Innovation in Paradise: The Beautiful, the Effective, and the Frustrating

Innovation in Paradise: The Beautiful, the Effective, and the Frustrating

MC: Doug Klein

Speakers: A Panel of Innovators & Patent Holders

Panelists: Jay Silver, Bathsheba Grossman, Susan Cannon

Audience: Welcome to all Innovators & Patent holders

Abstract: A panel of accomplished Santa Cruz innovators discuss the joys of, and impediments to, starting and dramatically growing a creative business in Santa Cruz.

A celebration of innovation in Santa Cruz, based upon he Sentinel article by Jondi Gumz, “Santa Cruz County 5th in nation for patentsper 1000 employees.”

Jay Silver Founded JoyLabz last year leading with an invention kit called "MaKey MaKey" kickstarted at $1/2M. He is inspired by the Maker Movement and works as a Maker Research Scientist at Intel Labs. He made many creative platforms such as Drawdio, Scratch, and Singing Fingers. Jay spoke at TEDx Santa Cruz about his MIT Media Lab thesis topic, which is "The World is a Construction Kit."

Susan Cannon’s contribution to innovation include many firsts: the first media distribution system for purchasing protected music over the Internet (Liquid Audio), the first home banking application running on a handheld device (General Magic), and the first dual-factor authentication on a USB flash drive (SanDisk). She is active in her local community, has served on several non-profit boards, and is pursuing ways social entrepreneurialism and crowd sourcing can “make a difference” in the world. I look forward to contributing to this effort!

Doug Klein is Accessibility Lead at Nook Media (Barnes & Noble) and a serial entrepreneur with over 25 years of startup experience. He has been the founder and executive management at 5 Silicon Valley startups, delivering products as diverse as network terminals (Network Computing Devices), electronic books (NuvoMedia, Barnes & Noble), network security systems (Vernier Networks), and mobile consumer applications and services (LightPole, Inc). He currently serves on the advisory board of several technology startups, and serves as an executive mentor in several local forums.