Boston Globe reporter Hiawatha Bray spotlights how MIT alumnus Josh Lessing has co-founded a company that is “developing technology to solve some of the most enduring challenges in agriculture — a sector that has long struggled with labor shortages, seasonal schedules, and compressed harvesting periods.”
Alumnus Tom Leighton, CEO and co-founder of Akamai, speaks with Forbes contributor Peter High about the company’s founding and his push towards making the company more focused on cybersecurity.
Fast Company reporter Katherine Schwab spotlights Duality, an MIT startup that is using homomorphic encryption to analyze encrypted data without decrypting it. Schwab explains that the “company’s technology could provide an actual solution to the data privacy problem by allowing companies to keep their data fully encrypted and still find patterns in it.”
Boston Globe reporter Hiawatha Bray writes about how MIT alumni Mike Pappas and Carter Huffman started a company that allows video game players to customize their voices. The company’s software “measures the tone, pitch, and emotional intensity of the speaker’s voice, then applies these qualities to any user’s speech in real time.”
MIT spinoff Ginkgo Bioworks has launched Motif Ingredients, a food ingredients company that uses yeast to mimic flavors or textures found in food, report Chloe Sorvino and Alex Knapp for Forbes. Motif Ingredients is “a potential game-changer for the budding industry of plant-based foods,” Sorvino and Knapp write.
Boston Globe reporter Hiawatha Bray writes that MIT startup Altaeros has developed a helium-filled airship called a SuperTower that can be used to carry cellular antennas and can be tethered 800 feet above ground. Bray explains that radio signals from the SuperTower “have a range of more than 35 miles over flat terrain, taking the place of 15 land-based cell towers.”
Forbes contributor Gil Press writes about MIT cybersecurity startup Duality Technologies, which is working on guaranteeing privacy and utility. Press explains that the company is using a cybersecurity technique called Homomorphic Encryption, which “allows for processing and analysis of the encrypted data without having the secret key.”
Prof. Tim Berners-Lee speaks with Wired reporter K.G. Orphanides about his startup Inrupt, which is aimed at transforming how we share personal data on the web. Orphanides explains that Berners-Lee’s idea is that, “instead of a company storing all your personal data on their servers, you would keep it on your own personal data ‘pod.’”
MIT startup Vicarious Surgical is developing a minimally invasive surgical technique that combines virtual reality and miniature surgical robots, reports Jonathan Sieber for TechCrunch. The founders say they hope “to drive down both the cost of higher impact surgeries and access to the best surgeons through remote technologies.”
TechCrunch reporter Jonathan Sieber writes about biomanufacturing company Culture Biosciences, which was co-founded by MIT alumnus Will Patrick. Sieber writes that Patrick was inspired by his time at the Media Lab and by MIT startups like Gingko Bioworks, explaining that he noticed “that the problem and the bottleneck in the industry was moving from industrial design to scale-up.”
Forbes reporter Chuck Tannert spotlights alumnus R.J. Scaringe, founder and CEO of the electric vehicle company Rivian Automotive. Scaringe explains his motivation to build electric vehicles: “It was frustrating knowing the things I loved were simultaneously the things that were making the air dirtier and causing all sorts of issues, everything from geopolitical conflict to the smog to climate change.”
Writing for The New York Times about up-and-coming technology startups, Erin Griffith highlights MIT spinoff Benchling, which is developing software that allows lab scientists to store notes and records in the cloud. The software is aimed at enabling scientists to “more easily use the records to collaborate with one another,” Griffith explains.
Boston Globe reporter Janelle Nanos writes about Radian Jeans, an MIT startup developing women’s jeans with functional pockets. Nanos explains that the company was inspired by Wardah Inam’s experience as a graduate student at MIT when “she grew annoyed that she couldn’t easily transport her phone, wallet, keys, and ID between her lab and office.”
Fast Company reporter Adele Peters writes about Tarjimly, a non-profit MIT startup that connects refugees with a large network of volunteer language translators. The platform “has more than 8,000 translators who speak more than 90 languages, and can be used in nearly any situation where someone trying to help can’t communicate with someone in need,” Peters explains.
Graduate students Stephanie Lee and Ellen Shakespear speak with WBUR’s Hadley Green about Spaceus, a collaborative work and exhibition space they created for artists in the greater Boston area. Lee explains that Spaceus is committed to nurturing artists in the “heart of cities, because local creativity is what makes a place, gives it identity and meaning.”