Dylan: Another reminder that BostInno's State of Innovation: WorkXPlay event series begins tomorrow with a mixer and then continues on Wednesday and Thursday with panels on smarter workplaces and scaling up. Tickets here. Separate reminder: we set up a form to accept anonymous tips.
Lucy: All right, so the obvious national story for the Boston tech scene is the Federal Trade Commission suing to block the DraftKings-FanDuel merger, but for today's Big One, we're going to focus on some news that will have an ever bigger impact in the Boston area.
Dylan: This morning WBUR's Bostonomix had the scoop that Gov. Charlie Baker "will continue funding a version of the Massachusetts Life Sciences Initiative" with $500M over the next five years. The initiative was started in 2008 by former Gov. Deval Patrick with the promise to spend $1B for the next 10 years. To date, according to BBJ, the initiative has spent $654M.
Up to $295M of Baker's new $500M commitment will be used to capital projects, BBJ reported, while another $150M will be used to give companies tax breaks if they agree to hire a number of employees.
“For Massachusetts residents, Governor Baker’s actions mean more high paying jobs in all corners of the state for years to come,” Bob Coughlin, the head of trade group MassBio, told BBJ in a statement. “For patients of the world, it means more breakthrough cures and treatments will reach them faster. I applaud the Baker administration for their vision and commitment to economic growth and patients.”
Lucy: Baker's move also received praise from one of the program's past beneficiaries, Vertex, which has received millions of dollars in tax incentives.
Lucy: Cambridge-based accelerator Delta V, a longtime initiative of the Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship, just revealed a snapshot of the 21 student startups that are taking part in the summer program. This year, for the first time, the program includes the MIT NYC Startup Studio, a second headquarter in SoHo, New York City. Read more: Here's a Snapshot of the 21 Startups From the 2017 MIT Delta v Program
Dylan: Akamai CEO Tom Leighton is in the White House today, according to CNN, with 17 other big-name CEOs, including Amazon's Jeff Bezos, Apple's Tim Cook and Microsoft's Satya Nadella. The goal? "To brainstorm on how to improve the government's creaky IT systems," Politico said. I reached out to Akamai for a comment on Leighton's participation.
Lucy: A few startups from the Boston area will take part in the Cleantech Open Northeast accelerator, which recently revealed its 2017 cohort. A name that pops out is change:WATER Labs, which was a finalist (and won the Audience Choice Award) at the MIT $100K Entrepreneurship Competition. Other local startups participating include Adappt Intelligence, AquaFresco, Flipswitch, Arrecife Energy Systems, Consilience Systems, Electra Vehicles and CoolComposites. Here’s the full list.
Dylan: So yeah, after speculation last week that FTC would possibly sue to block the DraftKings-FanDuel merger, it's actually happening. It seems that the FTC isn't buying the argument that the companies' newer season-long fantasy sports contests put them in a broader competitive environment than that of the daily fantasy sports market. According to a memo obtained by The Boston Globe, DraftKings plans to seek an injunction against the FTC's order. Read more: FTC Is Suing to Block the DraftKings-FanDuel Merger
Lucy: On a completely different note, the National Fabric Innovation Center opened its $10M facility near MIT today. For the occasion, they revealed a hat that can stream audio, Bostonomix reported.
Dylan: Talla, a Boston startup making enterprise chatbots for Slack and Microsoft Teams, just raised an $8.3M Series A led by Glasswing Ventures. The startup, which was started by Backupify founder Rob May, is one of the first investments made by Glasswing, a new AI-focused VC firm in Boston started by Rudina Seseri and Rick Grinnell, who were former partners atFairhaven Capital Partners in Cambridge for nine years. Seseri told me that Glasswing will have more funding announcements to share in the near future. Read more: Talla Raises $8.3M Series A to Answer Your Everyday Work Questions Using A.I.
Lucy: Glance Networks raised almost $4M in an equity offering, according to a new Form D. The software company, which, among other things, provides solutions for screen sharing, is looking to raise a total of $7M for the round.
Dylan: Last but not least, Julia Computing raised $4.6M from General Catalyst and Founder Collective to commercialize the Julia open source programming language.
Dylan: Two personnel moves to report:
-- Tom Huntington is now CFO of Qstream, a Harvard Medical School spinoff that provides a sales coaching platform and raised a $15M round last year. Huntington — who was previously CFO and co-founder of Windshield, as well as CFO of Vela Systems — replaces David Stack, a longtime HubSpotter who also held roles at Localytics and EMC.
-- Joe Tucci, the former EMC CEO who led the company's merger with Dell, has become a special adviser for a VC firm called 83North that focuses on Israel and Europe.
Dylan: On the events docket this week — other than BostInno's WorkXPLay series, obviously: a HubSpot event on what it's like to be LGBTQ in tech, an augmented and virtual reality meetup at Inphantry's office and a FinTech on Main Street meetup. Find more events in BostInno Approved.
Lucy: Submissions for The Ad Club Brandathon are now open. Eligible startups should submit an application, explaining what they do and why they could use some branding help. Deadline is July 24.
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