Philadelphia Media Network and Ben Franklin Technology Partners officially seeking startups for Project Liberty incubator

Philadelphia Media Network CEO Greg Osberg announcing Project Liberty, which includes the incubation program and tablet initiative. Photo by Liliputing

There is real movement on the $250,000 startup incubator program which will be housed at a legacy newspaper company and supported by local and national organizations with stakes in entrepreneurship and new media.

According to a press release sent on Friday, Ben Franklin Technology Partners and Philadelphia Media Network have announced that they are seeking applications from startups looking to be a part of the inaugural class working inside the partners’ Project Liberty incubator. The project has also includes a widely cited tablet program, announced by PMN CEO Greg Osberg as depicted above and detailed by tech news site Lilputing.

We first reported on the program last November, when Philadelphia Media Network CEO Greg Osberg announced the program at a Temple journalism seminar. The incubator program was later formalized with a $250,000 grant from the Knight Foundation.

The program starts October 31. Those interested can apply here to Ben Franklin Technology Partners before noon on Friday, October 14th.

Friday Q & A: Mark Loschiavo, Executive Director of the Baiada Center for Entrepreneurship at Drexel University

Mark Loschiavo, Executive Director of the Baiada Center for Entrepreneurship at Drexel University, believes the region’s universities are key to heightening the city’s profile when it comes to entrepreneurship.

“Part of our mission is to not only drive entrepreneurship, but entrepreneurial thinking,” he says.

Since 2001, The Baida Center has been a business incubator in Drexel’s Lebow School of Business that houses eight to ten companies on average, mostly winners of the school’s incubator competition. The center is also a big reason the school was named one of the top three entrepreneurship programs for graduate students in the country (three spots ahead of, ahem, Temple University).

Technically Philly sat down with the man behind the scenes: Executive Director and Senior Executive in Residence Mark P. Loschiavo and asked him how the incubator works and why, like the rest of us, Loschiavo has trouble pronouncing “Baiada.”

Read more

Drexel boasts tech, with smart grid system and incubator entrants

The City Six school with the computer science cred boasted its tech influence from two different places in big ways in recent weeks.

Drexel University is planning on deploying a smart grid system that will provide real-time measurements of location-specific energy outputs across its 65-acre campus in University City, as reported by inTech yesterday. The real-time pricing technology, which will come from Conshohocken-based Viridity Energy, will give Drexel the wherewithal to purchase power at low-demand times of the day and sell excess power back to the general power grid for profit.

That bit of news followed an announcement from the school’s LeBow College of Business that three new startups were welcomed into its Baiada Center for Entrepreneurship business incubator, all with a touch of technology. The three new entrants are Ranter, a social-networking tool that allows users to text groups; Konnect.me, a business-to-business Web portal and Stabiliz Orthopaedics, which is developing bone fasteners with bio-absorbable materials, as first reported by Mike Armstrong of the Inquirer.

Read more

University City Science Center welcomes three new companies

University City incubator and research park the Science Center includes a series of facilities hugging the Market Street corridor between 34th and 38th streets. Photo courtesy of the Science Center.

Europe’s largest organization for advancing chemical sciences has landed.

The Royal Society of Chemistry, which has a worldwide network of members and an international publishing business, needed to set up an East Coast base to continue its expansion.

So, RSC and two other organizations, including a second foreign group making their first U.S. home in Philadelphia, have moved into the University City Science Center, the historic nonprofit� incubator and research park, according to a press release from the center [PDF].

With RSC, GADORE Center USA, an outpost of a German collaborative focused on renewable energy, is the newest participant in the center’s Global Soft landing program, which aims to help international companies develop a presence in the region’s life sciences and information technology markets. The program is housed at 3711 Market Street.

Read more

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.

Read more