Seventeen companies in various stages of development pitched their causes to about 30 local investors last Thursday, June 4 at MAGNET’s ProtoTech: Invest at the Metropolitan at The 9. All of the companies are in significant fund-raising mode.

“It was a good event, it was a lot of fun,” says Dave Crain, executive director of the Incubator at MAGNET and ProtoTech organizer. “I don’t think people realized how many g... Read more >

Startup Scaleup, a daylong event on June 17th, will offer resources, networking -- and ice cream -- for Cleveland’s startup businesses.

 Last summer, Jenny Bendis Goe, artist and owner of Jewelry by Jenny, was touring Coventry with Angie Hetrick, director of the Coventry Village Special Improvement District. Goe, who has lived in the area for her entire life, was heartbroken by the amount of vacant shops at the top of the hill.

So, Goe made it her mission to transform the vacancies to thriving storefronts, starting with her own. She contacted landlord Lewis Zipkin in August, and after some ... Read more >

The issue of concussions among both professional and student athletes is a hot topic these days. But repetitive brain injuries – how to detect, prevent and treat concussions – are also a concern among people in virtually every walk of life.

So on Tuesday and Wednesday, June 23 and 24, national scientists, engineers, clinicians and researchers will gather at the Global Center for Health Innovation to brainstorm and share their ideas at Concussion... Read more >

While on spring break in 2013 from his junior year at Ohio University, Seth Miller and three of his friends were killing time in the car on their way to Florida. “My buddy and I were freestyling on the way down to spring break,” he recalls. “It was pretty terrible, but they were hilarious. I knew people would enjoy doing it.”
 
Miller, now 22, then spent the next two years developing his app concept – pick from a curated rap beat, fr... Read more >

When the Incubator at MAGNET launched ProtoTech last year, the event was a pitch competition for product-based start-ups competing for $25,000 in prize money. This year, organizers have shifted focus a bit with ProtoTech: INVEST – a networking and pitch event that is all about investment in growing companies.
 
“Last year it was a pitch event for really early stage companies,” says Dave Crain, the Incubator at MAGNET executive dir... Read more >

Thirty years ago, Carol Emeruwa began searching for an alternative to the standard chocolate chip cookie to put in a care packages to her daughter at college. “I was looking around for something, but she didn’t like chocolate chip cookies,” Emeruwa recalls. So she started fooling around with different recipes and developed a ginger cookie made with natural ingredients and three kinds of ginger.  “She moved to New York after college and I still sent tho... Read more >

Since 1965 Pier W in Lakewood has been a seafood destination for special occasions. On May 11 the restaurant will mark its 50th anniversary and it seems there is no shortage of memories shared at the iconic dinner spot on Lake Erie.

“We’re 50 years and still going strong,” says general manager Mark Kawada. “We’re having some of the best years of the restaurant’s history and it’s great to be a part of it, and great t... Read more >

Back in 1982, Jerry Mearini was all set to study guitar at Berklee College of Music when he abruptly changed his mind. “The day before I was supposed to go, I realized that I couldn’t play guitar for the rest of my life,” he recalls. Instead Mearini earned a degree in physics from Ohio State and a masters and PhD in experimental physics from CWRU.
 
Mearini’s decision to study physics paid off well. In 1998 he founded Genvac Aerospace, a compan... Read more >

Through turning inventors' ideas into medical products and services, CCI has created 73 spinoff companies in the past 15 years, including some that have become recognizable entities in Cleveland and worldwide.

Seniors in Cleveland will soon have a new outlet for creative expression, thanks to a new program through the Benjamin Rose Institute of Aging. The Encore Artists program pairs older adults with professional artists, art therapists and music therapists age 50 and older at various sites around Cleveland.
 
“I’ve been trying to find a way to bridge the art world with the aging world,” explains Linda Noelker, senior vice president at Benj... Read more >

When Todd Goldstein and Dar Caldwell first created LaunchHouse in 2008, the organization was the first accelerator in the region to support early-stage startup companies. Since then, LaunchHouse has supported 62 companies and secured $23 million in follow-on funding. “We’re still going to work with our portfolio companies and help those companies be successful,” says Goldstein.

But earlier this month, LaunchHouse announced it was moving away from its adu... Read more >