Twitter co-founder Biz Stone invests in local shopping app Lookup

Lookup, a free and secure messaging app that connects shoppers with local businesses has raised Series A funding from Twitter co-founder Biz Stone. Biz has joined the team as an investor and advisor. Lookup will be employing the funds towards investment in expanding its merchant base in order to enhance convenience for its users and to branch out in newer geographies.

Lookup raised a total of $382,000 in its seed round, from multiple investors including Infosys’ Kris Gopalakrishnan, Teru Sato, DeNA and MKS Group (Switzerland). It was started by Innoz’s Deepak Ravindran and within about 5 months of launch, Lookup has already registered over 2, 00,000 downloads and has answered over 3 million queries.  

Speaking on his investment, Biz Stone said, “I'm honored to be a part of Deepak’s next big project and I am truly impressed by what he has already accomplished in his life. I’m very excited about working with such an inspiring entrepreneur, whom I share common ideologies with.”

Deepak Ravindran, Founder and CEO of Lookup said, “I am extremely thrilled that Biz Stone is personally investing in our Series A round. It is almost surreal. His beliefs and ideals are very fascinating and I am glad that someone so altruistic and with such a genuine moral compass is a mentor and advisor to me and my company.”

On his future plans, he added, “Receiving this funding is like getting another opportunity to blazon the world with innovation; to fill more e-pages in the world of businesses and startups. We plan to integrate all the offline businesses into the online world and connect them to their customers. The final goal is to make Lookup a global phenomenon and hope to ease the busy lives of the people.”

Besides co-founding Twitter, Biz Stone also helped create and launch Xanga, Odeo, The Obvious Corporation and Medium. In 2012, Stone co-founded a start-up called Jelly Industries where he serves as CEO. The release of the Jelly app, a Q&A platform that relies on images, was officially announced in January 2014. He was named GQ’s ‘Nerd of the Year’  in 2009, one of the Most Influential People in The World by Time magazine, Entrepreneur of the Decade by Inc. magazine, and one of Vanity Fair's Top Ten Most Influential People of the Information Age.

About Lookup:
Lookup is a mobile app that aims to use chat to disrupt local e-commerce in India. Besides eliminating the need to call a retailer and wait for a response, Lookup assimilates all the requirements of the modern consumer in to one app. Based out of Bengaluru, the company started operations in October 2014 with the launch of the Android app. The iOS app was launched in March 2015. Going forward, Lookup will introduce more categories, payment options, NLP/Artificial Intelligence, deep linking to other apps as well as add a virtual store on its platform for vendors to sell through Lookup besides fostering partnerships with businesses in newer verticals such as education.

NV Organon, a subsidiary of Merck & Co fails to secure patent in India for female contraceptive kit.

As per reports, NV Organon, a subsidiary of US-based Merck & Co ,one of the largest pharma companies in the world has failed to secure a patent in India for its invention on a female contraceptive kit. The kit, which comprises a vaginal ring, is used in cyclical dosage and has a reminder system. Organon has a similar product under trade name NuvaRing (etonogestrel/ethinyl estradiol vaginal ring), which received initial US approval in 2001 and has been marketed worldwide. That Us patent expires in 2018. Organon followed with another patent in 2006 `Regimens for Oral Monophasic Contraceptives'. 

This patent claims:  A method of human female contraception which comprises: (i) administering a monophasic oral contraceptive dosage unit once a day starting on numerical date ‘m+4’ of a month continuously until numerical date ‘m’ of the following month; and (ii) not administering the monophasic oral contraceptive dosage unit in the numerical dates between ‘m’ and ‘m+4’; wherein ‘m’ is a numerical date of a month from 1-24 and wherein the method is repeatedly carried out for at least two cycles. 

UNICEF launches Open Innovation Portal

CauseTech is a private sector initiative in partnership with UNICEF Innovation Center. 

Innovators are invited to register and offer ideas to solve global challenges like Health, water, Energy listed there.

Some of the technologies that have the potential to address these challenges are illustrated in Tech Inspirations. 

• The EcoloBlue product line of Atmospheric Water Generators (AWGs) creates sustainable, unlimited pure drinking water from humidity in the air. 
• New Cycloclean is a bicycle water purification system that can be operated without an engine or a battery. New Cycloclean is driven by pedaling the bicycle to operate the water purifying equipment attached to the bicycle.
• The cigar-sized plastic tool, LifeStraw delivers the most basic needs and purifies water from potential pathogens like typhoid, cholera, dysentery and diarrhea

Through CauseTech's ideation platform, powered by IdeaScale, users can post their ideas, comment, and vote. Members can post an entirely new idea or technology, or simply improve upon the incredible work that UNICEF is already doing. 

IP Systems in the BRIC Countries

In conjunction with the 2015 BIO International Convention, Michael Best Attorney Lisa L. Mueller will co-present "Strategies for Successfully Mastering the Different Challenges of the IP Systems in the BRIC Countries and U.S. in the Pharmaceutical and Life Sciences Sectors" on Sunday, June 14.

Time: Presentation 3:30-5:00pm; Cocktail reception: 5:00pm

Location: Philadelphia Marriott Downtown

Panelists include: Otto Licks – Licks Legal, Brazil, Vlad Ugryumov, Gowlings, Moscow, Russia, Tarun Gandhi, Chadha & Chadha, India, Oliver Lutze, Spruson & Ferguson, Shanghai, China, Lisa Mueller, Michael, Best & Friedrich, Chicago, Illinois, USA,Moderator:  Verena Simpson, Guardian, IP Consulting, Copenhagen, Denmark

There is no cost for attending.

Internet Of Things (IOT) in Aquaculture- Eruvaka Technologies

Water quality maintenance is the crucial component to achieve a healthy aqua-farming environment. Its main purpose is to control the following parameters, i.e., water temperature, pH, dissolved oxygen (DO), salinity, turbidity, ammonia nitrogen, chemical oxygen demand (COD), biochemical oxygen demand (BOD), etc.-, the parameters that strongly correlated to the incubation environment of aquaculture.
Eruvaka Technologies, Vijayawada successfully developed and implemented system for aquaculture management using IOT topography based on patented system.

INPASS New Indian Patent Advanced Search System.

The present system, IPAIRS, allows a search to be conducted in all the Indian Patents and Patent Applications. This system however does not allow a user to perform a full-text search. The Patent Office has developed a new search tool, INPASS,which allows a full-text search to be conducted in all the Indian Patents as well as Patent Applications. INPASS supports wild-cards, truncation as well as Boolean operators in all the fields of the ST.36 compliant data available with the Patent Office, thereby enabling the stakeholders to conduct an advanced search in the Indian Patent Database. IPAIRSwill henceforth be withdrawn.
Comments for further improving INPASS may be sent to cgoffice-mh@nic.in
Source: Press note

Dominant standard in poultry- made dominant with action by schools

Emergence of a dominant standard depends on several factors but pressure from users that too by schools was a novelty.
Antibiotics are used to treat disease in farm animals and reduce food-borne pathogens, but some producers of meat and poultry also add antibiotics to feed and water to encourage weight gain. More antibiotics fed to farm animals, however, also contribute to increased occurrence of antibiotic resistant bacteria.
The Certified Responsible Antibiotic Use standard is a response to the problem devised by the Pew Charitable Trusts and School Food FOCUS, short for Food Options for Children in the United States, an organization that aims to harness the buying power of school districts to increase the nutritional value of food served in public schools. School Food FOCUS established a consortium of 15 school districts with some 2.3 million children that purchases $36 million in chicken each year, to exercise this buying power in establishing the antibiotic standard.
Tyson Foods, USA’s largest producer of chickens, adopted the Certified Responsible Antibiotic Use standard.

source: Science& enterprise

Electropreneur Park invites applications for incubation

Technopreneurs, Bioentrepreneurs is now followed by Electropreneurs- entrepreneurs in ESDM (Electronics System Deign and manufacturing ) promoted by DeitY, 
To know more attend roadshows at Delhi, Bangalore,Pune, Hyderabad, Kolaktta.
For details contact:
Saikat Mookherjee
Project Coordinator – Electropreneur Park
Email: ceo@electropreneurpark.com
Mobile: +91-9873409350