Into the lair of beasts strode Adam Goldstein. Armed only with his wits and a mean set of slides, he descended on the Boston area on a warm, early winter day. He was no stranger to the premises. Goldstein had been an MIT undergrad before moving to San Francisco to participate in the Y Combinator startup program with his online travel company, Hipmunk.

Goldstein, the startup’s CEO and co-founder, spoke at Xconomy’s “6×6: Six Cities, Six Big Tech Ideas” conference earlier this month, representing the Bay Area. I say he was among beasts because Boston is the land of heavyweight travel firms such as ITA Software (now part of Google), Kayak, and TripAdvisor, and upstarts like Hopper, WaySavvy, and SilverRail (now based mostly in the U.K.). And Goldstein has been on record saying other travel sites “have really dropped the ball on flight search.” (On the other hand, Hipmunk formed a licensing partnership with ITA about a year ago.)

Indeed, the whole culture of Hipmunk is about coming “into an established industry with a focus on usability,” says Goldstein, in a polite-but-firm jab at the big players who don’t seem to care as much about being user-friendly. (As for the company’s name, let’s just say the cute-animal logo is its main justification.)

I must confess, I was skeptical at first. Since part of me still lives in the ’90s (the early to mid-‘90s, mind you), any bluster from new travel sites tends to fall on numb ears. Most travel sites seem pretty much the same, and even the worst ones are still more convenient than what people like me used to do, which is call up travel agents and individual airlines, get some options, and repeat until settling on a purchase. Hipmunk is about making the whole search process simpler, more intuitive, and more visually interactive.

But there’s only so far that can take you as a business, as my colleague Wade probed a few months ago. What stood out to me most about Hipmunk is its strategy of building a business by focusing first on getting lots of loyal customers—not trying to cash in on every eyeball.

“The entire world, especially in the world of travel, has become sort of addicted to the idea of making as much money as possible from each time someone visits their website,” Goldstein said. “What that’s led them to do over time is bombard their customers with advertisements and pop-up windows and all sorts of other things that just distract them.” Conclusion: Hipmunk won’t make money from ads, just referral fees when people book trips. But it does need to gain users—lots of users.

Here’s a short video interview with Goldstein, conducted by my colleague Lilly O’Flaherty. I like the part at the end where he references a talk by Northrop Grumman’s Bill Walker, also at 6×6, on high-altitude UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles). Heck, maybe someday an entrepreneur will pitch an idea for a company that’s a “Hipmunk for UAVs.”

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Think of it as a flying beluga whale. At least, that’s the way Xconomy’s San Diego editor Bruce Bigelow, once described the Global Hawk robot spy plane. And I have to say, I am personally very excited that this reconnaissance craft extraordinaire will be one of the featured presentations at our 6X6: Six Cities, Six Big Tech Ideas conference in downtown Boston on December 1.

Get your tickets here—the saver rate ends on Thursday.

Built by Northrop Grumman, the Global Hawk was conceived in San Diego as the modern, robotic manifestation of Lockheed’s famous U-2 spy plane. Under development for well over a decade, it has a bulbed-out nose, a ‘V’-shaped tail, and long, thin wings that span 130.9 feet to be exact. But the important part is that it is built to fly autonomously for 35-40 hours at 65,000 feet-packing more than a ton of surveillance equipment from infrared and electro-optical sensors to synthetic aperture radar.

We are pumped that Bill Walker, chief of Global Hawk business development, will be one of our speakers. Walker reports he is bringing some cool video of the Global Hawk in action to share with our audience. “Global Hawk is a peek into the future of autonomous aircraft that can provide rapid access to remote areas of the world,” he says. Among the potential missions, for war and peace:

—track ground forces over a large area, and identify/locate small targets

—monitor shipping and maritime domain access for protection and threat assessment

—observe/assess large disaster areas to support relief operations

—collect scientific information about weather and climate, including hurricanes

—provide a communications gateway in the sky to connect military troops on the ground and in the air, or to connect first responders in a disaster area

Walker’s presentation and videos should be fascinating, but they are just one part of 6X6, which features one potentially game-changing tech company from each of Xconomy’s six cities—not to mention a special opening keynote from Xconomist Stephen Wolfram, the visionary founder and CEO of Wolfram Research and creator of Mathematica and the Wolfram|Alpha search engine.

You can see the rest of the lineup and get tickets here. We are looking forward to seeing you on Dec. 1.

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Daily deals and flash sales, please step off. Social-local-mobile recommendations, go fly a kite. Photo-sharing sites, go take a long walk off a short pier (and send me a picture).

We don’t need more companies like those. Here’s what we need. Stretchy, bendy wearable computers. New tablet publishing models. High-altitude unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). The next generation of cloud-based communication tools. A computer that can read your emotions from your facial expressions.

And did I mention, the workings of the entire known universe might boil down to a few lines of code? We’ll have to ask Stephen Wolfram for an update on that (see below).

These and other potentially world-changing ideas will be on display Dec. 1, when we all get together for Xconomy’s “6×6: Six Cities, Six Big Tech Ideas” conference at the Fidelity Center for Applied Technology in downtown Boston. This is the second year we’ve run this event, where we invite top speakers from each of Xconomy’s cities to talk about their big idea and how they’ve built a real business around it. The sessions will be interactive, and there will be plenty of networking time for Boston-area innovators to chat with our speakers and guests.

This year our featured talks are by Jason Baptiste from New York-based OnSwipe (tablet publishing); Adam Goldstein from San Francisco’s Hipmunk (travel search); Michigan’s Nathaniel Borenstein of Mimecast (communication in the cloud); Kabir Shahani from Seattle-based Appature (relationship marketing); San Diego’s Bill Walker from Northrop Grumman (advanced UAVs); and Dave Icke from Boston’s own MC10 (flexible electronics and sensors).

We’ll have some amazing speakers giving bonus talks as well:

—Nathan Eagle from Jana (global mobile marketing and compensation)

—Gina Ashe from Krush (social commerce and brand marketing)

—Hardi Meybaum from GrabCAD (social product development/manufacturing)

—Rosalind Picard from the MIT Media Lab and Affectiva (computers that recognize emotions)

Plus a keynote from the aforementioned and venerable Stephen Wolfram, the founder and CEO of Wolfram Research, creator of Mathematica and Wolfram Alpha, and author of A New Kind of Science (which, thanks to Steve Jobs, has no quotes on its back cover).

We’ll be announcing the full agenda soon. In the meantime, you can get your tickets here; they’re going fast. See you on Dec. 1.

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Ladies and gentlemen, your attention please. Ahem.

[A giant “6x6” fills the screen.]

Macho narrator voice:
Star Wars had The Empire Strikes Back (Vader: “I am your father”)
The Godfather had The Godfather Part II (Pacino: “You broke my heart”)
Mad Max had The Road Warrior…well, you get the idea.

Now Xconomy presents 6×6, the long-awaited sequel to its riveting, change-the-world program from last December, 5×5. (It was “5×5” because we weren’t in New York City yet. Now we are.)

Yes, for the second straight year, Xconomy has canvassed its national network to find the most original, sensational, and transformative tech ideas out there—across software, hardware, digital media, social technologies, robotics, and more. We are inviting a select few speakers to Boston for an afternoon of mind-bending presentations and business networking.

It’s all taking place on the afternoon of Thursday, December 1, from 1:30-5:30 pm, at the Fidelity Center for Applied Technology in downtown Boston. One featured speaker will be on hand from each of our six cities: Boston, New York, Detroit, San Francisco, Seattle, and San Diego. We hope “6×6: Six Cities, Six Big Tech Ideas” will be a rallying point for the Boston tech community to get together and discuss the future of their fields with our out-of-town guests.

The concept is to highlight some of the BIGGEST tech ideas out there—as well as the nuts and bolts of how founders are building successful businesses around these ideas. This event is about truly changing the world, so we’ve asked everyone to please check their daily deals, social network plug-ins, and run-of-the-mill mobile apps at the door.

Who better to set the table than Stephen Wolfram? We’ve invited the renowned scientist, inventor, and business leader to give the opening keynote. Wolfram is the founder and CEO of Wolfram Research and the creator of Mathematica and Wolfram|Alpha. So he knows a little bit about changing the world from a software, computing, and business perspective. Oh, and he also spent 10-plus years working to reinvent the entire landscape of modern scientific thought with his book project, A New Kind of Science. I’ll stop there, but you can read an interview I did with Wolfram around the beginning of last year. (As for what he’ll talk about on Dec. 1, it’s safe to say I have no freaking idea—but I’ll keep you posted.)

Here’s a quick rundown on who’s representing our six cities at 6×6:

—From the hometown of Boston, we have Dave Icke, the CEO of Cambridge-based MC10, a pioneer in developing flexible electronics and sensors for consumer, healthcare, and energy markets.

—New York City is sending Jason Baptiste, the CEO of OnSwipe, a scrappy young startup that is trying to invent the future of media through a new tablet publishing platform.

—Representing Detroit is Nathaniel Borenstein, the Chief Scientist of Mimecast, an e-mail management company headquartered in the U.K. Borenstein, who’s based in Michigan, is one of the fathers of modern e-mail systems, and will talk about the future of communication in the cloud.

—From San Francisco comes Adam Goldstein, the CEO of Hipmunk, an online travel search company that’s been making waves with its novel visual interface for finding flights and hotels.

—Seattle will be repped by Kabir Shahani, the CEO of Appature, a fast-growing startup specializing in social and relationship marketing technologies for the healthcare industry.

—And from the sunny climes of San Diego comes Bill Walker, Chief of Global Hawk Business Development at Northrop Grumman, the aerospace and defense tech giant. Walker will talk about high-altitude unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs).

We also have a few intriguing “burst” bonus talks to highlight, from some of the most exciting startups around Boston. They will include Affectiva (CEO Dave Berman), an MIT Media Lab spinout that’s commercializing software to make your computer or smartphone understand your emotional state (talk about a big idea); Krush (CEO Gina Ashe), an ambitious startup focused on social commerce and marketing for apparel and lifestyle brands; and GrabCAD (CEO Hardi Meybaum), a company that’s connecting engineers with people who need stuff built, via an online community and marketplace.

We are really looking forward to 6×6, and we hope to see you there on Dec. 1. You can register at the special super saver rate here.

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CyPhy Works, the Boston-area robotics startup led by iRobot co-founder Helen Greiner, has raised an additional $1.2 million in equity financing, according to a regulatory filing. The investors in the round weren’t disclosed, but John Simon and Anita Jones are listed on the form as directors of the company, which was originally called The Droid Works. General Catalyst is an existing investor in CyPhy, which is still in stealth mode but is reportedly working on flying robots (UAVs), among other things. The startup previously raised $1.75 million early last year and won a $2.4 million government research grant in late 2009 to study UAVs.

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If laser weapons and tools ever become mainstream, it might be because of a quiet little company called TeraDiode.

Sure, there are lots of more imminent (and perhaps more practical) applications for the Littleton, MA-based laser firm—welding, cutting metal, illuminating targets, and so forth—but blowing stuff up is what a laser was meant to do. At least if you grew up watching Star Trek phaser battles, Star Wars dogfights, and other forms of popular but admittedly dorky sci-fi entertainment.

TeraDiode, a two-year-old spinout from MIT Lincoln Laboratory, is commercializing a new kind of laser system, using what’s called a direct-diode laser, that it says is brighter, more powerful, and more focused than its predecessors. The technology is based on semiconductor lasers (which are electrically rather than chemically driven) plus a sophisticated optical system to manipulate individual beams to form a single output beam—a technique known as wavelength beam combining.

The 11-person company raised $4 million in a Series A round led by Stata Venture Partners in the fall of 2009, and is currently closing a second financing round from VCs and strategic investors, says founder and CEO David Sossen. The company has also landed some $3 million in U.S. defense contracts, he says.

Sossen, a veteran of Arthur D. Little and other firms, was a founding investor in TeraDiode, together with Fred Leonberger, a photonics expert from optical-tech firm JDSU. The startup’s laser technology, and its subsequent business development, is the handiwork of a couple of former Lincoln Lab scientists, Bien Chann and Robin Huang (no relation to the author), who both left to co-found the company in late 2009.

Lasers have been used in industrial applications for some 40 years. And the U.S. military has used lasers for decades, but in limited ways, because the devices tend to be bulky, inefficient (not enough power output), and prone to breakdown. To create a “directed energy weapon,” for example, a conventional chemical-based laser would need to be about the size of a building.

Until now, the limiting factors for laser diodes have been power output and beam quality. “We’ve broken through that barrier,” Sossen says, adding that his company’s relatively compact lasers (which for commercial uses are a bit bigger than a breadbox but smaller than competing devices) can output between several hundred and several thousand watts, and in principle up to 100 kilowatts (with a bigger laser)—enough power to do some real damage. And at different wavelengths, depending on the application.

TeraDiode envisions selling lasers “compact enough to be deployable on a tank or … Next Page »

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The innovation economy took center stage last week in San Diego, where new innovations were announced in mobile apps, unmanned aircraft, and new technology platforms developed for smart grid operating systems. We’ve got it wrapped for you here.

—Diego-based Cymer (NASDAQ: CYMI), which is considered a bellwether for the semiconductor industry, said during a fourth-quarter conference call last week that several of its chip-making customers had recently raised their capital expenditure projections for 2011. Cymer makes advanced, deep-ultraviolet lasers for use in photolithography to make chips. “We believe this increase in ‘capex’ investment will translate into continued growth as the year proceeds,” CEO Bob Akins told investors, analysts, and journalists.

—Los Angeles-based Northrop Grumman (NYSE: NOC), which operates an engineering and development center for unmanned aircraft in San Diego, said its stealthy X-47B unmanned combat air system (UCAS) successfully flew its long-delayed first flight at Edwards Air Force Base on Friday. The unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) is intended to serve as a carrier-based combat strike aircraft.

—-I profiled Fluorotronics, an 11-year-old startup in Vista, CA, founded by Russian immigrant Olga Sharts to commercialize a specialized type of laser spectroscopy that is tuned to the unique spectroscopic signal of carbon-fluorine bonds. Such bonds are found only in manmade products, including pharmaceutical products. Carbon-fluorine bonds also are used to make Teflon and other advanced materials, including microelectronics, semiconductors, chemicals, and aerospace materials.

—Wade described how innovation and entrepreneurship have become the bywords for efforts in various quarters to drive economic resurgence in the United States. He noted the Startup America initiative launched by the White House, an unexpected source of funding for the Y Combinator venture incubator program, an expansion of the TechStars operation, and much more.

—Mountain View, CA-based Intuit (NASDAQ: INTU) has developed more than 15 mobile apps that are focused on … Next Page »

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A couple of startup companies set a world aviation record last night.

But they were pretty low-key about it. As I walked into the Future of Flight Aviation Center in Mukilteo, WA, a half hour north of Seattle, I saw little activity. It was after hours, and the hangar-like building was nearly deserted except for the futuristic planes suspended from the ceiling—Burt Rutan’s “Quickie” and a Beechcraft Starship—and part of a Boeing 787 Dreamliner fuselage on the display floor. It was a bit like “Star Wars” meets “Night at the Museum.”

Tom Nugent, the co-founder and president of Kent, WA-based LaserMotive, greeted me and said they were almost ready for showtime. A small team of engineers divided its attention between the back of a command truck and the adjacent trailer that held the laser optics equipment that would make the show possible. Two German guys who hadn’t slept in days (and were still on Munich time) were sprawled out on deck chairs in front of computer monitors like they were playing a video game. One held a remote controller that he used to guide a “quadrocopter”—a small, 1-kilogram, square-shaped flying contraption with blinking lights and four spinning rotors—made by their company, Ascending Technologies.

Jan Stumpf and Michael Achtelik, the co-CEOs of Ascending Technologies, partnered with LaserMotive to perform this feat last night. The goal: to use a laser to power an aircraft in continuous flight for about 12 hours (far longer than its battery would last without recharging, which is only about five minutes). That would be a world record, by a long shot, for the longest free flight of an electric vehicle.

Indeed, this demonstration is a big deal for the future of electric planes, said Barry Smith, the executive director of the Future of Flight facility. Imagine putting a laser on top of every cellular tower, he said, so that certain types of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) would never need to land to recharge or refuel. That could potentially revolutionize communications, surveillance, and security and defense applications. Longer term, it could even impact the long-held dream of powering manned aircraft with electricity instead of jet fuel—though that is very far off.

For now, Nugent says, “The significance is we’re going to show this quadrocopter, and any aerial vehicle [of this size], will be able to fly effectively forever. It’s no longer limited by battery capacity.”

LaserMotive has done smaller flight tests before, but not on a free-flying vehicle like this. The company is best known for winning the $900,000 NASA Power Beaming Challenge last year, in one of the levels of the “Space Elevator Games.” That involved using a laser to power a climbing robot up a cable to a certain height (1 kilometer) at a certain speed (about 9 mph). But lately the company has been targeting UAVs as a big commercial application of its wireless power technology. (The next level of the NASA challenge, which was supposed to happen later this year, is still up in the air, so to speak.)

“Goggles on!” someone shouted, and we all complied. That meant the infrared laser, which puts out about 200 watts of light power, was switching on. The beam was directed using a series of mirrors and optics and shot out the top of the trailer. You couldn’t see it with the naked eye except for a reddish halo on the 50-foot ceiling. At the same time, the quadrocopter lifted off (under its own battery power), guided by Stumpf, and floated up to meet the beam, about 30 feet off the ground (see left).

“Not centered,” Nugent said. Then the computer vision system of LaserMotive’s setup kicked in. Software and cameras aligned with the path of the laser beam tracked the vehicle’s position, and positioned the beam so it hit the photovoltaic cells on the underside of the craft; those solar cells transformed the laser’s energy into electricity to continuously charge the quadrocopter’s battery.

With that, all human corrections fell away, and it was just a drone hovering eerily in space, rotors humming quietly. It swayed a few feet from side to side, and the laser tracked it. It was about 7:40 pm.

This is the boring part, Nugent said. And boring is good. Exciting is bad. For the next 12 hours, if all went well, nothing more would happen. The craft would stay up all night (as would the crew), … Next Page »

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Octobers have been cruel to San Diego.

The infamous Cedar Fire started on a Saturday evening, Oct. 25, 2003, and raced more than 30 miles from the Cleveland National Forest into the San Diego suburbs by the next morning. The firestorm destroyed 2,232 homes and killed 15 people before it was contained nine days later. Then there was the Witch fire of 2007, part of a cluster of wildfires that erupted on October 21, killed seven, and destroyed 1,500 homes and forced the evacuation of 500,000 residents throughout San Diego County. That was a bigger evacuation than in New Orleans in 2005, when Hurricane Katrina attained its dubious distinction as the costliest natural disaster in U.S. history.

Still, we’re getting better at dealing with firestorms in San Diego—and natural disasters in general—as innovations in sensor technologies, wireless networks, and predictive analytics have helped provide more accurate forecasts and better warnings. And much of the technology is being developed in San Diego.

Earlier this month, for example, San Diego Gas & Electric officials held a press briefing to explain that the utility had spent $1.1 million over the past year to add 93 anemometers (for measuring wind speed) to an existing network of 16 radio-automated weather stations throughout San Diego County. As a result, San Diego County now has the densest network of weather instrumentation in the country, according to Brian D’Agostino, a full-time weather forecaster hired by SDG&E last year.

The increased instrumentation gives SDG&E’s operations center more detailed information about wind conditions in specific locales. Utility regulators allow SDG&E to shut off power to specific transmission lines when local wind speeds exceed 56 mph, according to Dave Geier, SDG&E’s vice president of electric transmission and distribution. Wind speeds above 56 mph increase the odds that blowing debris or swaying trees will bring down a power line, according to utility officials.

A more sophisticated wireless sensor network, such as the High Performance Wireless Research and Education Network developed by researchers at UC San Diego, serves as a model of the type of network that could provide even more data, including imagery, that could help in the prediction of and response to disasters, according to Hans-Werner Braun of the San Diego Supercomputer Center. With funding from the National Science Foundation, Braun says the network demonstrates how a remote sensing systems can be effectively networked throughout remote areas of San Diego, Riverside, and Imperial Counties. Braun, who is overseeing the project, has described it as a wireless backbone that uses Internet routers on mountaintops, interconnected via wireless links.

Braun, who was the chief network architect for the satellite network conceived by Bellevue, WA-based Teledesic in the 1990s, uses the system for … Next Page »

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At Northrop Grumman’s unmanned systems development center in suburban San Diego, some folks are describing a $33 million contract that was announced today as “DARPA hard.”

DARPA is an acronym for the Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, and the two-year contract awarded to Northrop Grumman calls for demonstrating the feasibility of using one high-altitude unmanned Global Hawk aircraft to refuel another. The UAV-to-UAV in-flight refueling is to be completely autonomous, with the robotic aircraft using GPS navigation and optical tracking systems to approach, link up, and complete the refueling procedure. If successful, the first unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) air-to-air refueling will mark a historic milestone—for both aviation and robotics.

UAV-UAV aerial refueling (photo illustration)

While mid-air refueling has been done with piloted aircraft since 1923, it remains a tricky and hazardous maneuver that requires extensive pilot training. In the case of two robotic aircraft, both UAVs must automatically adjust to turbulence and other environmental uncertainties while maneuvering in the thin air of high altitude (the Global Hawk’s cruising altitude is 65,000 feet).

“So this one definitely fits” the category of DARPA hard, says Mark Gamache, the San Diego-based director of advanced concepts for Northrop Grumman Aerospace Systems. In a telephone interview, Gamache tells me DARPA hard “means they only like to work on projects that nobody else would do.”

The Global Hawk was itself the product of DARPA-funded development during the 1990s, with the first seven aircraft built in … Next Page »

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New industries like cleantech and mobile health are changing the face of San Diego’s innovation scene. Better catch up on all that’s happening before you don’t recognize it anymore.

—The wind power industry is now in the doldrums, after soaring last year to a record number of wind turbine installations. The industry’s boom and bust cycles are so jarring that the American Wind Energy Association is calling on Congress to enact policies to bring more stability to the market. The latest lull in new orders has prompted the Knight & Carver Wind Group of National City, CA, to lay off a third of its workforce at a wind turbine blade manufacturing plant near Sioux Falls, S.D.

—San Diego’s Avalon Ventures, which has embarked on raising between $150 million and $200 million for its ninth venture fund, gets a lot of attention for its investments in life sciences startups. But Avalon invests about half of its funds in Web and wireless deals like E-Band Communications, Cloudkick, and Nabbr.

—Google Ventures stepped out of the shadows to talk with reporters about the corporate venture fund and its investing strategy. In San Diego, Google Ventures has sunk money into V-Vehicle and OpenCandy. In a Q&A transcript, Bill Maris, the fund’s managing partner, said the fund’s goal is to invest roughly $100 million in startups each year.

—San Diego’s Envision Solar International, which specializes in architectural and project planning of renewable energy projects, began trading on the over-the-counter bulletin board market. The company’s shares trade under the symbol EVSI.

—The mobile health industry will meet in La Jolla tomorrow for the 5th Annual Wireless-Life Sciences Alliance Convergence Summit. While a survey by TripleTree, a Minnesota banking firm, shows the industry is still emerging; the WLSA itself became a full-time, member-supported trade group earlier this year.

—Some of the proceeds from a $53 million deal the J. Craig Venter Institute did in Maryland could help the research institute move ahead with its plans for a laboratory on the UC San Diego campus. The Venter Institute sold its five-building campus in Rockville, MD, and then leased it back.

—Larry Smarr, who heads the California Institute for Telecommunications and Information Technology at UC San Diego was among the featured speakers at a health IT conference that OVP Venture Partners hosted at its headquarters in Kirkland, WA. Smarr said biologists, physicians, and computer scientists rarely pool their brainpower in productive ways to tackle problems as hard as health IT.

—At a time when the Pentagon is pushing unmanned aircraft makers to develop a new generation of relatively inexpensive unmanned aerial vehicles, a startup near Seattle called LaserMotive has outlined a way to use a laser to beam power to unmanned aircraft. That way, they won’t have to land to refuel.

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You want some real tech? Here’s some real tech: LaserMotive, the Kent, WA-based startup founded by physicists Jordin Kare and Tom Nugent, has published a white paper on how to beam power to unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) so they don’t have to land and refuel, or change batteries. The idea is to recharge UAVs while they’re in the air using a laser power source from the ground. Presumably such “eternal” UAVs that never need to land would be very useful for military and reconnaissance operations.

In San Diego, which is a regional hub of UAV expertise, the San Diego Union-Tribune reports that defense contractors like Predator manufacturer General Atomics Aeronautical Systems and Northrop Grumman’s unmanned systems business are hustling to develop a new generation of relatively inexpensive UAVs. Most larger UAVs, like the Predator and Fire Scout, a robotic helicopter made by Northrop Grumman, run on gasoline, but smaller ones can run on electricity and are quieter.

That’s where LaserMotive comes into play. This inventive little company, which I first wrote about in-depth last month, has developed power-beaming technology using laser diodes to transmit energy through the air, and specially constructed solar cells to receive the beam and turn it into usable electricity. LaserMotive demonstrated its technology by winning the Level 1 prize of the NASA Power Beaming challenge last fall (part of its Space Elevator Games), in which it powered a robot to climb up a kilometer-long cable using only lasers from the ground. (The company will go for the Level 2 prize later this year.)

But powering UAVs and other practical devices has been the company’s plan for a while, and this is its first big market opportunity. Nugent, LaserMotive’s co-founder and president, said in a statement that his company’s plan is “an important step not only in powering UAVs, but in extending their abilities, improving their endurance and enabling new missions.” He added, “It is especially viable for high-altitude, long endurance unmanned aerial vehicles and other types of aircraft that need power over a long period of time.”

If you want to know the technical specs and capabilities of LaserMotive’s system (things like range, power levels, and efficiency), read the company’s report. But it seems like an intriguing market. The industry research firm Teal Group says the market for UAVs is expected to grow worldwide from $4.9 billion to $11.5 billion annually in the next 10 years.

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Something strange has been happening over at Adaptive Materials, a fuel cell developer based in Ann Arbor, MI. During the past few months, as everybody talks about how to get things moving forward in Southeast Michigan, Adaptive has been, well, actually moving forward.

A contract worth a few million from the Department of Defense here, an award worth another few million from the Air Force there, and more money to develop a product for the recreational vehicle market.

And then there’s the company’s recent resume-gathering blitz, hiring nine new engineers. That’s news in these parts (the company received an amazing 7,100 resumes for those nine plum jobs). So, I decided to find out what kind of magic is going on over at Adaptive Materials. I talked to Michelle Crumm, co-founder and chief business officer, and found out that there is no magic happening there at all. The success is the result of a decade of old-fashioned hard work and building of relationships.

Crumm also tells me that Adaptive just might be a victim of its own success now. The company made a decision 10 years ago not to seek angel or venture capital funding. She did not think it was right to use what she calls OPM (Other People’s Money) to fund a “wild and crazy idea.” A decade later, it’s no longer a wild and crazy idea. It’s a business getting ready to move from manufacturing a few hundred units to thousands. And the company could really use some non-government funding at this point. Trouble is, they’re just not wild and crazy enough to attract VC-style investors.

I’ll let Crumm explain what she means in her own words. Here’s an edited transcript of my recent talk with Crumm. Below is Part 1. We’ll run Part 2 later in the week.

Xconomy: First, let’s talk about your company, then we can broaden the conversation a little bit. Can you tell me the “elevator pitch” version of what your company does?

Michelle Crumm: Adaptive Materials started 10 years ago, and we’ve been focused on solid oxide fuel cells development. So, we’re an alternative energy development company. Our focus is portable power. In our early stage, we were primarily focused on military portable power for soldiers. Early successes in those programs, in the early 2000s, led us to getting to other power ranges—enough to power robots and airplanes.

So we provide [products] to “eyes-in-the-sky.” They get more power  when they’re flying unmanned aerial vehicles and longer duration capabilities when they have robots in the field. So, to protect them from IEDs [Improvised Explosive Devices], they can send robots out. About 12 hours is our most recent demonstration. So, about 10X longer mission for a robot in the field than a battery.

X: Is that being used in the field now?

MC: We have a small number of units out in different locations throughout the world for unmanned aerial vehicles and unmanned ground vehicles.

X: From what I’ve heard, there’s more of an emphasis on small, portable robotics in Afghanistan because of the mountainous terrain.

MC: Exactly. That’s been significant, just the change between the two wars. There’s definitely … Next Page »

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Think it’s possible to shoot down a swarm of buzzing mosquitoes in mid-air? Or maybe you want to power up a remote flying vehicle? Tom Nugent is your man. The Seattle-area entrepreneur just might be the most versatile guy with a laser you’ve ever met.

Yes, a laser. Until recently, Nugent worked in the laboratory of Bellevue, WA-based Intellectual Ventures, the invention company led by Nathan Myhrvold, where one of his projects was the so-called “photonic fence.” This effort has gotten lots of media attention, most recently for an impressive demo at the TED conference in February. That’s where Myhrvold showed a video of a laser burning the wings off a flying mosquito in super slow-motion. The idea is this technology, implemented on a larger scale, could help prevent the spread of malaria or protect crops against flying pests.

But Nugent’s focus now is on something that might be more practical: power beaming. That means using lasers to deliver energy to remote sensors, vehicles, or base stations. It’s a two-way trick: the receiver has to have a solar cell to convert the laser’s energy into electricity. But as long as the solar cell is viable, the technology could be useful in any situation where installing a wire is impractical, where batteries run down, or where it’s too expensive to truck in fuel.

That’s really just the beginning, to Nugent’s mind. One of his ultimate goals is to be able to beam large amounts of solar power to Earth from space, presumably to help solve global-scale energy problems. For now, though, he’ll settle for beaming power to unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and other remote devices, including very early technology that could help scientists develop something called a space elevator. These ideas, in sum, have turned into a small company called LaserMotive, based in Kent, WA.

Before dismissing these projects as far-fetched, a little background is required. The idea of power beaming has been around for decades. But advances in cheaper and more energy-efficient diode lasers have made it possible to pursue the idea commercially in the past few years. Even the rise of laser hair removal products (which you might see on late night TV) have helped things move forward. So in 2007, Nugent and fellow physicist (and Intellectual Ventures veteran) Jordin Kare, an expert on laser rocket propulsion and optics who worked on the “Star Wars” nuclear-missile defense system in the 1980s—decided to make a business out of power beaming, and co-founded LaserMotive.

“We think we can produce revenue while we get experience,” says Nugent, LaserMotive’s president.

Their first project: tackling the power beaming aspect of NASA’s “Space Elevator Games.” If you don’t know what a space elevator is, that’s OK—it doesn’t exist yet. The über-futuristic idea is to have a cable anchored to the ground, extending thousands of miles into space, that could be used to launch payloads into orbit. The space end would be unattached, and the Earth’s rotation would keep it taut so a robot “elevator” could move up and down the cable, carrying equipment. Sure, this would take billions of dollars and a few decades to get working, but it could ultimately make space operations much cheaper than using rockets. That’s the idea, at least.

If a space elevator is ever going to work, it will need power at multiple steps along the way. So, at “Level 1” of the NASA Power Beaming Challenge, held last November in Mojave, CA, Nugent and Kare’s team used a ground-based infrared laser to beam energy to specially designed solar cells aboard an 11-pound robot (see photo, left) driven by an electric motor. (All power must come from the ground.) The robot climbed a 900-meter length of metal cable suspended from a helicopter. Nugent and Kare’s was the only team to make it to the top with an average climbing speed of more than 2 meters per second—their robot went nearly 4 meters per second (9 mph)—beating out two other teams, who failed to reach the top. The prize was $900,000 (before taxes, Nugent laments—yes, it’s that time of year).

The upcoming “Level 2” competition will be held later this year, … Next Page »

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Robotics, in the noughties (I have rank ordered them in importance):

1. Thousands of remotely piloted and autonomous aircraft in the U.S. military.

2. Thousands of supervisory controlled ground robots in the U.S. military.

3. Millions of autonomous home cleaning robots in people’s houses.

4. Autonomous vehicles in the two DARPA grand challenge demonstrations.

5. Deployed automated logistics robots in fulfillment centers.

[Editor's Note: As the decade comes to an end, we've asked Xconomists and other technology leaders around the country to identify the top innovations they've seen in their fields the past 10 years, or predict the top disruptive technologies that will impact the next decade.]

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DroidWorks, the stealth-mode robotics company launched early in 2009 by iRobot co-founder Helen Greiner, has changed its name to CyPhy Works and has won a $2.4 million research award from the National Institute of Standards and Technology to study ways of using unmanned aerial vehicles to inspect civil infrastructure such as highways, bridges and dams, according to a story today in Mass High Tech. The grant will allow the company to hire more robotics engineers, Greiner told the publication.

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It was another busy week for deals in the Northwest, with lots of action in cloud computing software, mobile, and healthcare. Xconomy even got into the act, inking a partnership with The Seattle Times (see below).

—Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) acquired Lexcycle, an e-book startup based in Portland, OR, and Austin, TX. No financial terms were given. Lexcycle makes an online bookstore application called Stanza for desktops and the iPhone. The move is viewed as part of Amazon’s effort to consolidate its position in the e-book reader market for mobile devices.

—Seattle-based Symform, a cloud data storage startup, raised $1.5 million in Series A financing from OVP Venture Partners in Kirkland, WA. Symform, founded in late 2007, has developed an online data backup service for small to medium-sized businesses that is fast and relatively cheap. It is in public beta trials and plans to release its full service later this year. OVP’s Mark Ashida talked about the deal and some broader issues in investment strategy.

—Opscode, a stealthy Seattle startup working on cloud computing infrastructure for businesses, closed $2.5 million in Series A funding, led by Draper Fisher Jurvetson. Founded last year, Opscode says it will use the new cash to hire engineers and other key staff as it gets ready to launch its core cloud service this year.

—Seattle-based PATH, a global health nonprofit, received two grants worth $52 million to combat the spread of HIV, as Luke reported. The three-year grants are from the U.S. Agency for International Development ($35 million) to strengthen communities’ response to HIV in Ethiopia, and from the Canadian International Development Agency ($17 million) to aid HIV prevention efforts.

—Seattle-based LookStat, a maker of Web-based analytics and workflow automation software for the microstock photography industry, raised $500,000 from Seattle’s Founder’s Co-op and individual investors. LookStat is in public beta trials and looking to sell its service to photographers who want to know what kinds of photos are selling where, for example. Co-founder Rahul Pathak talked about what his company is doing, and provided some more context around the deal.

—Ryan reported on the Northwest’s second-biggest financing deal of 2009 so far, Seattle-based NewPath Networks’ $30 million funding led by Charterhouse Group in New York, with Denver-based Meritage Funds also participating. NewPath, founded in 2004, designs and operates wireless technologies such as antenna networks and underground fiber-optic cables for carriers like AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile, who need to provide wireless coverage in remote and difficult-to-access places.

—Bingen, WA-based Insitu, a developer of drone aircraft, received a one-year, $30 million contract from the Canadian government to ship small, unmanned aerial vehicles in support of Canadian military operations in Afghanistan. Insitu was acquired by Boeing (NYSE: BA) for about $400 million last summer.

—Hillsboro, OR-based Kryptiq, a maker of collaborative software for healthcare providers, sold off its health plan network management software line, called Choreo, to Portico Systems in Blue Bell, PA. Financial terms were not announced. Kryptiq’s core product helps providers share information with patients, labs, and pharmacies.

—Luke broke the news that Redmond, WA-based Asemblon has raised $2.9 million in the first installment of a Series C financing, led by London-based RAB Capital and Japan’s Sojitz Trading. Asemblon is working on a novel technology for storing hydrogen fuel using organic carrier molecules that can release hydrogen on demand, enabling the fuel to be stored at room temperature and without high pressure.

—Lastly, Xconomy has formed a partnership with The Seattle Times, whereby the Business/Technology section of Seattletimes.com gets an automatic feed of news and features headlines from Xconomy Seattle, as Luke announced. This syndication deal comes on the heels of another partnership we formed with the Seattle P-I back in December to share online stories.

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Bingen, WA-based Insitu, a developer of unmanned aircraft systems, announced today it has received a one-year, $30 million contract from the Canadian government to provide technologies to support Canadian forces’ operations in Afghanistan. The contract, which includes two additional one-year options, specifically calls for small unmanned aerial vehicles for intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance. Insitu was acquired by Boeing (NYSE: BA) for about $400 million last summer.

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San Diego’s General Atomics Aeronautical Systems said it has begun flight testing a jet-powered version of its Predator unmanned aircraft system (UAS) with a stealthier design and with the ability to operate aboard Navy aircraft carriers.

Dubbed the “Avenger,” the jet-powered version of the armed surveillance aircraft can fly as high as 60,000 feet and at speeds of roughly 460 mph (400 knots true air speed), which is almost twice as fast as the turboprop-powered Predator B, which has a top speed of 276 (240 KTAS). The Avenger’s first flight was April 4 at the company’s flight operations facility in Palmdale, CA, north of Los Angeles.

A recent preview on the Ares defense blog describes the Avenger as a “UCAV,” an unmanned combat aerial vehicle, designed with a sleek profile, folding wings, and a tailhook for landings aboard aircraft carriers. That could pose some furrowed eyebrows at Northrop Grumman, which has been developing the competing X-47B Pegasus in San Diego for Navy carrier operations under a Pentagon contract.

Developing unmanned aircraft with its own funding, rather than operating under a government contract, has been a hallmark of GA-Aeronautical Systems under retired Adm. Tom Cassidy. In a statement, Cassidy says, “Our company has been uniquely successful in forecasting military needs and delivering extremely capable aircraft that are ready for near-term military use.”

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I was a little surprised yesterday when Enerdyne Technologies, a subsidiary of Carlsbad, CA-based ViaSat, said encryption technology is now available for its digital data link systems to unmanned military surveillance aircraft.

Isn’t the video transmitted from robotic spy planes already encrypted?

Not necessarily, says Enerdyne general manager Steve Gardner. As it turns out, it’s possible to buy a standard commercial FM receiver used by TV news organizations and tune it to “eavesdrop” on the analog video signal transmitted by several different types of robotic aircraft used by the U.S. military. He says in the early years of UAV development, aircraft companies encrypted the digital electronics used to control UAVs, but “typically chose small analog transmitters” to broadcast video signals from the aircraft to ground units. That could be a problem if the eavesdroppers are U.S. adversaries in places like Afghanistan and Iraq. Gardner says whether that scenario should be a concern has become a hot topic of discussion these days in defense circles that are focused on the development and use of UAVs, or unmanned aerial vehicles.

Gardner says Enerdyne now has developed a module that can be installed aboard a UAV, between its camera and analog video transmitter. The module, which is a little bigger than a handheld calculator, digitizes and compresses the video signal so it can be encrypted without necessitating changes in the analog video transmitter aboard the plane or in U.S. equipment receiving the video signal on the ground. Enerdyne uses another module on the ground to decrypt the video signal.

“From the perspective of the FM equipment that they have on the airplane and on the ground, they can’t tell the difference,” Gardner says. The innovation reflects … Next Page »

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