November 29, 2023

Technology/Innovation

Tracking Close Encounters

Researchers at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Daytona Beach have developed a new way to count and analyze close encounters between drones and airplanes. The method will mean more accurate data — and safer operations — at airports, they say. Read more »

Published on 10/24/2023

Tech Focus

The Orlando Economic Partnership has spun off its development efforts in the technology sector to create Innovate Orlando, a non-profit that will promote its MetaCenter concept. David Adelson, who served as the partnership's chief innovation officer, will serve as Innovate Orlando's CEO. Read more »

Published on 9/27/2023

Enabling Orion

Darryl Howard grounds himself to his workstation to prevent a spark. Specially designed sticky floor mats and electrostatic smocks serve as additional safeguards, and for good reason: An unexpected zap could fry sensitive circuits that will go to the moon. The lives of four astronauts depend on more than just clean equipment. Read more »

Published on 9/12/2023

Optics Tech Training

Valencia College is launching a 15-week accelerated training program in September to meet growing demand for skilled precision optics and photonics technicians in Central Florida. Read more »

Published on 8/23/2023

Level Up

Brian Murphy knows the steep climb that startups face. He started ReliaQuest in 2007, nine months before the Great Recession, and didn't see a dime of outside investment for nearly a decade. In those early days, the Tampa-based company did general IT consulting work, mostly for government agencies. Over time, the company narrowed its focus to safeguarding digital client data and thwarting security threats. Read more »

Published on 8/2/2023

Live, Work, Scoot

J'Yah Marshall first saw the downtown high-rise apartment in 2017 while driving into Tampa for a job interview with ReliaQuest. When he got the job, the Jacksonville native remembers thinking, “I know where I want to live.” Read more »

Published on 8/2/2023

Florida's Future

We asked 13 experts in their respective fields to look into their crystal balls. Here are their thoughts on the decade ahead. Read more »

Published on 7/18/2023

Faster 3-D Fabrication

Ali Tamijani, an aerospace engineering professor at Embry-Riddle University, has spent the past decade and a half working on design and simulation technologies for 3-D printing, a process the aerospace and aviation industries have embraced to create prototypes and parts for planes and spacecraft. Read more »

Published on 6/29/2023

Connecting Seniors

After spending time with his grandparents, who live in the Villages, Lyman Starmer, 19, of Jacksonville started to think about the online platforms that connect residents of adult communities. At age 17, he started an online platform called Perspective with the goal of connecting people on bipartisan issues. Read more »

Published on 6/26/2023

Engineering a Solution to Cancer

Over the course of his career as a mechanical engineer, Greg Sawyer relished working on what he thought were “the hardest problems” in engineering — controlling surfaces to make things work in challenging environments, such as space. Read more »

Published on 6/23/2023

Rocking the Boat

A marine marketing truism holds that the ideal locale for photographing a boat is in the clear blue waters of the Bahamas. Cam Heaps, CEO of electric boat maker Voltari, wanted that Bahamas photo and decided to go for more: Instead of shipping or towing his new Voltari 260 performance boat there, he would seek to set a record for the “first and longest” electric boat overseas crossing — the 91 miles from Key Largo to Bimini. Read more »

Published on 5/15/2023

Smart Cane

Bay County high school students Henry Jiang and Walker Verenakis have created a prototype aid for the visually impaired. Both seniors at North Bay Haven Charter Academy in Panama City, the two have invented a digital ultrasound walking cane. Read more »

Published on 4/26/2023

Child's play

Will Weinraub caught the entrepreneurial bug early, while attending Nautilus Middle School in Miami Beach in 1997. Read more »

Published on 4/14/2023

The Futurist

By now, the usual reasons Wall Street types had for decamping to Florida during the pandemic are well-known: No income tax, an entrepreneurial spirit, welcoming policies and effusive politicians, high-growth potential and minimal regulation. Read more »

Published on 3/15/2023

Wasting No Time

About 30% of a typical city's food waste comes from restaurants. Aneshai Smith wants to do something about that while helping restaurants thrive. Her Orlando-based startup, Go See The City, offers digital coupons for deep discounts on unsold food before restaurants close for the day. Read more »

Published on 3/7/2023

Rocket Booster

Growing up in Satellite Beach, Janet Petro enjoyed a front row seat to the U.S. space program. Her father, who worked for Chrysler, moved the family from Michigan to the Space Coast in the early 1960s to help the automaker build spacecraft consoles that astronauts could operate. He ended up working on the Gemini, Mercury, Apollo and space shuttle programs. Petro recalls her family navigating their way through dunes strewn with sea oats — “there were no condos at the time,” she says — to witness rocket launches from the beach. One of her most vivid memor Read more »

Published on 2/9/2023

Construction underway for Leon County's $24-million business incubator

Construction underway for Leon County's $24-million business incubator Read more »

Published on 12/31/2022

Emergency Ventures app helps get critical information out during natural disasters to those without cell service

Emergency Ventures, a web and mobile app that connects citizens, volunteers and emergency managers during natural disasters when there's no internet or cell service, was launched to help recovery efforts during Hurricane Ian in Southwest Florida. It uses cached data from hundreds of services and bluetooth links. Read more »

Published on 12/30/2022

NanoRAD takes on germs with powerful new non-toxic anti-microbial disinfectant

Three-year-old Orlando-based Kismet Technologies has developed a patent-pending nanotechnology called NanoRAD that aims to revolutionize infection control for the health care sector and other industries. Read more »

Published on 12/27/2022

Dr. Hyun Suh's new scarless surgery is a gamechanger for thyroid patients

Partial or complete removal of the thyroid, the butterfly-shaped organ in the lower front of the neck that controls a person's metabolism, is a common treatment for an array of conditions, including thyroid cancer, overactive thyroid and non-cancerous enlargement of the gland known as a goiter — but the cosmetic impact of the routine surgery can be life-altering for patients. Read more »