Shop Talk: Bill Jefferis of Evolve IP

Sometime in 2007, the founders of Wayne-based Evolve IP sat down for a brainstorming session to name their new company. They thought that the name should play off of the concept that business communication services should evolve to the next generation. They believed that business IP services were scattered amongst companies, when most businesses would prefer a single solution.

A few glasses of Cabernet later, someone scribbled “evolve” on a cocktail napkin that now hangs framed in the company’s lobby.

Evolve burst on to the scene in 2007, raising an unheard of $15.4 million in financing from private entities. According to Pricewaterhouse Coopers, it was the largest information technology investment in Philadelphia since 2001.

The company, which has over 50 employees on its payroll, has lived up to that original brainstorming session. It now offers a one stop shop for business communications such as hosted applications and telephony. Now, small-to-medium businesses can avoid spreading their resources over a handful of small companies.

“You can get a patchwork quilt of five or six different vendors …[but] if you come to Evolve IP you have that single point of contact,” said Bill Jefferis, the company’s Vice President of Marketing & Business Development. “The secret sauce is integrating them all together, writing easy to use user interfaces, having a support center of people and scaling to make the price point compelling and attractive.”

Because of its everything-under-one-roof philosophy, Evolve IP has been growing steadily. Currently, the company offers business communications services to 200 businesses with over 9,000 users and it has its eyes on expansion. After the jump, find out how Evolve makes sure it provides uninterrupted service to customers and how the homegrown company plans to take over the rest of the East coast’s IP needs.
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Rumored Philadelphia Apple Store location suffers damage

Photo courtesy of a Philebrity.com reader

While Philly’s Apple community is served well by local retailers Springboard Media and Bundy, we often wonder what it takes to get some love from Steve Jobs and company.

After all, Philadelphia is the largest media market without an Apple Store, unless, of course you count the city’s suburban Apple outlets.

Well, the architecture gods may have exacted revenge on the computer company, Philebrity.com reports.

The rumored site of Apple’s Philadelphia location has suffered some sort of structural damage. Overnight, a piece of marble installation crumbled off the building and into the street, though no one was hurt, according to Philly.com.

Last year, AppleInsider speculated that Apple was eying the space at 1619 Walnut Street, formally the home of the Brasserie Perrier restaurant. PhiladelphiaWillDo’s DMac disputed the claim.

All has been quiet on the Philly Apple Store front, though the company continues to expand its number of retail locations nationwide. The company recently announced that it will be opening up a fourth store in the second best city on the East coast, ahem, New York.

According to public records, the space at 1619 Walnut is owned by “Walnut Street Retail Investments.”

Bohlin Cywinski Jackson, the firm responsible for designing some of the company’s New York locations, declined to comment about the possibility of a Philadelphia location when Technically Philly contacted their Philadelphia office late last week.

As part of the firm’s agreement with Apple,�it is prohibited from discussing any details of future locations and would not even confirm that Apple was considering Philadelphia.

Philly police to begin Segway patrols, please take them seriously

If you hang out on Main Street in Manayunk, you should begin seeing the Segway police patrols.

Officers on South Street, in University City, Center City and Southwest Philadelphia also begin using the new toys this week.

Try not to cringe at how ridiculous the two-wheeled, self-balancing, battery-powered vehicles may seem, because its role in law enforcement has been growing for years and doesn’t appear it will stop. More than 1,000 municipalities are using them for patrolling, according to the company.

Now, after a 10-day trial in April 2008, the Philadelphia Police Department is joining in.

The department announced yesterday that it received a donation of more than $60,000 toward the purchase of ten Segway PTs, according to a press release [PDF]. The funds came from the Philadelphia Police Foundation, a nonprofit that raises funds to purchase technology and other police equipment that are deemed outside the city’s budget. Yes, our police department takes charity.

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Profit and conscious with new South Philadelphia incubator

They’re going to incubate profitable good works.

That’s much the angle of GoodCompany Ventures, which opened its Philadelphia Naval Yard Business Center offices with a ribbon-cutting ceremony highlighted by appearances from Mayor Michael Nutter and Chuck Lacy, a former president of Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream, yesterday.

All the startups they take in will be for-profit and looking to make a difference or two.

Yesterday, the incubator was also welcoming its inaugural 2009 class of “social entrepreneurs,” including the following: Cyrus-XP, which focuses on advancing the management and delivery of healthcare; CalendarFly, a single source scheduling solution for families (for a test drive, use “student for username and password), and VolunteerBIG.com, a philanthropic social network that was gunning for grant money earlier this year.

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Technically Philly will soon be introducing advertising, other monetization strategies

For four months, we’ve been writing, reporting and researching dutifully the technology and innovation communities in and around Philadelphia.

We want to do more.

To appease our devotion for transparency, we want to be the bearer of the news that in order to continue to grow our coverage, we will now begin pursuing monetization. We’ll continue sharing disclosures and conflicts should they arise and hope you’ll approach us with any concerns you may have.

This is no hobby of ours.

We are three professionally-trained and seriously-driven young journalists who want to develop a sustainable and impactful news coverage source for you, your city and this region.

We’re doing it already. When Google CEO and Princeton University-graduate Eric Schmidt gave the commencement address at the University of Pennsylvania, we asked the question and got his answer about the possibilities he thought Philly had to become a tech corridor. No other news source in this city of 1.5 million people reported when Philadelphia CIO Allan Frank pledged to work with Refresh Philly to reinvigorate Philadelphia’s connection to technology.

We’ll chase big city news when it affects our readers, on the Web or otherwise. Philadelphia Inquirer Publisher Brian Tierney told Fox 29 yesterday that the third-oldest newspaper in the country is going to add a paid content model to its Web site, but, of course, we told you about that three days earlier on Friday.

We want to be able to devote the time to make sure that coverage continues and only expands. We’ll need resources to do that.

So consider this the official declaration of the monetization of Technically Philly — something we hope to do slowly and judiciously to ensure we never deleteriously affect our maturing brand or turn off our growing readership. Still, sometime soon, you should begin to see advertisements, and we want to invite you to participate, as other profit strategies come online.

See our media kit here. For rates and further advertising information, contact us at advertising@technicallyphilly.com.

If you have any thoughts, let us hear them in the comments. Any more sensitive thoughts can be sent our way here.

Albert Einstein uses real-time tracking system to save lives, cash

If the guy who said “what gets measured gets managed” stepped foot into Albert Einstein Medical Center he would have been a happy man.

The Logan-based hospital has been using a Real-Time Location System (RTLS) that monitors and measures the location of doctors, medical devices and patients since last September, according to RIFD Journal, but the North Broad Street fixture has just released their first round of related metrics.

What Twitter is to your friends’ eating habits, the RTLS is to medicine.

Each patient who comes through the hospital is given one of the 350 special ID cards that gets synced with the patient’s medical file. The devices act as a GPS of sorts, relaying the location of the wearer to receivers throughout the hospital which transmit the data over a local area network to a computer running special software. Hospital employees can pull up the building’s floor plan and see in real-time where patients and co-workers are and how long they have been there.

Doctors no longer have to go searching for equipment (and each other), while the time patients spend waiting around to be treated is being cut down.

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Technically Not Tech: Sustainable learning with Solar States

Kensington-based solar startup Solar States fuses education with a unique business plan. Photos courtesy of Solar States.

The growth generation of the region’s solar-tech work force is going to be trained in Northern Liberties, if solar startup Solar States has anything to do about it.

This Saturday is the first of a four-session training course called “Green by Example” held in the NoLibs Community Center by Solar States. The $350 class, taught by LEED For Homes expert Sam Klein, will give participants the shot at learning the latest in solar technology and weatherization. Guest speakers from top green building companies will join the party, too.

It’s the education arm of a fully-fledged solar business.

See, Solar States Solar States aims to become an independent solar power producer by 2010, and the plan is to do so with the help of Philadelphia high school graduates and others who might want the work but don’t have the training.

Saturday’s beginning of the adult vocation course is another step in that mission of developing this city’s sustainable workforce.

But the company is more than education. Its founders say what they’re developing will help shape the solar energy industry for the better.

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Events highlights for the week of June 1 – June 7, 2009

Now that summer is upon us, it’s getting harder to stay tethered to our computers.

Assuming the feeling is mutual, while we’re not expecting you to spend your evenings relaxing in parks or sipping cocktails on sidewalk cafes, we are sayin’ it’s an excuse to get to some local tech events.

There’s something going on every day of this week, if you have an hour (or five) to spare.

On Monday, Refresh Philly is brainstorming up ways to improve Philly with special guests Johnny Goldstein of Envizualize and Livia Labate of IA Design Games to help smooth out the process and explain how they get their ideas out on paper.

Tuesday, talk mobile apps for social change with the Net Tuesday crew, but don’t get too hippie-dippy on us. Web Analytics Wednesday is flying in two speakers from behavioral analytics firm Quantivo to discuss the obvious.

Drexel’s 2009 Entrepreneur Conference happens Thursday, an all-day event with a great lineup of speakers there to talk all things innovation and business.

Finally, on Saturday don’t miss HigherEdCamp, which we covered late last month. After hosting our own BarCamp unconference, we have high expectations for this meetup about all things post-secondary education.

All events listed on the event calendar are free to attend. Be sure to check our complete calendar for more information, or follow us past the jump.
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