The White House has honored 11 immigrant innovators and entrepreneurs as “Champions of Change,” including a graduate of the University of Texas at Austin.
The immigrants are “the best and brightest from around the world who are helping create American jobs, grow our economy, and make our nation more competitive.”
Amar Sawhney, medical device inventor and entrepreneur, holds more than 120 patents and has founded six companies that employ more than 1,600 people and have generated more than $1.5 billion in revenue. He lives in Boston and is the President and CEO of Ocular Therapeutix, Inc.
He also founded a medical device incubator, Incept.
Sawhney, a native of India, moved to the United States in 1987. He became an entrepreneur because he applied for 30 jobs in the U.S. but he got rejected from all of them because he didn’t have a green card. So he decided to pursue a Ph.D. He received his Ph.D. in chemical engineering from the University of Texas at Austin in 1992.
“If you have not much to lose, you take more risk and you try harder,” Sawhney said in the Youtube video from the Immigrant Learning Center.

By SUSAN LAHEY
Reporter with Silicon Hills News

In the offices of Main Street Hub, dozens of employees stare at computer screens, scanning for social media posts relevant to their customers. Somewhere in Austin, somebody hashtags “birthday” on a Twitter feed and the employee in charge of the bakery client tweets a birthday greeting and mentions the client’s custom cakes. Across town, somebody tweets about a check engine light coming on and the writer in charge of the mechanic client bangs out some clever offer, with a link to the store.
This is only one of the services offered by Main Street Hub, an Austin company that manages social media for brick-and-mortar companies locally as well as in all 50 states, the United Kingdom, Republic of Ireland, Hong Kong and Canada.
The company creates a social media strategy for its customers including creating snazzy social media profiles, helping craft social offers designed to promote sales, responding to fans and customers on social media sites and responding to reviews. Twenty four hours a day, seven days a week, they take social media off their customers’ plates on channels such as Facebook, Twitter, Yelp, and Trip Advisor.
For client Jim Medina, who owns Van Ness Auto Repair in Fresno, California, Main Street Hub answers auto repair questions on social media sites and via email.
“It works for me because they answer questions for me about mechanical problems. They know the automotive field. I have 2,200-to-2,500 clients and each has two to three cars. This saves me time I need for my family. “

Besides answering questions, Main Street Hub, works to get people talking about their customers.
“The practice we have is to actually write a message that’s going to get people talking,” said Co-founder Andrew Allison. “It’s about an ongoing conversation. We write messages that are unique to people to spread word of mouth. It’s not about writing stuff that’s going to be annoying. The proof is in the results. If it was spam, we would get crickets.”
Sheila Likar, office manager for Palo Alto Laser and Skin Care said it took about six months with Main Street Hub to take their business from $40,000 a month revenue to about $40,000 weekly.
Natasha Bajic, owner of Brass Ovaries, an Austin company that teaches pole dancing for fun and fitness, said Main Street Hub not only exponentially increased her audience and ability to communicate with her customers, but tackled a couple of social media issues she would not have had the time or knowledge to fix quickly.
When she moved her business, it took Google maps a long time to make the change; Main Street Hub got it done, keeping customers from driving halfway across town only to learn that the location was closed. And when someone else committed a trademark violation, trying to set up social media accounts with her company’s name “They actually went after it and got it removed right away,” Bajic said. That’s something that would have taken time away from my business and they just handled it.”
“They look for different things,” she said. “If somebody Tweets ‘I need to get in shape’ they have this matrix that looks for that and they engage the customer. If the person is within five miles, they try to get them to come in…. They have experience to know which posts will promote engagement.”
Allison and his Co-founder, Matt Stuart, met at Stanford and founded their company in 2010 in Silicon Valley but moved to Austin in the summer of 2011, saying they believed could recruit more easily here.
“There’s a talent pool here in Austin which has both the breadth and depth we needed,” said Stuart. “There’s great talent in all three areas–account management, engineering and sales. We get something like 200 resumes for every opening on the team.” The company had 26 employees when it moved to Austin. It now employs 160.
Main Street Hub was Allison and Stuart’s answer to the question of how to make an impact on the world.
“I was going to be an attorney for progressive causes,” said Allison, who is originally from New York. “I decided I could do more good more quickly in entrepreneurship.”
Stuart, who got his MBA from Stanford, also was looking to create a business that had impact. They were introduced by a mutual friend.
“We started kicking around ideas and realized we had similar approaches and values,” Stuart said. “One of those was making a big impact…. Local businesses are the backbone of a local economy. They create the most jobs, most of the spending. We believe we can have the biggest impact if we support them and create thriving local economies throughout the world.”
To do that, Main Street Hub created in-house technologies to support their mission.
“We started out with very little technology,” said Stuart, “So we could understand what our clients were asking for. We built in-house tools that enable us to do this for them. We knew we needed to leverage technology. With that said, we’re also investing in relationships with our clients. We’re always on the phone with our clients, talking strategy as well as doing actual content.”
In October of 2011, the company got $2.6 million in funding from angels back in Silicon Valley, including Michael Dearing of Harrison Metal, that allowed them to grow. They received another private round of funding from Silicon Valley angels for an undisclosed amount.
The company charges about $300 a month, depending on the service plan. Some other social media management companies, such as Virtual Social Media, charge between $1,000 a month for the starter package and $15,000 for the corporate package.
Main Street Hub has recently added helping clients with their web presence and is getting ready to launch email marketing services.
The data they’ve collected, Allison said, has helped them hone what is effective for all of their different client types.
Allison and Stuart said they’re not looking for an exit. They’re still focused on impacting the world with local business.
“We plan to build a big, independent, long-term company,” Stuart said.

By SUSAN LAHEY
Reporter with Silicon Hills News

So here’s a sobering thought: According to the Sloan Digital Sky Survey there are 60 billion trillion stars in the observable universe. By the year 2017, according to Kevin Nowka, Director of Research for IBM, the total amount of data humans have generated will surpass that.
Much of that data, of course, is kitten memes.
Nowka spoke Tuesday at the Austin Forum on Science, Technology and Society held at the AT&T Executive Education and Conference Center on the topic: The Big Deal About Big Data.
According to the International Data Corporation, Nowka said, a fourth of the information in the digital universe would be useful for big data if it were tagged and analyzed but only three percent of useful data is tagged and even less than that analyzed.
Useful data includes data that could tackle the world’s problems such as wasteful medical spending, congested urban roadways, and environmental concerns. For example, the Institute of Medicine estimates of that of the $2.7 trillion spent on U.S. healthcare in 2011, $750 billion was wasted because of unnecessary and inefficiently delivered services, excessive administration costs, missed prevention opportunities and fraud. Some of which could be addressed with better data. Also, Nowka said, an IBM study revealed one in three business leaders frequently made decisions based on information they don’t trust or don’t have.
After sharing more than a dozen statistics about the growth of data streams—the volume of data doubles every year; and exploring the burgeoning number of sources—everything from social media to connected automobiles–Nowka introduced IBMs solution to problem of making use of it all: Watson Core Technology. This computer system uses natural language capabilities, hypothesis generation, and evidence-based learning to analyze and find answers in huge amounts of data. It is already being used by medical institutions such as Memorial Sloan Kettering who have trained the system to help diagnose and treat oncology patients and in experiments with retail and institutional banking organizations.
IBM is beginning to offer the technology on a limited basis to individual and business customers through the Watson Engagement Advisor Early Customer Program. The system still only speaks English and doesn’t deal well with images, Nowka said. But it can analyze natural language for subjects and verbs, dates, proper names, and learn as it goes, categorizing information and refining its hypotheses.
The Austin Forum is a monthly speaker series sponsored by the Texas Advanced Computing Center.

By ANDREW MOORE
Reporter with Silicon Hills News

Peptalk

Peptalk is a proof of concept project created by developers Richard Ortega, Michael Girdley, and Ryan Taner at AngelHack Austin last weekend.
“Peptalk is essentially a personalized data alarm call,” said Ortega.
After logging into your Google Account, the app pulls your information — particularly from the Google calendar — to create a personalized wake-up call which summarizes your schedule for that day. In concept, the information would then be sent to a voice actor who records a motivating wake-up call which you will hear the next morning.
In the concept demo, the user simply selected a time, a specific day, and the personality they wanted to call them.
The Peptalk team is still working on recruiting the talent or personalities to make the motivational calls. Ortega is looking forward to the different options he can create to motivate people to get up, go to the gym, etc.

InnerAlly

Another app created at AngelHack Austin, InnerAlly is the brainchild of HEALTH eDesigns CEO Cynthia Phelps and among the first of the company’s mobile apps designed to improve mental health and wellness. Currently for Android, the app is being produced with the help of Geekdom developer Tex Morgan.
“You can’t really buy happiness or sobriety, but with InnerAlly we can help you build it,” said Morgan.
InterAlly provides a virtual mental health check-in for recovering addicts to help them overcome the daily bouts of depression and self loathing caused by their condition. Once a day the app will buzz, and then prompt its users to input how happy or sad they feel and how positive or negative their day has been. The user can then select how they are doing overall from four prompts that range from “Sober and doing awesome” to “Off track”. Each option will provide a solution to help with their current situation. Selecting “Off track”, for example, will prompt then to call a sponsor or mentor for help.
To help prevent addiction relapses, the app will have a function where users can record any triggers or situations that contributed to a past relapse so the person can avoid those triggers in the future.
Additionally, InnerAlly will keep track of all user input in a database for several possible future uses. Phelps plans to create a system where users can allow third parties to access the database in order to connect them with a support network. This function could be used by psychiatrists, therapists, or AA sponsors to monitor a users mental health every day without being physically present. It could also act as a reference for health professionals to track progress over time.
Tex Morgan sees several other applications for the product as well, such as monitoring people on probation or monitoring employees that are on a mandatory sobriety plan. While the app still has a long way to go to before it’s completed, the core concepts and database backend are already in place.
HEALTH eDesigns is currently looking for an iOS programmer as well as design help.

Akimbo Card

The Akimbo Card is a Visa debit card system that allows primary account holders to easily and quickly transfer funds to other Akimbo users. CEO Houston Frost created the card so that family, friends, or frequent business associates could exchange funds in the quickest way possible.
“The question is: How could you get money to that son, that daughter, that good friend, or whoever it may be who needs the money right then and right away,” said Frost.
After transferring funds to an Akimbo account, primary card holders can then quickly transfer funds between different cards on the account from an iPhone app or online. Transfers have several different options that allow for both one-time payments and monthly allowances. Cardholders can also transfer funds to other Akimbo primary accounts, and the mobile app incorporates social networks to make the process easy between Facebook friends. The actual Akimbo accounts are held by Bancorp Bank, which Akimbo partners with.
The Akimbo business model mainly relies on interchange revenue – the small fees paid by banks for card transaction. It will also get money from ATM fees that apply when using the card. The card currently has no monthly or startup fee, but Akimbo may charge users for additional cards on an account.
Akimbo is currently looking for someone with design experience.

Freescale Semiconductor announced it will be sponsoring the Austin Marathon and Half Marathon, replacing Livestrong.
The Austin Marathon organization broke ties earlier this year with Livestrong, the cancer charity founded by Cyclist Lance Armstrong in 1997. Armstrong resigned from the board last year amid allegations of a doping scandal involving his Tour de France titles.
Now Freescale, with 4,000 employees in the Austin area, will be the prime sponsor of the Austin Marathon and Half Marathon which will take place on Sunday, Feb. 16. Freescale had previously sponsored the event.
Proceeds from the race will go to the “newly created Freescale Foundation for science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) education initiatives.”
Since its founding 22 years ago, the Austin Marathon and Half Marathon have raised more than $75 million dollars for the city’s economy and generated an additional $5 million for local nonprofit organizations.
“Freescale and the Austin Marathon are Austin’s original power couple — and together we’re bringing the race back home,” Gregg Lowe, president and CEO of Freescale, said in a news release. “We are committed to the Austin community and we plan to leverage the marathon and Freescale Foundation to inspire students to pursue STEM-related careers. Freescale wants this race to be a catalyst for the next generation of innovators and scientists.”

Innovative Computing Systems, based in Los Angeles, announced it is opening an Austin office on July 1st.
The company, which provides technology services to law firms and legal departments, already has three offices in the Los Angeles area.
ICS, founded in 1989, is now venturing outside of California with the creation of a Texas regional headquarters that will provide “Managed Help Desk Support” and other technology needs for its customers.
Austin’s growing base of technology companies convinced ICS to open the Austin office.
“ICS has experienced rapid growth in the California legal market in recent years and is ideally situated to expand into other markets,” CEO Michael Kemps said in a news release. “We believe Austin is the perfect choice for a new regional location for many reasons. The business climate there is terrific, particularly for technology services companies like ours, and there is a deep pool of highly educated talent. We look forward to serving the legal market in Texas and beyond and are confident that the reputation we have built in California will follow wherever our growth takes us.’
ICS’ Austin office wil be located at 3101 Bee Caves Road, Suite 305.

Microchip Technology, with offices in Austin and Chandler, Arizona, announced today the acquisition of Novocell Semiconductor.
The acquisition was announced today at the 2013 Design Automation conference in Austin.
Both board of directors of each firm have approved the deal. The terms of the deal, which is expected to close this month, were not announced.
“We are pleased to announce the acquisition of Novocell and are expecting great things as we integrate the technology into our ever-expanding portfolio of IP solutions,” Mark Reiten, vice president of Technology Licensing for SST, a wholly owned subsidiary of Microchip, said in a news release. “This acquisition provides our customers with valuable and differentiated technology and helps us to enable their designs with an even more comprehensive set of solutions, expanding our position as a leading memory IP supplier.”
When the deal closes, Novocell, which is based in Hermitage, Pennsylvania, will become a wholly owned subsidiary of SST, a Microchip company based in San Jose.

Jason Cohen founded WPEngine because his A Smart Bear blog kept crashing whenever he wrote a popular post.
He looked around for a reliable hosting site, but he couldn’t find one.
So he thought why not create one?
Voilà! WP Engine was born.
Cohen, who has founded four startups and sold two, founded the specialized WordPress hosting site in July of 2010 at Capital Factory, the downtown Austin coworking site.
But now Cohen said the startup, which has 50 employees and is hiring five to six new employees every month, has outgrown the space and is moving to 15,000 square feet of space in August. WP Engine also has four employees at a satellite office in San Francisco.
The new office is at 504 Lavaca, Cohen said during a recent interview at WordPress Camp 2013.
WP Engine now has more than 30,000 customers including Wells Fargo, Williams-Sonoma, Constant Contact and Pottery Barn.
In late 2011, WP Engine raised $1.2 million led by Silverton Partners and angel investors including Eric Ries, Bill Boebel, and others. The parent company of WordPress also invested in the company.
Money has not limited the company’s growth, Cohen said. The company’s ability to grow and provide good customer support has been the biggest challenge, he said.
“Our support is everything,” he said.
While web hosting sites like DreamHost, BlueHost and Go Daddy are cheaper than WP Engine, the site distinguishes itself by offering superior customer service, Cohen said. WP Engine is also four times faster than regular Websites, he said.
A few months ago, WP Engine had some trouble with fulfilling its customer service promises. A customer’s ticket for service usually took less than a day to resolve and soon it was stretching to two or three days. Customers were not happy. WP Engine had to retool to solve the problem. Simply hiring more people was not the answer, Cohen said. The company had to hire for fit and not comprise its culture to growth, he said. They worked crazy hours and eventually solved the problem. They’ve since scaled back some of their marketing initiatives to deal with the growth, Cohen said.
“The goal is BBNW – Bigger But Not Worse,” Cohen said. He said he borrowed the mantra from Chuck Gordon, co-founder of SpareFoot, another fast growing Austin startup.

In a post on Startup Digest, Damon Clinkscales, organizer of AngelHack Austin, announced PeerLearn, a peer-to-peer learning platform accessible via the Web or a mobile phone, won the weekend hacking competition.
At the first AngelHack held at Mass Relevance’s headquarters in downtown Austin, teams and individuals started working on projects at 9 a.m. on Saturday and continued until Sunday afternoon.
They produced a “wide variety of hacks, focused on mobile, web and even some hardware solutions,” according to Clinkscales.
“While around 25 projects were submitted since the hackathon began on Saturday, the projects were narrowed down to an overall winner and a runner-up,” Clinkscales wrote. “The participants had a lot of fun and were extremely focused and determined to create something awesome this weekend. It was inspiring to be around such dedication and creativity.”
As the winner, PeerLearn will get free local mentoring and a trip to San Francisco to attend TechCrunch Disrupt. The second place finisher was Starbox, a photobooth for retailers that uses a Kinect tracking device.
The judges for the event included Jason Seats with TechStars Austin, Gordon Daugherty with Capital Factory Accelerator, Josh Kerr, CEO of Written, Sam Decker, CEO and Founder of Mass Relevance and Chris Dunn, Central Texas Angel Network investor and Founder of Emini Academy.