Innovate Arkansas' administrative coordinator, Vicki Malpass, was kind enough to highlight the main points of Josh Quittner's speech during last week's Arkansas Venture Forum.

Here are Malpass' notes, which were compiled using information provided by Quittner and her own observations:

Josh Quittner, editor-at-large for TIME, was the keynote speaker at the Arkansas Venture Forum luncheon on Nov. 19 at the Peabody in Little Rock. Quittner's speech centered on "The 12 Ways Your Startup Can Survive the Nuclear Winter." He drew from a number of reports and blog posts concerning the state of the U.S. economy and how startup companies can survive the downturn. Many of the sources listed seem to overlap, but Quittner distilled the major points.

The 12 Ways:

1. Have an "Immigrant Ethic" (Max Levchin) - Basically, now is the time to work especially hard, but also smart. You must be frugal and get rid of the "nice-to-do" things, and focus on the "must-do" things.

2. Get Cash-Flow Positive and Get There Now (Mike Moritz) Raising capital without being cash-flow positive is going to be tough - very tough.

3. Outsource As Much As Possible (John Borthwick) - "Face reality as it is, not as you wish it was. Change the mix of sales and performance-based employees. Think about what you outsource - and how you can distribute your costs. It's hard and it requires different workflow, but when it works it can change your whole business makeup."

4. Spend Smart (John Doerr) - Most of Doerr's 11 tips can be boiled down into this mantra: "Spend smart." He covers things ranging from protecting the core of your business to renegotiating contracts.

5. Get Hypercompetitive (John Borthwick) - Take the offensive; learn your client base; adjust pricing tactics if need be (don't skimp on your marketing plan but make sure your marketing plan is working); and think about your burn (think three years out, not six months).

6. Bullet-proof Your Product: Now is the time to reduce the expenses around your product (Doug Leone) - Also, the durability, reliability, safety and performance of your product are always important; but in an economic downturn these aspects become crucial to its survival.

7. Obsess About Data - (John Borthwick) - Know everything there is to know about your business: Your clients, your business scales, your revenues, your profits, your burn, your valuation, your traffic, your R & D priorities, etc. Know them and be ready to defend and prove them to possible investors.

8. Find New Business Models (Eric Upin) - Throw out all the models and spreadsheets because assumptions will probably be wrong in a "secular bear market." Use your expertise to find the model that works best with your business.

9. Always Be Aware of the Big Picture (John Borthwick) - Typically, these are the times that have driven innovation. By keeping an eye on the big picture, watching the "elephants" dance, ferreting out the trends and being aware of subtle changes, you and your company should be able to make the necessary changes in a timely fashion.

10. Over-communicate (John Doerr) - "Talk to everyone - employees, investors, partners and clients. Don't sugar coat things; communicate your resolve."

11. Work on Stuff That Matters (Tim O'Reilly) - No matter what happens with the economy, what will you be working on? What does everyone need to know about your company?

12. Have a Great Back-up Plan (Paul Sieben)

Innovate Arkansas advisor Mike Smith Jr. had this to say today about the upcoming WBTshowcase in Texas: "Several Arkansas companies have been selected in the past and it is a pretty good venue for getting regional exposure."

He added that it also is a good venue for tech-based companies with an SBIR/STTR history. 

From the WBTshowcase newsletter:

If you have been thinking about attracting follow-on investment or a Fortune 1000 strategic partner for one of your portfolio companies, the upcoming WBTshowcase next March is a must-attend event.

Now in it's seventh year, the WBTshowcase is the foremost event offering seed and early stage venture investors and Fortune 1000 licensees a unique opportunity to sample the "best of the best" technologies from private companies, universities, federal labs, agencies, and research institutions from across the country and around the globe.

Leveraging a screening panel of over 80 investors and licensing professionals, presenting technologies are selected solely on the merits of their innovation and the specific investment or licensing opportunity. Exhibit space is limited to selected presenting technologies and event sponsors only.

If you are ready to submit an application for a break-through company, I have some great news...the deadline for online applications has been extended to December 22.

There is no cost to apply. Please visit www.wbtshowcase.com for more details.

Well-known innovation author Stephen C. Lundin this week announced the upcoming release of the follow-up to his bestseller, "FISH: A Remarkable Way to Boost Morale and Improve Results." Lundin and co-author Jimmy Tan's new book is called "CATS: The Nine Lives of Innovation" and, according to Amazon.com, will be available in the U.S. in January.

Maree Harris, EzineArticles.com's "expert author," offers a sneak peak in her review:

You would remember him as the author of the best selling book FISH: A Remarkable Way to Boost Morale and Improve Results, which was inspired by the Pike Place Fishmarket in Seattle. Remember the message in FISH - Be There; Play; Make Their Day; Choose Your Attitude - simple but immensely powerful. The Pike Place Fishmarket, as a result of his book, is now an international tourist destination!

CATS, his new book, is the same - a simple but powerful message, communicated within an innovative framework via a fun process that makes the message of innovation accessible to all. So if innovation has always been a mystery, or even a threat, then this book is worth a read.

A CAT, for Stephen and Jimmy Tan his co-author, is "an everyday human being who learns how to release his or her creative potential and develops the skills and understandings critical to innovation," those creative and imaginative people who are invaluable to any organisation caught in the rapidity of change in the twenty-first century.
...
What makes this book different to so much of the reading I have done on innovation, however, is that its message is that innovation begins with the individual and that it begins with being innovative in the ordinary and the small in our lives. That's where the process of becoming a CAT begins. Innovative organisations are just organisations with lots of individual CATS in them who are supported by a seasoned CAT that Stephen and Jimmy call a CAT Wrangler - a leader who knows "the difference between a meow and a purr." You'll have to read the book to find out what those kinds of leaders are really like!

The journey they take us on teaches us how to deal with the four challenges of innovation, live the nine lives of CATS and earn the five CAT Belts that tell us how successful we are as a CAT and even what sort of a CAT we are.

For Lundin and Tan the four challenges of innovation are:

1. Overcoming our doubts and fears.
2. Getting beyond "the normal."
3. Creatively managing failure.
4. Leading through change.

The nine lives are:

Life One: CATS overcome the clutter of life.
Life Two: CATS are always prepared, especially for the unpredictable.
Life Three: CATS know that innovation isn't normal.
Life Four: CATS welcome real provocation.
Life Five: CATS promote imaginary provocation.
Life Six: CATS say "How Fascinating!"
Life Seven: CATS fail early and well.
Life Eight: CATS pounce on change.
Life Nine: CATS love CAT Wranglers.

More here.

Click here to read the press release from London-based SourceWire.com.

A little company called Down River Cryogenics in Jefferson is on the cutting edge of cryogenics - freezing things, not bodies, that is - and is providing the hi-tech service to a variety of industries.

"People ask us all the time what it is we do here. I guess a lot of people think we freeze bodies," owner Michael Pate said.

He explained "cryonics" deals with freezing bodies, whereas "cryogenics" is the study of low temperatures and how materials are affected by them. The term also refers to the creation of low temperatures.

Customers seek cryogenics treatments for items ranging from machine parts to musical instruments.

Pate, his wife Judy Pate and two employees use two processors he built himself. They use liquid nitrogen to lower the machines' internal temperatures to -316 degrees Fahrenheit, hold the temperature for 32 hours then temper the contents at 450 degrees for two cycles of 10 hours each.

The business has been operating for nearly eight years and uses a variation of a process that developed from a discovery by NASA scientists during the early days of the U.S. space program.