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Right Up Einstein’s Alley

November 2018

Celebrating over a decade of helping make NJ the place
for high tech business success
 
In This Issue
News

Einstein’s Alley Welcomes New Member
Intrepid Advisors, LLC 

Intrepid Advisors is a specialized business consulting firm offering expertise and advisory services regarding the federal and state R&D tax credits to manufacturing and technology companies.Over the past 30 years, Intrepid Advisors has been highly successful in obtaining the maximum allowable R&D tax incentives for our US based clients. The R&D tax credit is a general business credit that is used to reduce a corporation’s income tax. A business taxpayer may claim the credit if it incurred expenses associated with the development of new products, fabrication processes and software.

Murphy signs MOU with German Chamber to Increase Workforce Training (Think Apprenticeships) for Manufacturers
Photo Credit: Governor’s Office/Edwin J. Torres
From: roi-nj.com
By: Anjalee Khemlani
October 19, 2018

A memorandum of understanding to increase access between New Jersey and German companies and help foster greater collaboration on workforce development and training was signed by Gov. Phil Murphy on Friday in Berlin at The Association of German Chambers of Commerce & Industry.

The memorandum calls for a broadening of a workforce training program – which already exists between companies in New Jersey and the German American Chamber of Commerce.

The chamber, based in New York, has been facilitating similar economic programs with German and American companies, some of which are based in New Jersey, according to CEO and President Dietmar Rieg.

The nonprofit, which has been around since 1947 – prior to the existence of the Federal Republic of Germany – is increasingly focused on the workforce of the future, and manufacturing jobs that remain unfilled.

Germany currently has what Rieg called a dual education program, because half of the student’s education is in the school, and the other half is in the company – similar to apprenticeships.

At the end of the training, there is a certification, which employers recognize as a certain standard of training.

The program through GACC has trained 500,000 people every year in almost 460 professions.

New Jersey is especially prime for such programs, something New Jersey Manufacturing Extension Program CEO John Kennedy knows a little something about from his time with Siemens.

 Read more

Murphy Signs Order to Create Task Force to Study How Tech Innovation Will Impact NJ Jobs
Photo Credit: ROI-NJ.Com
From: roi-nj.com
By: Emily Bader
October 8, 2018
Gov. Phil Murphy signed an executive order on Friday to establish the Future of Work Task Force, his administration announced.
The task force, which was previewed in Murphy’s Economic Development Strategic Plan last Monday, will study how technology innovation will impact the development of jobs in New Jersey.
The task force will be chaired by Dr. Beth Simone Noveck, New Jersey’s chief innovation officer.
“Building a stronger and fairer economy requires a laser focus on reclaiming New Jersey as the state of innovation,” Murphy said. “However, we must not lose sight of the profound impacts that technological change will have on our workforce and economy. The insights provided by our Future of Work Task Force will ensure that all New Jersey workers share in the prosperity that innovation can deliver.”
The task force will aim to protect New Jersey workers against technological shifts, Murphy said, including developing a policy roadmap to enable the state the prepare for the future of automation.

Read more

For those of you who attended the Einstein’s Alley Future of Work Institutes here is more useful information…

What is artificial intelligence?

From Brookings Institution
By:Darrell West
October 4, 2018
Few concepts are as poorly understood as artificial intelligence. Opinion surveys show that even top business leaders lack a detailed sense of AI and that many ordinary people confuse it with super-powered robots or hyper-intelligent devices. Hollywood helps little in this regard by fusing robots and advanced software into self-replicating automatons such as the Terminator’s Skynet or the evil HAL seen in Arthur Clarke’s “2001: A Space Odyssey,” which goes rogue after humans plan to deactivate it. The lack of clarity around the term enables technology pessimists to warn AI will conquer humans, suppress individual freedom, and destroy personal privacy through a digital “1984.”
Part of the problem is the lack of a uniformly agreed upon definition. Alan Turing generally is credited with the origin of the concept when he speculated in 1950 about “thinking machines” that could reason at the level of a human being. His well-known “Turing Test” specifies that computers need to complete reasoning puzzles as well as humans in order to be considered “thinking” in an autonomous manner.

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M.I.T. Plans College for Artificial Intelligence, Backed by $1 Billion
From NY Times
By: Steve Lorh
October 15, 2018

Cody O’Loughlin for The New York Times
Every major university is wrestling with how to adapt to the technology wave of artificial intelligence – how to prepare students not only to harness the powerful tools of A.I., but also to thoughtfully weigh its ethical and social implications. A.I. courses, conferences and joint majors have proliferated in the last few years.

 

But the Massachusetts Institute of Technology is taking a particularly ambitious step, creating a new college backed by a planned investment of $1 billion. Two-thirds of the funds have already been raised, M.I.T. said, in announcing the initiative on Monday.
 
The linchpin gift of $350 million came from Stephen A. Schwarzman, chief executive of the Blackstone Group, the big private equity firm. The college, called the M.I.T. Stephen A. Schwarzman College of Computing, will create 50 new faculty positions and many more fellowships for graduate students.
 
It is scheduled to begin in the fall semester next year, housed in other buildings before moving into its own new space in 2022.

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Of Special Interest
Regional Plan Association CEO presentation highlights NJ’s advantages in Region

 Tom Wright

Tom Wright, President and CEO of the Regional Plan Association,the nation’s oldest independent metropolitan research, planning and advocacy organization, spoke to a gathering of Princeton, NJ citizens at a Princeton Future meeting on October 6, 2018.
Wright’s presentation makes clear that smart land use, dependable transportation and affordable housing are integral to New Jersey’s prosperity and the continuing growth of its innovation economy.

If you need more reasons to see why Einstein’s Alley is promoting the importance of immigrants to New Jersey’s and America’s economy…

More Than Half of America’s $1 Billion Startups Were Started by Immigrants

From: Entrepreneur. com
By Catherine Clifford
March 18, 2018
Image Credit_ Shutterstock
Image credit: Shutterstock

Many of the entrepreneurs we idolize and praise for their innovation and business success — traits we herald as specifically American — were not born here.

Elon Musk, the founder of SpaceX, was born in South Africa. Garrett Camp, a co-founder of Uber, was born in Canada. Jyoti Bansal, the founder of AppDynamics, was born in India.

Immigrants are turbo-charging startup innovation in the U.S., according to a report by the National Foundation for American Policy, a nonpartisan think tank based in Arlington, Va.  In fact, of the U.S. companies currently valued at $1 billion or more, more than half (44 out of 87) had at least one foreign-born founder. Collectively, these 44 privately held “unicorns” are valued at $168 billion.

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Events

TEDx NJIT
Thursday, November 8, 2018
Jim Wise Theatre
NJIT Campus
Newark, NJ
5-9 PM
New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT), will host a TEDxNJIT event, November 8, 2018 in the Jim Wise Theatre on the NJIT campus and via an accompanying live simulcast available to viewers worldwide. The independently organized event, licensed by TED, is themed “ReFraming” and will feature leaders from business, academia and the arts addressing a range of topics. Speakers will explore assumption that limit solutions to social problems and broadening perspectives to find new opportunities for cross cutting aproaches. They will cover a range of disciplines including arts, entertainment, technology and design.

Register here

More Upcoming Programs & Events

Einstein’s Alley Website
www.einsteinsalley.org
 

The Einstein’s Alley website is for you. Check the Directory section and see the companies listed that you need to know.

 

The website is also a great place for visibility for your company.  Contact kkish@einsteinsalley.org for information both on membership and on how to get a highlighted listing in the Directory. Or go directly to the website and download the form.

 

What is Einstein’s Alley?

 

Einstein’s Alley is the destination for technology-based businesses in Central New Jersey. Einstein’s Alley collaborates and coordinates with existing governmental and private sector organizations to grow the region as a magnet for entrepreneurial activity and as a globally recognized economic powerhouse.