now that the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has signed an agreement with Michigan State University (MSU) to build the Facility for Rare Isotope Beams (FRIB) on campus, the $550 million project announced in December feels more real.
 
The agreement, announced June 8, is necessary for the DOE Office of Science to provide money to MSU to design and build the new facility.

Full build out will take 10 years and bring 400 employees and 1,000 users to the region. But planners project hundreds of other related jobs and new businesses in the Capital region.

To prepare for that potential influx of business, the cities of East Lansing and Lansing, the Lansing Regional Chamber of Commerce, Lansing Economic Area Partnership (LEAP) and Prima Civitas plan to collaborate in a marketing program to draw scientists and researchers to the area.

“The importance of business leaders and scientists from around the world who will come into the region to conduct research at FRIB should not be overlooked,” says Bob Trezise, president of the Lansing Economic Development Corporation. “Those visitors will generate significant business and economic opportunities for the region.”

Jim van Ravensway, director of planning and community development for the City of East Lansing, concurs.

“We need a long-term marketing strategy that lets potential FRIB employees and their families know about the high quality of life we enjoy in this region.”

Source: Tim Daman, Lansing Regional Chamber of Commerce

Gretchen Cochran, Innovation & Jobs editor, may be reached here.

Lansing-based filmmaker Michael McCallum and his crew walked away from the Muskegon Film Festival May 31 with the Best Feature Film award for “Fairview St.,” the black and white movie they made entirely within the city of Lansing.
 
They were a bit nervous before the announcement, the last of the two-day event, but working hard not to show it.

Ever the serious writer and director, McCallum says, “Before the awards, I told everyone, 'Look, whether it wins or doesn’t, it’s still the same damn movie.'”

“I’m just happy to be known as a Michigan artist and filmmaker,” he says.

But “Fairview St.” did win, and that means it will have a laurel leaf imprinted on the poster, and pique the interest of more people, he says. Hopefully, that interest will translate into sales. The DVD is available on its website for $20.

Just getting admitted to a film festival is a big thing, he says, as he plans for more entries. He has his eye on the Sundance Festival in Utah in 2010, but with 40,000 entries, competition will be fierce.

Meanwhile, he is working on “Handlebar,” a comedy written with Shane Hagedorn. Both act in the color film with McCallum’s father, William C. McCallum, and Grace Ann Rowan. A. E. Griffin is director of photography. It will have an overly saturated look, like a 70s movie.

He hopes to have its first showing at Celebration Cinema in January.

Source: Michael McCallum

Gretchen Cochran, Innovation & Jobs editor, may be reached here.

Oleg Cassini he’s not—yet. But Cassini had to start somewhere. Curtis Long may be the next generation of couturier although his new clothing line, Pauli Casalino, so far deals mostly in t-shirts with sophisticated graphics. For now, his is a part time project but buzz is growing.

Marketing to 18 to 30 year olds, primarily through Facebook and his website, he drew 60 people to the company’s formal launch June 1 at The Small Planet in East Lansing.

“We know a lot of people who know a lot of people,” Long laughs. Twenty volunteer models showed up, recruited on Facebook, for an upscale photo shoot at 4 p.m., followed by a blow out party that went on until 2 a.m.

Long is a Sexton High School graduate and majored in history and education at Ferris State University. He now is in graduate school in public administration at Western Michigan University.

But he has long been passionate about clothing, although he didn’t want to go to school to learn about it. The 25-year-old is getting on-the-job training in clothing as well as business management. He has invested $2,000, so far.

The t-shirts sell for $20 to $30. Already, Long is looking for ways to cut production costs. To print Nathan Johnson’s art work on a t-shirt costs $20 for set up and $6 per imprint. 

“We can save a lot of money if we purchase the printing equipment and do it ourselves,” Long says.

His company’s name, Pauli Casalino, is a creation of his imagination. He was watching the movie, “Goodfellas” and selected one of the character’s names, “Pauli.” Then he searched the names of towns in Italy online and found “Casalino.”

People like the name, he says. It is emblazoned in some cases from top to bottom on the t-shirts.

“One day I hope to have the line in lots of stores,” Long says.

Source: Curtis Long, Pauli Casalino

Gretchen Cochran, Innovation & Jobs editor, may be reached here.

Two Lansing police officers learned the hard way that moving incapacitated people, particularly if they are unconscious, is not easy.

So they have created a company to sell a sling that can be used to carry people, and folds into a space no bigger than a number 10 envelope. Already they’ve invested $6,000 in attorney fees and a training video for their new Evac-q-sling.

Scott Ellis, 38, and Chad Frasier, 32, have been with the Lansing Police Department (LPD) 13 years. They both are members of the city’s Special Tactics and Rescue Team (START). They’re the ones that handle hostage incidents, among other things.

A year and a half ago, Frasier “blew out his knee” and had to be carried out of a dicey situation. A sling like the Evac-q-sling would have been helpful, Ellis says.

About the same time, Bill Hough, a paramedic, showed a prototype for a sling to a seamstress accustomed to working with canvas. She made improvements and with Frasier, they got a patent. Ellis and Frasier set up their own company to market and distribute the slings.

They are discovering many potential clients: paramedics and emergency medical services in general; hospital and assisted living personnel needing to move people, particularly for evacuations; homebound people needing to be moved; law enforcers needing to move passive resistant protestors; and the military.

“The market is just gigantic,” says Ellis.
 
In two months, in their off duty hours, Ellis and Frasier have sold 17 Evac-q-slings at $225 each. (They come with a 10-year-warranty.) But the officers have made numerous calls to governments and hospitals that are considering buying the slings in their next budget cycles.

The Lansing Police Department will not be a client.

“We have ethics,” says Ellis.

Instead, Central Michigan Police Distributors, an independent company in Lansing, will carry the sling and approach the LPD.

“We hope to have the product nationwide very soon,” Ellis says.

Source: Scott Ellis, Evac-q-sling

Gretchen Cochran, Innovation & Jobs editor, may be reached here.

Lansing-based Neogen Corp. is spreading its reach further around the globe. Its Scotland-based European subsidiary has struck an agreement to develop a laboratory in Beijing in partnership with the Chinese government.

The lab will focus on Chinese food safety and plant health issues. Testing methods and data developed there will be used by more than 30 other labs throughout China.

"This agreement represents a great opportunity for Neogen to be at the forefront in helping develop food safety and plant health solutions specifically for the Chinese," says Jim Herbert, Neogen's CEO.

A recent high-level meeting between the Chinese minister of quality supervision, inspection and quarantine; Scotland's first minister; the United Kingdom's ambassador to China; and Neogen representatives, led to the final agreement.

"This is fantastic news for Neogen Europe, Scottish jobs and businesses and for our international reputation," says Scotland's First Minister Alex Salmond. "The pace of progress following our meeting . . . in China last month is a remarkable testament to the impressive work of Neogen Europe, the potential for Scottish businesses in China and the lasting cooperation built."

The company's Neogen Europe subsidiary, based in Ayr, Scotland, does research and development of diagnostic tests for plant diseases and food safety, and also markets products from other Neogen locations.

Neogen Europe was honored last year with the Queen's Award for Enterprise—the most prestigious business award in the United Kingdom.

Source: Jim Herbert, Neogen

Gretchen Cochran, Innovation & Jobs editor, may be reached here.

Most hospitals and large medical systems have already gone to electronic record keeping out of sheer necessity. But the small medical practices have not made the switch because the task seems too daunting and too expensive, says Chad Paalman of Lansing-based NuWave Technology Partners.

But with the Obama administration’s stimulus package offering a $44,000 carrot to practices making the switch by 2011, interest is high in making the shift and NuWave is ready.

NuWave has been working for a year to prepare to meet that need and has just launched a subsidiary, NuWave Medical Solutions, added an office in Ft. Myers, Florida, and hired two people to manage the growing business. Paalman is looking for others with both medical and information technology experience.

Before now, there was no integrated product that helped practitioners convert their office management (think billing) to electronic tools and also helped them put their patients’ records online, Paalman says.

Then came MISYS MyWay, which has since changed its name to Allscripts MyWay. It offers software as a service (SAAS), allowing medical personnel to amortize the costly switch by paying a monthly fee. MISYS selected 27 companies in the U.S. to distribute its new product targeting healthcare and NuWave Medical Solutions (NuWave Med for short) was one of them.

Paalman recently converted a Lansing medical practice. The project consisted of installing new computers, a new network and a new Cisco telephone system, using the capabilities of its sister company, NuWave Technology. Finally, NuWave Med added the digital practice and electronic medical records components.

Source: Chad Paalman, NuWave Medical Solutions

Gretchen Cochran, Innovation & Jobs editor, may be reached here.

Downtown Okemos has long been the picturesque but sleepy place drivers cut through to get to Meridian Mall. But 59 merchants there have invested $10,000 in an effort to change that image.
 
The most visible piece of the recently energized Meridian Township Downtown Development Authority’s (DDA) new campaign will be Celebrate Downtown Okemos Art Walk on June 20, featuring the unveiling of four street sculptures on consignment for a year. Activities offered all day will include artisans in Wonch Park, a pig roast and food vendors.

It’s the first big event the area has hosted in 30 years, says Melinda Barr of Get Up and Grow, a consultant to the project.

But once the merchants have shown how well they can work together, they hope grant makers will come through for more sculptures and other activities, Barr says.
It’s a worthy cause. Okemos is in Meridian Township, the oldest township in Michigan.

“There’s history and heritage here,” she says. “We want to re-introduce our assets. We have a great story to tell.”

Art is being used as a focus to reflect events in East Lansing and Old Town in an effort to foster regionalism while at the same time promoting the town’s virtures. The outdoor art is complimented by eight new large planters recently planted with day lilies.

The DDA’s boundaries are Grand River Ave. on the north, Mt. Hope on the south, Liverance on the west and the roundabout at Marsh Road and Hamilton on the east.

Source: Melinda Barr, Get Up and Grow

Gretchen Cochran, Innovation & Jobs editor, may be reached here.

Thanks to a $70,000 grant from the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ), visitors to Lansing’s Impression 5 Science Center can graphically learn about the importance of keeping groundwater clean.

“It’s hard to scrub groundwater once it is contaminated,” says Wayne Kukek of the DEQ. And dirty ground water can seep into the underground sources of drinking water called aquifers.

Clean water is one of those things people take for granted. But if a city doesn’t have it, it can’t develop economically.

Kukek has learned by experience. He works in Lansing but lives in Battle Creek where, in the 1980s, large quantities of dry cleaning fluid were dumped on the ground over a period of time. The caustic-chemical-laden fluid seeped into wells and then aquifers and has cost the city millions of dollars to clean up the mess.

 “Battle Creek is still trying to recover,” he says.

Impression 5’s eight-foot-wide display hopes to mold minds toward greater respect for the ground water. 
 
It depicts the city sitting atop layers of tiny pebbles, representing dirt, and with the twist of the wrist, one can inject dye into the pebble layers and watch it seep into the aquifer.

Included in the grant is $20,000 to train the Impression 5 staff to maintain the display’s plumbing and other working parts, and to teach viewers about its meaning.

Christine Spitzley, an environmental planner with the Tri-County Regional Planning Commission, coordinated the project.

Groundwater is important for people to understand, she says. “Our goal is to let them see it, touch it, learn it.”

Source: Christine Spitzley, Tri-County Regional Planning

Gretchen Cochran, Innovation & Jobs editor, may be reached here.

Picture a person sandwiched between two beds of pointy nails. Place a cement block on top and smash the block with a sledgehammer. The person between the nails is neither punctured nor smashed. How come? It’s science, Shannon Morey laughs.
 
Morey is director of the Michigan State University (MSU) Science Theatre. She and about 40 other students use the nail bed and other “look at that” demonstrations to pique the interest of children and adults and encourage greater respect for science.

Jobs in science fields are growing, yet training is falling short. Morey, the chemistry major, puts it gently.

“Americans in general, compared to other nations, are not as good at understanding science.”

A new study from the Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO) shows the problem begins early. About half of Michigan's tenth through twelfth graders failed the “proficient” level in science standards under the federal government’s No Child Left Behind Adequate Yearly Progress test, according to BIO.

The Science Theatre aims to change that picture, performing 35 times this past  year, mostly in schools. Its catalog lists 50 demonstrations, including dipping a banana into liquid nitrogen and then using it to hammer nails.
 
By the way, the nail bed demonstration works because the weight is evenly distributed over and under the person, thus dispersing the power of the sledgehammer. The force is divided by the area, Morey explains.

When people see it, they go "Wow!"

“We want people to know that science is cool,” Morey says.

Source: Shannon Morey, MSU Science Theatre

Gretchen Cochran, Innovation & Jobs editor, may be reached here.

The Ingham County Power of We Consortium is giving $285,000 in federal cash to 17 area community and faith-based organizations to purchase computers, create new media tools, build their boards of directors and increase their volunteer outreach. 

In addition, the groups will get technical training, says Peggy Roberts, consortium director.

“The consortium is a network of networks,” Roberts says, mandated in the 1990s by the state to facilitate collaboration.

The technological piece is particularly important.

“In this day and age, organizations can’t function without technology. They can’t reach donors, apply for grants, or get their messages out about what they do,” she says.

A technology team will be assigned to each organization.

Recipients were selected by a committee, based on proposals from various groups. They range from the Greater Lansing Housing Coalition (GLHC) that provides affordable housing to low and moderate income persons, to Action of Greater Lansing, a human rights advocacy collection of 13 church congregations working to make change.
 
Other recipients include the East Lansing Peace Education Center, the Friends of Fenner Nature Center and St. Stephen’s Community Church.

“The grant has come at an amazing time in the life cycle of our organization,” says Valerie Hart, action director. “Our board and leadership are ready to take our work to the next level and this increased funding and consultation will provide us necessary capacity to strengthen our mission, solidify our partnerships and build our technological infrastructure.”

Source: Peggy Roberts, Power of We

Gretchen Cochran, Innovation & Jobs editor, may be reached here.

Michigan State University (MSU) and two partnering universities, Wayne State University (WSU) and the University of Michigan (U-M), have injected energy into the state’s life sciences market.

They have increased the number of jobs by 10.7 percent and the salaries by 29 percent since the formation of the University Research Corridor (URC) 10 years ago, a new report says.

According to East Lansing-based Anderson Economic Group, nearly 80,000 Michigan residents now work in the life sciences industry, with the average worker’s salary climbing from $64,602 in 1999 to $83,494 in 2006. The report was contracted by the universities.

The URC invested more than $887 million in life sciences research in 2008, a 69 percent increase since 1999. Sixty percent of life sciences research dollars come into Michigan through federal grants, up from 54 percent a decade ago, the report says.
 
MSU President Lou Anna Simon notes former MSU chemists John and Karen Frost raised $21 million in the first quarter for their young company, Draths Corp., which has hired several former Pfizer scientists who wanted to stay in the state after Pfizer closed several state operations. Started in an Okemos lab, Draths has opened new corporate headquarters in Plymouth, Minn. Meanwhile, MSU is reviving the former Pfizer laboratory in Holland.

About 75 percent of life sciences jobs are in biological fields including medical product manufacturing, chemical preparation or research and development. Another 18 percent are medical and seven percent are in an agricultural-related field.

Source: MSU

Gretchen Cochran, Innovation & Jobs editor, may be reached here.

Lansing-based C2AE architectural and engineering firm held its revenue steady in 2008 and expects to do the same in 2009, bringing in $10 to $15 million. It hired six new employees recently, including a new director of environmental services, Glenn Burkhardt.

“We are expecting many opportunities in the environmental field,” says Marcie McCann, C2AE spokeswoman.

The company served as lead architect last year on the design and construction of the Hastings Library, which won gold LEED certification from the U. S. Green Building Council.

C2AE is working on a drinking water contract for Lansing Township; Burkhardt’s resume is heavy on water and wastewater treatment experience.

Other C2AE projects in progress in the Capital region include design studies for improvements to the 200 and 300 blocks of South Washington Square in Lansing and the Edgewood Avenue streetscape on Lansing's Southside.

The Prudden Place-sited company most recently worked on the extension of Lansing’s River Trail from Hawk Island Park to Jolley Road.

The company has three offices: Lansing’s employs 73 people full time; the Grand Rapids and Gaylord offices employ 37. Seasonal and contract labor would add more people to the roster to implement statewide projects.

Source: Marcie McCann, C2AE

Gretchen Cochran, Innovation & Jobs editor, may be reached here.

To be successful, you have to have new ideas. It is true for communities and businesses as well as people, says Edsan Zackerny.

Zackerny is an immigrant to Lansing and it is people like him that add strength to the Capital region’s shift from manufacturing to the knowledge economy, says John Melcher of Michigan State University’s (MSU) Center for Community and Economic Development.

The center has recently moved to a Michigan Avenue storefront on the city’s Eastside, in the heart of an area rich in small businesses and homes occupied by people born in other countries. 

Melcher says that if the Capital region is going to attract young knowledge workers, it will have to nurture the kind of communities they seek.
 
“Diversity is crucial to these young people,” says Melcher, citing Richard Florida’s book, “The Rise of the Creative Class."

Raised in the country he still calls Persia, now Iran, the 42-year-old robotics engineer has lived in nine countries, picking each for a specific purpose. He came to the United States Dec. 20, 1999, deliberately to start a new life in the auto business with the beginning of the new millennium.

Within 10 days, he’d enrolled in language classes, had a donated car and a job in a Williamston auto parts manufacturing plant.

Then came Sept. 11, 2001, and the attacks on New York City and the Pentagon, followed by the closing of his plant for a month.

“I could see then the frailty of the auto industry and set out to work elsewhere,” he says.

He now works for 21st Century Plastics in Potterville, overseeing maintenance of the company’s robotics operation. The company makes plastic seats and has no reliance on the auto industry, he notes.