This month's issue of Connections is filled with plenty of people and organizations connecting with each other. It's really fantastic to read about the great work being done in northern New Mexico each and every day. Whether in the area of education, economic development, or community giving, many of us are giving of ourselves to strengthen our community. Let's stay connected!

Make it a great May!

Doxcelerate, presented by Jim McDonald, specializes in policy process automation software development and policy consulting. Precision Data Mining (PDM), presented by Alex Alaniz, PhD, provides a set of predictive correlation tools that gives PDM customers a live image of internal corporate performance metrics. LANL Particle Pipes, presented by Marko Rodriguez, is an information distribution infrastructure company that uses multi-relational networks as a push-based medium. LANL RageGrid, presented by Sriram Swaminarayan, is a leading image vectorization and segmentation application.

The Springboard Panel was made up of experts in the software industry, investor community, and serial entrepreneurs from New Mexico and San Diego: Russ Aldrich, Guide Ventures; Howard Asher, President and CEO, Global Life Sciences; Peter Dickstein, Visiting Entrepreneur, LANL; Gary Ebersole, Entrepreneur; David Franklin, CEO, Strategic Analytics; Greg Horowitt, Executive Director, Global Connect; John Miner, Intel; and Bob Slapin, Executive Director, San Diego Software Industry Council.

These experts bombarded the presenters with questions, recommendations and analysis important to identifying gaps in their businesses and commercialization plans. In addition to the invaluable feedback, the presenters grew their network of experienced business leaders in our community and within appropriate technology industry clusters.

For information regarding Springboard, contact Doruk Aytulu at (505) 667-5315 or doruk@lanl.gov.

Students from northern New Mexico are awarded scholarships through Los Alamos Employees' Scholarship Fund, which gets its funding from Laboratory employees, retirees, and subcontract personnel. Scholarships are awarded based on grade point average, diversity, need, academic rigor, test scores, leadership, and community involvement.

The RFP submission deadline is June 1, with a projected award date of July 1. For further information, please visit the Math and Science Academy website.

The meeting will be held at the Cities of Gold Hotel in Pojoaque beginning at 5:30 pm. Contact Jennifer Basile at 505-661-4960 or Jennifer.basile@smsi.us.

Terry Wallace, the Laboratory's Principal Associate Director for Science, Technology and Engineering provided the welcome address and participated in a panel session. Kurt Steinhaus former manager of the Education Programs Office at LANL, and now education advisor to Governor Bill Richardson; and Tom Bowles, former Chief Science Officer at LANL and now Chief Science Advisor to Governor Richardson, all participated in the conference as speakers.

Since food is near to the hearts of the cultures and people of northern New Mexico, the Taos Food Center is at the heart of TCEDC's activities. The center is a 5,000 sq. ft. commercial kitchen that has the equipment, services and support needed operate a food businesses. Over 42 local food companies use the Center to process their foods. That number does not include the seasonal businesses that use it during the holidays or during the summer when jams and jellies are made.

Another food project supported by the TCEDC is the "mobile matanza." This is a mobile livestock slaughtering unit designed to enhance economic opportunities for limited-resource ranchers in northern New Mexico.

EVFAC was founded in 1995 by a small group of weavers who learned that there were many area families who had inherited looms but who had little knowledge of the heritage and techniques of northern New Mexico textiles practiced by their grandparents. With donated looms and space in a local church, these weavers began to learn and teach weaving. With a grant from the McCune Charitable Foundation, EVFAC rented space, hired a manager, and opened its door for business in October 1996. Today, EVFAC has a staff of five, over 400 members, and serves over 1,500 artisans and small businesses across the United States, the majority located in northern New Mexico.

Community

• Kudos to Tom Aageson, Terry Williams-Keffer and Lillian Montoya-Rael, who are all 2007 recipients of United Way of Santa Fe County's Innovation Awards. Los Alamos National Laboratory also received the United Way 2007 Raise the Roof Award.

Business

• Kudos to Desert Blends of Taos for being the only New Mexico business recipient of a loan from Whole Foods.
• Kudos also to CVI Laser, LLC who recently signed an agreement with Barloworld Scientific Ltd. to acquire Melles Griot.