Sunday, October 14, 2012

Small Chemical Business Symposium Report at Nova 10/11/12

Award-winning symposium: Starting and Financing a Small Chemical Business
Photo by M.Z. Hoffman L to R: M. Morello, S. Vercellotti, J. Maclachlan, J. Sabol, S.Seelig, M. Chorghade, M. Bruce, J. Driscoll, T. Barton
This award winning symposium earned a ChemLuminary award at the 15th Annual Awards Ceremony September 10, 2013 in Indianapolis, IN  for Outstanding Collaboration between a Local Section and a Division: Northeastern Local Section and the Division of Small Chemical Businesses
















Guest blog post by Jack Driscoll, PR Chair NESACS

Waltham, MA, Oct.11,2012- When Nova Biomedical Corp. in Waltham, MA agreed to host the 926th meeting of the Northeastern Section of the American Chemical Society (NESACS), we asked whether we could add an afternoon symposium to the venue and received an enthusiastic “yes”.  Our section, NESACS, is the largest of the 187 sections of the ACS with 7,500 members mostly in the greater Boston area. Most people are surprised to hear that.  The symposium program is described here.

 The program included a summary of the ACS programs for Entrepreneurs, programs available from MA Small Business Development Center, the startup of Nova in the nineteen seventies, conventional  and
SBA financing. Other subjects included advantages of executive education for Tech entrepreneurs, non dilutive and dilutive equity funding and an enlightening talk on the advantages of tweeting and other social media for marketing your businesses. Madeleine Jacobs, Executive Director & CEO of the American Chemical Society, the world’s largest scientific organization with 164,000 members talked about jobs and ACS programs for entrepreneurs that is described at http://www.acs.org/ei. We had a number of our NESACS  members describe “True Stories of Chemical Entrepreneurs”. The first described how he worked with Senators Kennedy and Dole to get government R&D funding for small businesses in the early 80’s. This became the NSF SBIR programs. Another, of the Movie “21” fame (MIT entrepreneurs develop a system to predict the cards in blackjack) and a serial entrepreneur describes four of her new ventures in biofuels, drug discovery etc.  The last true story was about of the start up of a contract drug discovery company. 
We had very lively discussions on financing small companies and how the Nova start up (no venture capital just bank financing) in the 1970’s could not be duplicated today.
We had 50 participants at this meeting with 30% NESACS members, 30% from Universities,  30% small business owners and a number of  patent attorneys. We also had Vivian Walworth, an entrepreneur, attend the seminar. On Thursday evening she received an award for being a 70 year member of the ACS. She is still very active in NESACS activities.
This symposium was organized by Dr. Mukund Chorgade, President,   Chorgade Enterprises  and immediate past chair of the Small Chemical Business Div. of the ACS, and Dr. Jack Driscoll, President, PID Analyzers, LLC, and Public Relations Chair of NESACS.

The symposium was sponsored by NESACS, the NESACS Government Relations Group,  the Small Chemical Business  Division of the ACS  and Nova Biomedical. 
Prepared by
Dr. Jack Driscoll,
Public Relations Chair of NESACS

Monday, September 24, 2012

Entrepreneurial career cravings? Learn how to satisfy them

FEBRUARY 14-18 2013 BOSTON, MA
ACCEPTED FOR CAREER WORKSHOP PRESENTATION
Entrepreneurial career cravings? Learn how to satisfy them.
Date: Saturday, February 16, 2013
Time: 10:30 AM to 11:30 AM
Facility: Hynes Convention Center
Room: 209



Session Description:

A number of government and business resources are available for entrepreneurs, whether start-ups or later stage businesses. This workshop will provide information derived from various agencies, and experts from the law. Topics will include funding, incentives, business organization, patents, consulting, manufacturing, and expanding outreach. We are geared towards propelling “Entrepreneurs on the Road to Success”.

Audience:
Late-Career Scientist, Mid-Career Scientist, Early-Career Scientist, College and University Faculty, Postdoctoral Scholars, Graduate Student, Undergraduate
Audience Interest Statement:
There is very little funding available for initial startups unless you can tap your own bank accounts or have wealthy friends and relatives. You will probably have to do this to get your new business “off the ground”.  You can always start your business on a part time basis, particularly if the new business has no conflict with your regular job.
Once a company is shipping products and, if profitable, the funding options increase. There are a number of Local Banks that will provide receivables financing while other companies  can provide factoring of receivables to improve cash flow.  A number of states have initiatives to help small businesses. For example, in MA, we have the MA Office of Business Development that is chartered to help small businesses and has offices across the State. Other states such as CT, RI, OH, NY,PA, to name a few, have Small  Business Development Centers also. 
We  have quasi government organizations in MA such as MTDC, MCRC, MIFA that provide some venture capital for startups, loans for phase 2 SBIR’s, mezzanine financing, loans for real estate and/or capital equipment.
Of course, there is always the SBA funding through local banks that can be used for capital equipment, property and receivables financing.
The thing to keep in mind is that the loan programs are just that- “Loans”. They have to be paid back and generally require personal guarantees.
It is not easy to start a successful business but there are many places to go now for help including the American Chemical Society Career Consultant Program (CCP) that offers personalized consulting on résumé preparation, job search strategies, interviewing techniques, making a career transition, salary negotiation techniques and
30-minute resume review sessions to critique a candidate's  including a mock interview session followed by a feedback conversation.
If a business is successful, it is a better option than working for someone else.

Participants:
Presenter 1:  Dr. John N. Driscoll 2011- present Northeastern Section of the American Chemical Society Board Member and Chair Public Relations
2003- present- Founder and President, PID Analyzers, LLC- Development and marketing of portable and process instrumentation using technologies such as photoionization, flame ionization, GC , infrared, UV, electrochemistry. 1973-2003 Founder and President of HNU Systems, Inc.- Developed the first commercial photoionization detector for measuring ppb levels of VOCs in the environment. Sold more than 40,000 PID's. 1976- present- Nova Biomedical Corp. -A founder and board member . Nova Biomedical is the world leader in the development of fast whole blood analyzers to support the care of critically ill patients. 1988- Present- Founder and  Chairman- HNU Nordion Ltd OY. Schools: Boston University, Franklin Institute, Northeastern University, Suffolk University,  Suffolk University Business School
PAPERS: More than 130 papers published (44 papers were invited) Patents: More than 35 US & foreign Patents
Presenter 2: Dr. Mukund Chorghade is President of Chorghade Enterprises and Chief Scientific Officer, THINQ Pharma / THINQ Discovery, AGN Biofuels and Empiriko. He is also an adjunct research professor at Northeastern University and has appointments at Harvard and MIT. Dr. Chorghade earned his B. Sc. and M. Sc. degrees from the University of Poona, and a Ph. D. in organic chemistry at Georgetown University. Completing postdoctoral appointments at the University of Virginia and Harvard University, visiting scientist appointments at University of British Columbia, College de France / Universite’ Louis Pasteur, Cambridge and Caltech and directed research groups at Dow Chemicals, Abbott Laboratories, CytoMed and Genzyme.  A recipient of three “Scientist of the Year Awards”, he is an elected Fellow of the ACS, AAAS and RSC and has been a featured speaker in several national and international symposia. 

Printed Materials:
No

Presenters

John N. Driscoll
Ph.D.
PID Analyzers, LLC
2 Washington Circle #4
Sandwich, MA 02563


Mukund S. Chorghade
President and CSO
Chorghade Enterprises / THINQ Pharma
Chorghade Enterprises / THINQ Pharma
14 Carlson Circle
Natick, MA 01760-4205



Coordinator

Jennifer L. Maclachlan
Managing Director
PID Analyzers, LLC
2 Washington Circle #4
Sandwich, MA 02563

Tuesday, September 4, 2012

@pidguy is a featured speaker at the BU Chemistry Alumni Symposium

Dr. Morton Hoffman and Dr. Jack Driscoll at NESACS February 22, 2011 Brookline, MA. 
Mort was Jack's thesis adviser at Boston University in the late 1960's.

Jack aka @pidguy is honored to be a featured speaker at the upcoming 2012 Boston University Chemistry Alumni Symposium. See event information below.

2012 BU Chemistry Alumni Symposium

Saturday, September 1, 2012

Demystifying social sharing: an interactive workshop for chemists who are skeptical about social media







NERM1054 titled "Demystifying social sharing: an interactive workshop for chemists who are skeptical about social media", has been accepted for an oral presentation at the 2012 Northeast Regional Meeting. This presentations is scheduled for Tuesday October 2, 2012 at the Radisson Hotel in Rochester, NY.   












Information: Session Title: Small Chemical Businesses Division of ACS Programming, Best Practices for Entrepreneurs
Session Date: 02-Oct-2012,
Session Start Time: 8:30 am
Presentation time: 10:55 am-11:45 am by Jennifer Maclachlan


Abstract Body: This workshop is designed for chemists in the industrial or academic sectors as well as the chemical entrepreneur who wants to be convinced to move out of their comfort zone with social media. Topics covered will include: how to use Twitter, setting up a Facebook for business page and a community page, Linked-In tips and tricks, blogging, Google+ and Pinterest. Bring your tablet or laptop, your questions and let's get ready to share.               



Wielding social media for effective science communication

  ABSTRACT SYMPOSIUM NAME: Combatting Science Mis- and Dis-Information ABSTRACT SYMPOSIUM PROGRAM AREA NAME:  CINF CONTROL ID:  3910009 PRES...