Day: February 25, 2020

MIT Solve announces 2020 global challenges

Posted on by

On Feb. 25, MIT Solve launched its 2020 Global Challenges: Good Jobs and Inclusive Entrepreneurship, Learning for Girls and Women, Maternal and Newborn Health, and Sustainable Food Systems, with over $1 million in prize funding available across the challenges. Solve seeks tech-based solutions from social entrepreneurs around the world that address these four challenges. Anyone, anywhere can apply by the June 18 deadline. This year, to guide applicants, Solve created a course with MITx entitled “Business and Impact Planning for Social Enterprises,” which introduces core business-model and theory-of-change concepts to early-stage entrepreneurs. Finalists will be invited to attend Solve Challenge Finals on Sept. 20 in New York City during U.N. General Assembly week. At the event, they will pitch their solutions to Solve’s Challenge Leadership Groups, judging panels comprised of industry leaders and MIT faculty. The judges will select the most promising solutions as Solver teams. “Based all over the world, our Continue reading MIT Solve announces 2020 global challenges→

Build a Rover, Send It to the Moon, Sell the Movie Rights: 30 Years of iRobot

Posted on by

This article was originally published on LinkedIn. The views expressed here are solely those of the author and do not represent positions of IEEE Spectrum or the IEEE. Build a rover, send it to the Moon, sell the movie rights. That was our first business model at iRobot. Way back in 1990. We thought it would be how we’d first change the world. It’s ironic, of course, that through that model, changing the world meant sending a robot to another one. Sadly, that business model failed. And it wouldn’t be our last failed business model. Not by a long shot. Photo: iRobot Why? Because changing the world through robots, it turns out, is no easy task. Perhaps the biggest challenge back when we started in 1990 was that there existed no rule book on how to do it. There weren’t many robots, let alone robot companies, let alone any kind of robot industry. Continue reading Build a Rover, Send It to the Moon, Sell the Movie Rights: 30 Years of iRobot→