Over the past year, we at BeHeron have brought you many insights into the world of entrepreneurship.

Today, we are asking for your help in creating a better website for our viewers. Due to other recent engagements, our staff at BeHeron have been struggling to provide the news and information in a quantity that we deem is necessary to be an adequate online source for inventors and entrepreneurs alike. Additionally, we are unclear if the area of news and information is interesting and helpful enough for our readers.

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Stimulus funding. Those two words are extremely simple, but can be very powerful these days. Just look at a company called Zenergy Power. They are the makers of a rather simple technology, called a fault current limiter. A fault current limiter is a device that can protect the breakers and transformers has within a circuit, and this particular product has been described as a “surge protector for the electric grid.” Zenergy CEO Woody Gibson has described the technology this way, “It absorbs like a big sponge and just soaks up that power.” They have recently been awarded $8 million in stimulus funds as part of the Department of Energy's investment into our national power grid. If you watch the video at Zenergy Power's website you will find that the technology is really not that complex. In fact, many of the recipients of stimulus funds have been small to medium sized businesses, with rather do-able technology. Just remember, each federal department has its own opportunities or deadlines, but the easiest and good place to start is your local business journal. Many business journals have listing of federal funding and application deadlines. See here for an example. Good Luck!

First, we would like to apologize for the lack of posts recently. Our more profitable ventures get in the way sometimes :) .

Getting back to our favorite job, we would like to talk to you about the MitraClip® system. This is used by interventional cardiologists to reduce mitral regurgitation (MR) in a less invasive catheter-based procedure. What is mitral regurgitation you ask? Well, according to Wikipedia, "Mitral regurgitation (MR) is a valvular heart disease also known as mitral insufficiency or mitral incompetence, is the abnormal leaking of blood through the mitral valve, from the left ventricle into the left atrium of the heart." In simpler terms, it means that the blood is flowing backwards. Not a good thing.

We don't usually talk about new medical inventions because they are often complicated to understand, and regulatory approval is beyond most inventors ability to pursue. However, one must realize that medical devises are often invented by doctors and then sold to larger medical device companies for approval and sale. This method allows "small-time" inventors to reap the benefits of medical inventions. We like the MitraClip because it is really a simple device, and it uses an existing Steerable Guide Catheter to deliver the clip. It is really something a doctor or engineer could design. And finally, it saves one from undergoing open heart surgery, which gives it the potential of really making a large profit. So watch the video below, and tell us what you think. And don't let scary regulation scare you away from medical device ideas, there are companies out there waiting to help you out!

In our investor toolkit we talk about some of the common ways for a small-time inventor to get the needed funds. One of those tools is peer-to-peer lending. We believe a great place to start is Prosper, which recently got approval from the SEC to continue lending. They provide a marketplace for individuals to provide loans to customers who have a credit score of at least 640. The site lets you research for rates, if you are a borrower, and lets you browse for investments if you are a lender. Then, they provide the infrastructure to administrate the loan. While this may seen scary to go out on your own, it really can be quite rewarding. Lenders and borrowers can get better rates than at a bank, and you can start small and choose what investments your money will go towards. You also have the ability to diversify your investment by loaning in $25 increments to multiple borrowers. So the next time you are looking for cash and find that the banks are being tight with theirs, look no further than a website called Prosper!

As inventors, we are always in the need for better materials. Often a great idea won't be thwarted by not knowing how to build something but rather materials simply not meeting the need of the inventor. One way to find the newest and most high performing materials in existence is to monitor the aerospace business, NASA in particular. Why NASA? Well they are on the cutting edge of material science, and second they usually are not bound by military secrecy like most other aerospace companies.

NASA is all to happy to fund the R&D into these materials, but really doesn't care about the commercialization side of things. Thats where we come in! One example of this is a small press release about a new high temperature composite, PETI-330. According to the release, "It is the first commercially available, off-the-shelf, high temperature resin that has processing characteristics useful for resin infusion, resin transfer molding, and the vacuum-assisted resin transfer molding manufacturing processes. The finished product of PETI-330 has the strength and high temperature properties ideal for large structures exposed to hot temperatures, offering a combination of processability, high temperature performance and toughness ideal for high performance aerospace vehicles (or perhaps your application!). PETI-330 and the vacuum process are of interest to the aerospace industry because of a combination of weight reduction and manufacturing cost savings."

Some other characteristics can be found at the manufacturer'ss website.

1. Major advancement in materials technology combining unprecedented processing characteristics with long term (1,000 hours) performance at 300
2. The combination of easy processing for composite fabrication combined with high temperature performance and toughness is unprecedented
3. Offers low (less than 10 Pa-sec, 288) and stable melt viscosity highly suited to RTM process
4. Simple and efficient 1 hour full cure process
5. High glass transition temperature 330 / 626
6. Solvent free (no volatiles)
7. Non toxic

Now we don't expect you to use this product everywhere, it is limited in its application. But the point is that there are some rather large organizations out there that can do your R&D for you. Take advantage of it!

Every once in a while it is nice to hear some good news. So here it is! In an article by the Silicon Valley Business Journal, we are told that the mood among Silicon Valley venture capitalists appears to be rising. The USF Silicon Valley Capitalist Confidence Index rose to 3.37 in the second quarter from 3.03 in the first quarter. And this might be becoming a trend. This is the second straight quarter that the index has risen. They key is that most VCs believe that the worst is behind us. The only downside is that much of the money is going to late stage start-ups. Another sign of good news is that Solyndra, Inc., a manufacturer of photovoltaic systems for commercial rooftops, has signed a long-term sales contract with another German solar integrator worth up to $238 million. They now have a backlog of over $2 Billion. If you remember, we have been following Solyndra for some time now (first in January 09 and then in May 09) due to their unique solar design. This just goes to show that green tech still is finding money if the product warrants it!

Siftables. It is a unique name for a unique invention. As described by their inventor, "Siftables are cookie-sized computers with motion sensing, neighbor detection, graphical display, and wireless communication. They act in concert to form a single interface: users physically manipulate them - piling, grouping, sorting - to interact with digital information and media. Siftables provides a new platform on which to implement tangible, visual and mobile applications."

Inventions that are completely new and unique are some of our favorites. Why? Because they can be the most challenging. Often we improve what already exists or counter a known problem. However, creating a product to overcome an unknown need is something a bit harder. These little blocks do exactly that.

Siftables are a totally new type of computer. They let the user create games, sounds, and learning tools on the fly. They let the customer create the value of the end product. Now that is unique. Can you imagine another product that allows the customer to make it more or less valuable? Not many products like this exist. The closest thing to it is the old fashioned paint brush and paper. A brush and paper allow a customer to create. In the same way micro-computers like Siftables will allow kids and adults alike to create just about anything imaginable. We predict that this technology will not only be a money making venture. But, in large way, will change the way we interact with the world around us. Don't believe us? We are willing to take bets on this one.

We told you so. On April 19th, 2009, we said that GM's Project P.U.M.A (Personal Urban Mobility and Accessibility) prototype was going to be a massive bust. Well, We guess we were right on the money. It is always nice being validated. But, it is especially nice if the validation was given by a publication such as Fortune Magazine, even if it is in a section called "Dumbest Moments in Business 2009 Midyear Edition".

"It became clear this spring that General Motors was going to have to get smaller to survive, but this was ridiculous. A week after President Obama gave the company a 60 day deadline to avoid bankruptcy, GM took time out from its turnaround efforts to unveil the PUMA, a two-seat vehicle being developed with Segway that looked more like a rickshaw than a car. The vehicle, capable of going only 35 mph and traveling 35 miles between charges, got lots of attention, but did little to change popular opinion about the company that had ridden large SUVs to the cusp of failure. On June 1, GM filed for bankruptcy."

So, there you have it. We can't say this enough, but cool gadgets are not enough to bring a profit. Products have to be customer driven. Pun absolutely intended. ;)

Patents, small companies use them for protection, but large companies use them for profit! We at Beheron really try to remind our readers that, as inventors, we need to use every business tool available to profit and survive. But we often fail to realize the power of intellectual property. But why? Companies like IBM are alive and well today not because of the products they sell, but also because of the licenses they have negotiated. Take Toyota for example. Yesterday there was a great story in the Wall Street Journal about how Toyota has over 2,000 patents for its hybrid technology. This is twice as much as its closest rival, Honda. Why are they doing this? Well, they realize that no matter how good the company gets, its market share will never be close to 100%. But, by selling its technology to its competitors it can reap some of that share that it can't reach directly. This strategy has already paid off by licensing technology to Ford Motors for its hybrid Escape. Now this strategy isn't just good for supersized companies. The same thing can be done by a small time inventor. So remember patent what you develop, and be diligent in protecting and monetizing the effort!