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Week of May 23 - May 27, 2005Welcome to the National Dialogue on Entrepreneurship, an initiative of the Public Forum Institute made possible by a grant from the Kauffman Foundation of Kansas City. Through NDE-news, we bring you short summaries and analyses of various trends driving the innovation economy. Subscribe now to receive your weekly copy. Archived issues are available online. Links to the day's entrepreneurship stories from across the nation and around the world are posted each weekday on the NDE main page - bookmark it and stay informed about the latest entrepreneurship news. |
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Capitol Hill Update: Patent Reform Ahead We
have regularly reported on various studies that examine America’s patent and intellectual property protection systems. While these studies frequently differ in their particulars, they all agree that the current system needs fundamental reform. The House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Courts, the Internet, and Intellectual Property, led by Congressman Lamar Smith (R-TX), has been holding an interesting set of hearings on future reforms of the patent system. Congressman Smith has developed draft legislation that would introduce a number of reforms. For example, the proposal calls for a “first to file” system where patents are provided to the first person who filed for a patent as opposed to the first person who invented a new technology, product or service. In addition, the draft would create a post-patent grant time window that would allow others to challenge recently granted patents. Many of these changes are expected to make it easier and cheaper for small businesses to engage in patent-related litigation. These current discussions are the start of a long process, but expect to see
more discussion and NDE briefings on patent reform in the current Congress. |
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As in Politics, All Angel Investing is Local With venture capitalists becoming much more selective, startups and entrepreneurs
have had to tap new revenue sources in the past several years, increasingly
turning to angel investors to fund new business ventures. As angel investing has
increased in importance, groups of angel investors are constantly emerging and
new and best practices are being adopted. ‘Angel Groups in Action: Funding Early
Stage Innovation’, a satellite and web broadcast presented by the MIT Enterprise
Forum, the Kauffman Foundation of Kansas City and its program, the Angel Capital
Association, will tell entrepreneurs what they need to know how to gain access to
angels, how to understand what they are looking for and how they operate. The
program aims to help close the knowledge gap that exists between entrepreneurs
and the tech community, and will explain the practices and principles of angel
investing, both via the broadcast, and through the in-person networking taking
place at each viewing site. |
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Measuring the Social Impact of Venture Investments As the venture capital field has grown, we have witnessed a parallel growth in the field of community development venture capital. While venture capitalists (VCs) are concerned about the financial bottom line, community development VCs pursue a double bottom line: seeking to earn financial returns while also having a positive social impact in the community. Until recently, we have been much better at measuring the financial bottom line. A new Measuring Impacts Toolkit, developed by the Community Development Venture Capital Association (CDVCA), should help in improving our ability to measure social impacts. The toolkit includes a series of surveys that will allow social investors to better understand and track the social and economic impacts of their investments. |
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New Data on Lending Discrimination A new report from the Small Business Administration’s (SBA) Office of Advocacy confirms what many minority business owners have long suspected. Many African-American and Hispanic business owners face significantly higher barriers in accessing capital from traditional sources of business finance. The researchers took a very detailed look at a whole range of finance mechanisms, ranging from traditional bank loans to transaction loans, such as capital leases or vehicle finance. They found that African-American and Hispanic business owners face greater prospects of loan denial than do other entrepreneurs. These trends did not appear to be present for women or Asian business owners. Somewhat surprisingly, the research also indicates that preferential lending is more common in transaction loans than in relationship loans (i.e. more traditional bank lending). |
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