Penn State Grad, Chairman & CEO of Medtronic talks innovations in healthcare

Neeli Bendapudi, currently president and professor of marketing at the University of Louisville, Kentucky, has been unanimously named Penn State’s next president by the Penn State Board of Trustees on Dec. 9. With a nearly 30-year career in academia, Bendapudi has:  Taught marketing at the undergraduate, graduate and doctoral levels at several universities Received numerous […]

The move benefits DoD, manufacturing and R&D around the U.S.   Penn State’s Innovation Park-based Center for Innovative Materials Processing through Direct Digital Deposition (CIMP-3D) is expanding its already-world-class capabilities in metal-based additive manufacturing. It’s a move that will benefit the Department of Defense, American manufacturing companies and researchers around the globe.   “The university performs […]

Research shows that project-based learning better prepares students for their futures. In the engineering world, it's not enough to simply have theoretical knowledge and technical breadth. You also need that spark of innovation and creativity that often only comes when you mix education with real-world experience. Enter the Learning Factory. What started as a shop […]

Happy Valley innovation and ingenuity is a driving force in this Ben Franklin Technology Partners’ success story, but timing played an equally important role in the rise of SoftGenetics.  “It was kind of kismet,” chuckles co-founder John Fosnacht. “My partner Dr. Jonathan Liu and myself had just sold a weld sequencer to a leading cancer […]

Happy Valley-based early-stage gene technology company NeuExcell Therapeutics is on the cusp of a life-changing breakthrough treatment for patients suffering from Huntington’s Disease, an incurable, hereditary brain disorder that affects different parts of the brain, impacting movement, behavior and cognition. In September, the company announced a gene therapy collaboration with Spark Therapeutics aimed at developing […]

Over the last 18 months, I’ve asked a lot of Happy Valley leaders about how they feel about working here. Here in this valley that’s built out of mountains and patchwork fields, startups and materials DNA and entrepreneurial grit, as opposed to Silicon Valley or Research Triangle.  Does location even matter anymore, you might ask? […]