News

July 9, 2020

Luminate startups to make pitches before global audience this year

Via the Rochester Business Journal
July 8, 2020

A Rochester-based accelerator program focused on helping entrepreneurs bring their optics, photonics and imaging-enabled technologies to market has partnered with a well known industry event that will allow the startups to share their business ideas with an international audience.

The 10 companies currently working with Luminate will discuss their business ventures, and compete for additional funds, at the OSA Frontiers in Optics + Laser Science APS/DLS, which will be held Sept. 14 through 17.

Normally an in-person conference, the program has changed this year to an all virtual web-conference format due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Sujatha Ramanujan, Luminate’s managing director, says the platform is ideal for the companies affiliated with Luminate.

“Holding our finals pitch event during OSA’s conference provides a global stage for our cohort companies at an internationally recognized annual event,” Ramanujan says. “This improved visibility could introduce our companies to potential partners, investors and customers to help further accelerate their growth, and the commercialization and availability of new technologies in the market.”

Luminate is a $25 million, five-year program funded by Empire State Development’s Finger Lakes Forward Initiative. The program is administered by NextCorps, a nonprofit catalyst for entrepreneurship in the region, and supported by a host of participating partners.

Accepted companies take part in the six month intensive accelerator program that brings in outside experts, industry leaders, and its advisory board to help scale startups working in the fields of optics, photonics and imaging-enabled technologies.

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June 12, 2020

Team Kilo develops lighting technology to aid stabilization and growth of NICU babies

Via the Rochester Business Journal
June 12, 2020

Kilo Medical Solutions is a medical startup that developed a product that can be hooked up to incubators to control lighting for infants in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU). The technology is called Brise-Solette, and it consists of a system of films used to imitate a womb-like optical environment to improve the health of babies born prematurely, while preventing them from being exposed to bright lights in the NICU.

The company, based in Richmond, Va., is one of 10 finalist companies in the optics, imaging and photonics industry selected to work within the Luminate NY accelerator. The $25 million accelerator program — which is funded by the Finger Lakes Forward Up- state Revitalization Initiative and administered by NextCorps — provides each finalist with an immediate investment of $100,000 and months of support to heighten the speed of the commercialization of their technologies and businesses. On Demo Day in September, the startups will compete for up to $2 million in follow-on funding.

“Light can be a tremendous resource within health care settings, dramatically impacting the treatment and outcomes of patients. Kilo Medical Solutions is harnessing this potential to solve a very real problem in neonatal care,” said Sujatha Ramanujan, managing director of Luminate. “Our region, with its extensive universities, hospital systems and photonics cluster provides startups such as Kilo with an ecosystem to rapidly develop, test and iterate light-focused technologies that can save lives.”

In the U.S., one in 10 babies is born prematurely. Currently, fabric covers are used to control light conditions for babes in the NICU, but the fabric covers pose safety and sanitary issues that make it difficult for infants to establish their circadian rhythm, gain weight and stabilize vitals.

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June 10, 2020

Haqean tackles sales of counterfeit and pirated goods

Via the Rochester Business Journal
June 10, 2020

Haqean is a security startup that is in the process of developing an on-demand quantum entropy solution to address the sales of counterfeit and pirated items to combat fraud and infringement issues. In 2018 counterfeiting was the largest criminal enterprise in the world, with sales of counterfeit and pirated goods totaling $1.7 trillion per year. The crisis has major consequences; reputable companies were projected to lose 5.4 million jobs by 2020.

Based in Bangalore, India, Haqean is one of 10 finalist companies with optics, imaging and photonics-enabled technologies working inside the Luminate NY accelerator. The $25 million accelerator program, which is fund- ed by the Finger Lakes Forward Upstate Revitalization Initiative and administered by NextCorps, provides each finalist with an immediate investment of $100,000 and months of support to speed the commercialization of their technologies and businesses. On Demo Day in September, they will compete for up to $2 million in follow-on funding.

“Quantum technologies have many promising applications, with those in cybersecurity predicted to be avail- able first,” said Sujatha Ramanujan, managing director of Luminate. “Haqean’s mission to address theft on a global level is rooted in a novel approach that could have a significant impact on our trade system.”

Random numbers are the basis of information security and are essential to encryption, but if a third party can reproduce the randomness used, they can reproduce the keys and crack the encryption. Haqean’s mission is to protect classified data with enhanced security, delivering seamless encryption of data using a single photon source based technology. This gives them an upper hand in generating truly random numbers using quantum physics with virtually no bias.

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June 9, 2020

ExPrimary’s health care technology aims to impact ‘every human’

Via the Rochester Business Journal
June 3, 2020

Advancing personalized health care is the mission of ExPrimary, a startup company in NextCorps’ Luminate NY program. By improving access to bioanalytical tools and information, ExPrimary strives to help consumers identify and catch diseases at an earlier, more treatable stage.

ExPrimary is one of 10 finalist companies with optics, imaging and photonics-enabled technologies working inside the Luminate NY accelerator. The $25 million program, which is funded by the Finger Lakes Forward Upstate Revitalization Initiative, provides each finalist with an immediate investment of $100,000 and months of support to speed the commercialization of their technologies and businesses. On Demo Day in September, they will compete for up to $2 million in follow-on funding.

“Health care is changing at a rapid pace as more innovative products and methodologies become available. But the process of moving these innovations out of the lab into trials and then through regulatory procedures before commercialization can even take place can be daunting,” said Sujatha Ramanujan, managing director of Luminate. “We’re working with healthcare startups like ExPrimary to help them accelerate their pace and foster the partnerships critical to advancing their mission. Many of these rich resources reside here in the Finger Lakes region with our medical and research universities, benchmark hospital systems and manufacturers that specialize in opto-photonics and electronics.”

ExPrimary is developing a suite of high performing bioanalytical instrumentation as well as state-of-the-art assay content at a less costly rate compared with existing products on the market. The product uses an iOS mobile operating system, which is a critical reason for an expected three- to five-fold expansion of a $30 billion market.

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May 26, 2020

AkknaTek finds safer methods for using high-end intraocular lenses

Via the Rochester Business Journal
May 26, 2020

AkknaTek, a German-based startup company, offers innovative solutions for ophthalmology, specializing in cataract surgery. AkknaTek is one of 10 finalist companies with optics imaging, and photonics-enabled technologies in the Luminate NY accelerator program.

Patients suffering from cataract disease can often achieve better vision through premium artificial lenses, but surgeons tend to be reluctant to go that route because of unpredictable postoperative refractive surprises. AkknaTek’s Lens Reviewer overcomes the challenge of implanting premium lenses by correcting the lens centration after implantation.

Founder and co-CEO Edgar Janunts and his team have created a diagnostic system that includes an alignment joystick, an optical imaging system and an embedded computer. A series of images are created while a patient fixates on a green light. The built-in analysis software then calculates the intraocular lens (IOL) dislocation. AkknaTek technology allows for a non-contact method of obtaining measurements.

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May 18, 2020

Sknow detects weak snow layers to protect skiers from deadly avalanches

Via the Rochester Business Journal
May 18, 2020

Norwegian geo analytics company, Think Outside, has developed a product called Sknow, which provides deeper insight into snow conditions and protects skiers from dangerous avalanche terrain. Sknow can also be used to offer more reliable insights about the quality of water in the mountains. Think Outside is one of the 10 finalists in optics/photonics accelerator Luminate NY’s third cohort.

Sknow is aimed at reducing avalanche accidents and deaths, while simultaneously improving knowledge and sharing about the snowpack. The Sknow device attaches to a ski to read snow layers, GPS position and skiers’ performance metrics to alert the user if a weak snow layer has been detected.

For every step the skier makes, Sknow generates a live digital snow profile to identify weak layers as well as localized avalanched risk levels. Deborah Karlsen, Think Outside’s co-founder, offers more insight to Sknow technology.

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May 12, 2020

SunDensity’s Photonic Smart Coating improves energy efficiency

Via the Rochester Business Journal
May 12, 2020

Boston-based SunDensity has produced groundbreaking Photonic Smart Coating (PSC) technology to double the energy efficiency for products like digital cameras and solar cells. SunDensity is an optics/photonics company in Luminate NY’s third cohort.

“SunDensity’s ability to tap the unique resources that exist in the Finger Lakes region has really helped the company accelerate their development,” said Sujatha Ramanujan, managing director of Luminate. “They are a prime example of how new partnerships can be critical to speeding the commercialization of more energy efficient materials that will have a significant impact on multiple industries and our environment.”

SunDensity’s photo-electric devices convert light into electricity. Currently, 85 percent of light energy is wasted because the materials within photo-electric devices more efficiently use invisible infrared light, therefore most visible light is not used. Nishikant Sonwalkar, SunDensity’s president and CEO, discusses how PSC greatly improves energy efficiency by converting the wasted visible light into infrared light.

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May 11, 2020

Spotlight on ExPrimary: Improving Access to Bioanalytical Tools

Most people only see their doctor once a year, contributing to a lack of data points and ultimately a reactive approach to disease. ExPrimary, Inc., a Luminate cohort III startup, is miniaturizing bioanalytical tools to bring them closer to the individual. With more accessible tools and testing comes more data points, which increases the ability to identify trends and catch diseases at an earlier, more treatable stage.

Luminate Technology Program Manager, Damon Diehl, PhD, spoke with ExPrimary President and CEO, Sean Higgins, PhD, about how his startup’s work will help usher in more preventative healthcare.

Learn more about ExPrimary at exprimary.com.

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May 7, 2020

How to Construct a Compelling Grant Proposal

This article originally appeared in the October-December 2019 issue of SPIE Professional.
By Damon Diehl, PhD, Technology Program Manager at Luminate

Whether pursuing a career in academia or industry, a researcher’s success and autonomy hinges upon skillfully crafted funding proposals.

Grant reviewers look for answers to six questions when appraising a proposal:

a) What is the problem the team wants to solve?
b) Why is that problem critical to the funding agency’s mission?
c) What solution does the team propose?
d) What is the team’s plan to implement or test its proposed solution?
e) Why is the team qualified to implement its plan?
f) How can the funding agency contribute to the project’s success?

The most common mistake researchers make is spending too much time answering questions c and f but not enough time answering questions b and d. To ensure that a proposal completely answers those six questions, follow this ten-step process:

1) Highlight critical elements within the funding agency’s request for proposal (RFP). Identify everything in the RFP that is a priority for this specific funding opportunity. Some project requirements are expressed directly, but some must be inferred. For example, the agency may mention the importance of undergraduate participation but not mention it in the list of proposal requirements.

2) Turn every highlighted element into a question. To ensure that your project completely aligns with the funding agency’s interests, create a questionnaire that addresses every highlighted point in the RFP. To extend the previous example, your list should include a question like “How will this project incorporate undergraduate participation?”

3) Develop a project proposal that answers every question. Use the questions as prompts to articulate your proposed project. Write thorough answers to every question. The more detailed you are now, the easier it will be to assemble the proposal later.

4) Call the funding agency if possible. Most RFPs include contact information for the topic author or expert. It is best to call, rather than email—a personal conversation is more efficient and establishes rapport. Explain your proposed solution and how it addresses the problem, then ask whether the project is, in proposal jargon, “responsive to the RFP.” Listen more than you talk. These conversations often reveal unwritten priorities that you should address and which will give you an advantage over other applicants.

5) Create a project plan and schedule. Create a week-by-week (or minimum month-by-month) schedule for the project. Some agencies—especially Department of Defense and NASA—expect an enumerated work breakdown structure and an annotated schedule, and some expect only an outline. Regardless of what the agency requires, the process of creating a clear schedule is an essential tool for good project management.

6) Establish a budget and cost justifications. Every RFP has different rules for format, content, cost considerations, etc. As a researcher, the important thing is that you review your project plan and articulate what you need, in what time frame, and why. Too often applicants delay creating the budget until last, only to discover that the scope of the project is larger than the budget.

7) Copy every answer from step 3 into the corresponding section of the proposal. Find a home for everything to ensure that nothing critical gets lost. Some answers may fit in more than one section, which is fine. Thoughtful repetition will reinforce information.

8) Make the proposal easy to skim. Create a sequence of figures that provide a high-level visual explanation of the project. For every figure, write a caption that states the conclusion the reviewer should make. Use bullets, tables, italics, and bold fonts to draw attention to important information.

9) Fill in gaps and smooth transitions. The reward for following all of the previous steps is that, in principle, the proposal, though disjointed, is now a complete and thorough rough draft. What follows is a very careful rewrite to improve clarity. Technical writing is a skill that only comes from practice, but books such as Michael Alley’s The Craft of Scientific Writing can train you to write better, faster.

10) Proofread. Grammar, spelling, and punctuation errors are distracting, and the last thing you want is a distracted reviewer. Ask someone not involved in the project to read the proposal.

Following the above process guarantees that a grant proposal will be clear, complete, and well-structured. Reviewers will quickly find answers to evaluation criteria, thus reducing the chance that something important will be overlooked. Most important, this method puts central emphasis on why the project is important to the funding agency.

Nothing guarantees a proposal’s success, but high-quality proposals always rise to the top.

Damon Diehl, PhD, is the Technology Program Manager at Luminate, the first optics-only startup incubator in the world. In addition to his grant-writing workshop, he also teaches the SPIE professional development class “The Very Least You Need to Know about Optics” and writes the corresponding blog www.vlyn2k.com.

May 6, 2020

Nordetect’s ‘Lab-on-a-Chip’ designed to improve agricultural practices

Via the Rochester Business Journal
May 6, 2020

Nordetect, a chemical analytics company based out of Copenhagen, Denmark, is another optics/photonics startup in Luminate NY’s third cohort.

The company’s mission is to bring lab-grade testing to aid farm managers and agronomists by optimizing the use of additives like fertilizer to move toward a data-driven, adaptive farm practice. Nordetect’s biochemical analysis instruments measure the levels of nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium in soil, groundwater, hydroponics and aquaponics samples. The company combines GPS-enabled soil sampling and “Lab-on-a-Chip” technology to provide a quick assessment of key nutrients in soil to give farmers fertilizer recommendations on an acre-by-acre basis.

Keenan Pinto, CEO of Nordetect, and his team make in-field chemical analysis fast and affordable with a simple system to improve agriculture safety. Nordetect’s one-click device and test kits are easy to integrate into current farm management software, giving farmers a complete overview of fertility levels.

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