Handshake Media, Incorporated is a communications technology company specializing in public relations and mobile technologies to generate market awareness and market action for its business-to-business and business-to-consumer clients. Handshake Media creates both the method and the message to achieve meaningful connection and strategic results for corporations, organizations and enterprises seeking global reach for their products and services. Handshake Media, Incorporated is based in Blacksburg, Virginia, USA and is a member of the VT KnowledgeWorks Global Partnership. Handshake(R) mobile applications are produced and developed by Handshake Media, Incorporated.
VT KnowledgeWorks encourages and enables creative entrepreneurship world-wide, through innovative curriculum, local business resource centers, and a global network of cooperating regions, all focused on three essential contributors to success: clear understanding of fundamental business principles; access to timely, relevant information; and meaningful personal and corporate relationships. It is a subsidiary of the Virginia Tech Foundation, funded through the continuing confidence and enthusiasm of its clients, sponsors and friends, both corporate and individual. Its world headquarters are located in the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center in Blacksburg, Virginia, USA.
We are starting to sign up host families for our 2012 VT KnowledgeWorks Global Partnership Week, August 19-25, 2012. We hope you will consider the opportunity to participate in this global event!
We already have student teams who will attend from Tech University of Malaysia, Tongji University, China, Telcom SudParis, France, University of Trento, Italy, University of Kent, England, Vienna University of Technology, Austria, and Pontifical Catholic University of Chile. We are in discussion with more universities about their participation and expect even more attendees than last year!
If you are able to commit to being a host family at this time, we would appreciate hearing back from you at your earliest convenience. For more information about being a host family, please contact me at leversole@vtknowledgeworks.com.
VT KnowledgeWorks encourages and enables creative entrepreneurship world-wide, through innovative curriculum, local business resource centers, and a global network of cooperating regions, all focused on three essential contributors to success: clear understanding of fundamental business principles; access to timely, relevant information; and meaningful personal and corporate relationships. It is a subsidiary of the Virginia Tech Foundation, funded through the continuing confidence and enthusiasm of its clients, sponsors and friends, both corporate and individual. Its world headquarters is in the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center in Blacksburg, Virginia, USA.
You're invited to keep in-the-know about VT KnowledgeWorks on Facebook and Twitter.
VT KnowledgeWorks Executive Director Jim Flowers will hold open office hours on the Virginia Tech campus in Blacksburg, Virginia for informal chats with prospective entrepreneurs. If you have notions about starting a business, or know of anyone with similar ambitions to bring along, you're invited to meet and talk with Jim.
If you can't make it then, Jim will also hold open office hours at ICTAS at these times:
Tuesday, February 14, 10-12
Wednesday, February 29, 3-5
Tuesday, March 13, 10-12
Wednesday, March 28, 3-5
Tuesday, April 10, 10-12
Wednesday, April 25, 3-5
Use this link to see available times and to schedule your session.
You can schedule a free personal visit with Jim Flowers at the VT KnowledgeWorks headquarters in the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center. Contact Christine Spalding, Member Services Coordinator, to make an appointment, christine.spalding@vtknowledgeworks.com, 540-443-9100.
VT KnowledgeWorks encourages and enables creative entrepreneurship world-wide, through innovative curriculum, local business resource centers, and a global network of cooperating regions, all focused on three essential contributors to success: clear understanding of fundamental business principles; access to timely, relevant information; and meaningful personal and corporate relationships. It is a subsidiary of the Virginia Tech Foundation, funded through the continuing confidence and enthusiasm of its clients, sponsors and friends, both corporate and individual. Its world headquarters is in the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center in Blacksburg, Virginia, USA.
You're invited to keep up with VT KnowledgeWorks on Facebook and Twitter.
Inform. Provide high quality relevant information concerning the business environment and strategy to people at every level.
Involve. Involve others in big issues. Coach high potential managers to lead. Involve managers in the company’s strategic goals.
Structure. Create and use teams. Reduce differences between levels. Support integration of middle managers to improve coordination.
Reward. Recognize success regularly, even small progress steps.
Create New Thinking. Challenge old assumptions. Provoke new conversations. Create dialogue to deepen understanding.
Encourage. Listen and support. Understand obstacles. Establish “can do” expectations.
Accentuate Positive Potential. Look for potential. Emphasize strengths and talents. Focus on high performers.
Focus on Solutions. Focus employees on co-creating solutions to business challenges.
Think Long-Term. Articulate Short-Term. Articulate short-term and long-term goals and strategies.
Get Personal. Increase the frequency and quality of times when employees can engage with leadership personally.
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WilderWeber Leadership Group is a business consulting firm dedicated to helping leaders build sustainable advantage by facilitating change initiatives that deliver competitive marketplace focus and amplify organizational effectiveness.
VT KnowledgeWorksencourages and enables creative entrepreneurship world-wide, through innovative curriculum, local business resource centers, and a global network of cooperating regions, all focused on three essential contributors to success: clear understanding of fundamental business principles; access to timely, relevant information; and meaningful personal and corporate relationships. It is a subsidiary of the Virginia Tech Foundation, funded through the continuing confidence and enthusiasm of its clients, sponsors and friends, both corporate and individual. Its world headquarters are located in the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center in Blacksburg, Virginia, USA.
Despite their similar names, JavaScript is not to be confused with the Java programming language. However, it is helpful to think of JavaScript as an object-oriented language, just like Java. "Thinking object-oriented" allows for the encapsulation of data within objects as well as functions and methods to interact with individual objects.
"Thinking object-oriented" also allows for easier management of the various aspects of graphical user interfaces (GUIs), including those within mobile apps. Buttons, tabs, text fields and windows all have different purposes and perform separate tasks and, therefore, can be thought of as separate objects. Being part of a GUI, they are all designed to be interacted with and the use of various methods and functions makes this interaction possible.
Titanium Appcelerator’s modular approach to the design process makes the development of apps with their software much more object-oriented. It provides users with numerous application programming interfaces (APIs) that contain many of the common components for GUI implementation, both desktop and mobile. These APIs enable the metaphorical Dr. Seuss magic to occur when developing mobile apps. They transform the JavaScript written by the programmers into separate code for the two operating systems, or should I say they transform the Plain-Belly Sneetches into those with “stars upon thars.”
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Handshake Media, Incorporated is a communications company specializing in public relations and mobile technologies to generate market awareness and market action for its businesses-to-business and business-to-consumer clients. Handshake Media creates both the method and the message to achieve meaningful engagement and conversation for corporations, organizations and enterprises seeking global reach for their products and services. Handshake Media, Incorporated is based in Blacksburg, Virginia, USA and is a member of the VT KnowledgeWorks Global Partnership. Handshake(R) mobile applications are produced and developed by Handshake Media, Incorporated.
VT KnowledgeWorks encourages and enables creative entrepreneurship world-wide, through innovative curriculum, local business resource centers, and a global network of cooperating regions, all focused on three essential contributors to success: clear understanding of fundamental business principles; access to timely, relevant information; and meaningful personal and corporate relationships. It is a subsidiary of the Virginia Tech Foundation, funded through the continuing confidence and enthusiasm of its clients, sponsors and friends, both corporate and individual. Its world headquarters are located in the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center in Blacksburg, Virginia, USA.
Workspace in the JumpStart Community in the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center for a year
The objectives of the competition are to encourage prospective technology entrepreneurs to test their business concepts, and enhance their understanding of requirements for a successful business venture.
Registration is $25 and due by midnight of February 10, 2012.
VT KnowledgeWorks encourages and enables creative entrepreneurship world-wide, through innovative curriculum, local business resource centers, and a global network of cooperating regions, all focused on three essential contributors to success: clear understanding of fundamental business principles; access to timely, relevant information; and meaningful personal and corporate relationships. It is a subsidiary of the Virginia Tech Foundation, funded through the continuing confidence and enthusiasm of its clients, sponsors and friends, both corporate and individual. Its world headquarters are located in the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center in Blacksburg, Virginia, USA.
New employee Chris Turnbull came from the World Bank, where he traveled to global hot spots. He was featured in Valley Business FRONT (December, 2011 issue, Dan Smith's column).
President and owner Thomas Becher is a recognized expert in communicating aviation.
Counts among its clients a Fortune 500 company, a global cargo airline, and Virginia’s largest retirement community.
VT KnowledgeWorks encourages and enables creative entrepreneurship world-wide, through innovative curriculum, local business resource centers, and a global network of cooperating regions, all focused on three essential contributors to success: clear understanding of fundamental business principles; access to timely, relevant information; and meaningful personal and corporate relationships. It is a subsidiary of the Virginia Tech Foundation, funded through the continuing confidence and enthusiasm of its clients, sponsors and friends, both corporate and individual. Its world headquarters are located in the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center in Blacksburg, Virginia, USA.
A version of this post first appeared on Handshake 2.0.
SmartCollegeVisit is an award-winning college-search and travel planning resource that works with college and university admissions offices to provide efficient on-line and mobile products for college-bound students and their families.
hosts a weekly chat on Twitter called #CampusChat.
was invited by President Obama's Chief Technology Officer, Aneesh Chopra, to attend a Whitehouse Mashup: The Convening on Consumer Information in Higher Education in September, 2011.
is listed in the Top 100 Education Advice Blogs by College Scholarships.
is listed in The Top 50 College Info Web Sites by Parents Countdown to College.
is founded by someone whose last name means "cheese."
VT KnowledgeWorks encourages and enables creative entrepreneurship world-wide, through innovative curriculum, local business resource centers, and a global network of cooperating regions, all focused on three essential contributors to success: clear understanding of fundamental business principles; access to timely, relevant information; and meaningful personal and corporate relationships. It is a subsidiary of the Virginia Tech Foundation, funded through the continuing confidence and enthusiasm of its clients, sponsors and friends, both corporate and individual. Its world headquarters are located in the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center in Blacksburg, Virginia, USA.
In the early days of doing business in 2012, we're not asking as we did in 2009, "Have you Googled yourself?" but stating what savvy business people think to themselves after that first word-of-mouth (WOM) referral or that first handshake of introduction: "I will Google you."
In the physical world of business, "It's who you know" begins introductory handshakes that can lead to handshakes on deals.
In the online world of business, "It's still who you know" begins a knowledge-based consideration of a handshake. But how to get known? We founded Handshake 2.0 with "It's still who you know" as a tagline to assist good companies in sharing good information about their good companies to help them get known well.
We may need to change Handshake 2.0's tagline to this: "It's still who you know - and it's what they know."
If someone in my "It's who you know" network introduces me to you for that introductory handshake and the first impression was a good one, I will return to my office and Google you.
I will Google your name, your company's name, your name + your company's name, your company's name + your industry, etc.
Why am I using Google to get to "know" you? Two reasons.
1) I want to decrease business risk.
I want to see what's online about you to learn that you are who you say you are, that your company truly exists, and that what you say about yourself and what others say about you match my impression. The more due diligence-based trust I can place in you and your corporate practices, the less risk I take.
2) I want to increase competitive advantage.
I am finding Shoshana Zuboff's assertion in The Support Economy to be increasingly true: there are two economies, one in the physical world, one online, and my company needs to operate strategically in both. I Google you to learn that your company is operating competitively in its industry both online and off. I want to learn that doing business with your company would be good for my company.
When I find your company's site, I'm glad to see Twitter and Facebook icons, but I click or tap through to see how active you are in social media. I look for the quantity and quality of your activity. My company needs your company to be participating in "both economies." If you're not competitive in one whole economy, that makes doing business with you less advantageous than doing business with someone who is competitive in both.
Handshake 2.0 is an enterprise of Handshake Media, Incorporated and as Handshake Media's representative, I will be extending handshakes of greeting in both the physical and online worlds of business in 2012. I look forward to meeting you. I will return to my office later and Google you. If we're at a business luncheon and the meeting is boring, with my smartphone, I won't wait. Within minutes of meeting you, I'll be Googling you.
Handshake Media, Incorporated is a communications company specializing in public relations and mobile technologies to generate market awareness and market action for its businesses-to-business and business-to-consumer clients. Handshake Media creates both the method and the message to achieve meaningful engagement and conversation for corporations, organizations and enterprises seeking global reach for their products and services. Handshake Media, Incorporated is based in Blacksburg, Virginia, USA and is a member of the VT KnowledgeWorks Global Partnership. Handshake(R) mobile applications are produced and developed by Handshake Media, Incorporated.
VT KnowledgeWorks encourages and enables creative entrepreneurship world-wide, through innovative curriculum, local business resource centers, and a global network of cooperating regions, all focused on three essential contributors to success: clear understanding of fundamental business principles; access to timely, relevant information; and meaningful personal and corporate relationships. It is a subsidiary of the Virginia Tech Foundation, funded through the continuing confidence and enthusiasm of its clients, sponsors and friends, both corporate and individual. Its world headquarters are located in the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center in Blacksburg, Virginia, USA.
VT KnowledgeWorks encourages and enables creative entrepreneurship world-wide, through innovative curriculum, local business resource centers, and a global network of cooperating regions, all focused on three essential contributors to success: clear understanding of fundamental business principles; access to timely, relevant information; and meaningful personal and corporate relationships. It is a subsidiary of the Virginia Tech Foundation, funded through the continuing confidence and enthusiasm of its clients, sponsors and friends, both corporate and individual. Its world headquarters are located in the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center in Blacksburg, Virginia, USA.
Overview of Company’s Products/Services, and Significance to the Market
TORC changes the way mobile robotic systems are designed, integrated, tested and deployed by empowering engineers with a suite of modular, customizable products. TORC’s Robotic Building Blocks product line is used by leading academic, commercial and government organizations to shorten the development process, lower costs and mitigate risks. These products have been used on more than 100 mobile robots ranging from 15 pounds to 15 tons. TORC provides by-wire and autonomous vehicle kits, as well as individual products and custom solutions for drive-by-wire conversion, emergency stop, power management, autonomous navigation and operator control.
Traditionally, engineers have relied on products that were not intended for use in robotic applications. This approach created system integration problems, escalating development costs, poor reliability, and limited performance. As a result, robotics technologies have struggled to transition out of research laboratories to real-world applications. TORC helps solve these problems with a line of safe, reliable, and customizable products specifically designed for engineers of robotic systems.
This product-based approach has enabled customers to accelerate their development efforts, stay focused on solving their problems or developing new technologies, and reduce overall project costs. From developing cars that enable the blind to drive to autonomous ground vehicles that lighten the load of our Warfighters, TORC products are used in a wide variety of robotic systems.
Company Accomplishments
Since entering the VT KnowledgeWorks program in 2006, TORC has grown significantly in revenues, employees, office space and market presence. Originally a two person operation working on small research contracts, TORC has quickly become a leading provider of unmanned and autonomous vehicle technologies. TORC continues to grow year over year, attract and retain a high caliber workforce in the region, and provide excellent internship opportunities for a number of engineering students from Virginia Tech each year.
In 2007, TORC partnered with Virginia Tech in the DARPA Urban Challenge and led the software development that allowed Odin, the team’s fully autonomous Ford Escape Hybrid, to navigate complex urban traffic situations without human intervention. Odin finished the 60-mile race in third place, minutes behind teams from Stanford and Carnegie Mellon. The team was awarded the 2008 Graphical System Design Achievement Award in Robotics from National Instruments for the use of their LabVIEW graphical programming environment in the development of the award-winning autonomous vehicle.
Since its success in the DARPA Urban Challenge, TORC has been engaged in a growing number of contracts to transition unmanned and autonomous vehicle technologies to commercial and military applications. One of the more prominent examples has been the Ground Unmanned Support Surrogate (GUSS) project for the Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory. TORC’s product line and engineering services were used in the development of four optionally unmanned ground vehicles designed to support dismounted Marines with missions such as autonomous resupply, casualty evacuation, and to “lighten the load,” among other capabilities.
In 2008, TORC won the prestigious Roanoke-Blacksburg Technology Council (formerly NewVa Corridor Technology Council) “Rising Star Award” in recognition of its growth, cutting edge products and services and its current and future impact on the local economy. In the same year, TORC was also nominated and selected as the winner of the 2008 Donna Noble Outstanding Virginia Incubator Client Award.
In early 2010 Virginia Tech’s Robotics and Mechanisms Laboratory (RoMeLa) partnered with TORC to provide its ByWire XGV mobile robotics research platform, along with other sensing, perception and route planning technologies, to integrate with RoMeLa’s non-visual interfaces for the National Federation of the Blind’s Blind Driver Challenge®. This allowed for the first full-sized blind drivable vehicle to be demonstrated on January 29, 2011, when a blind driver successfully navigated 1.5 miles of the Daytona International Speedway, reaching top speeds of 27 mph and navigating obstacles. This effort resulted in major media coverage including the Today Show, MotorWeek, Bloomberg, Anderson Cooper 360, Popular Science magazine and more. This was recently written up in an article by Mashable titled “7 Tech Breakthroughs That Empower People With Disabilities.”
Over the last few years, TORC has been selected to participate in several programs sponsored by the Virginia Economic Development Partnership designed to help promising Virginia-based companies increase export sales and expand into international markets. In 2009 TORC was nominated to participate in the year long “Accessing International Markets” program and was recently selected as one of a small number of Virginia companies for the 2011-2012 “State Trade Export Promotion” initiative.
TORC has a strong record of commercializing robotic technologies into products. Through a balance between work with the DoD, industry and internal research and development, TORC has commercialized eight robotic products over the last four years and are used on platforms ranging from 15 lbs to 15 tons, from speeds of 1 mph to 102 mph, and by customers in defense, mining, automotive, agriculture, security and academic markets. The TORC product line provides modular, interoperable and scalable “Robotic Building Blocks” to rapidly upfit platforms with unmanned and/or autonomous capability.
