Bioplastics Cluster Explores Maine Potato Resources for Organic-Based Products with Help of MTI Award A June 6, 2008, article in Mass High Tech looks at Maine's bioplastics cluster as it begins its exploration with the help of an MTI Cluster Award of the future of potatoes as a source of biodegradable plastic resin for a breadth of uses. Read the article. MTI Award Winner Kenway Corporation Recognized as Manufacturer of the Year by MEP The Maine Manufacturing Extension Partnership (Maine MEP) announced that Kenway Corporation, a nationally known fabricator of fiberglass products, is the recipient of this year's Maine MEP Manufacturer of the Year award. The award was presented at a ceremony at Kenway Corporation's facility in Augusta on Wednesday, June 4. The award is presented every year to a company that has achieved world-class manufacturing status and has implemented best manufacturing practices required to advance in the marketplace. Read the MEP press release. MTI Seed Grant Helps Develop Online Website for the Creative Economy in Maine Z Creative, LLC, of Gouldsboro launched www.MaineCreates.com, an online networking website for thecreative economy workers of Maine to exchange ideas and knowledge andshowcase creative works by individuals, businesses, and organizations. Read the story in the Ellsworth American on June 5, 2008. MTI Seed Grant Recipient Fiddler's Reach Produces 'Nectar ofthe Gods' Using Local Ingredients Fiddler'sReach used its MTI Seed Grant to study how yeast affects the taste ofwine in the process of making mead, known across history as the "nectarof the gods." The study enabled Fiddler's Reach to determine theformula necessary to produce a dry mead using honey instead of winebecause, as owner and mead master Rob Nicoll explains, "It's hard togrow grapes (in Maine), and I wanted to use local ingredients." Read the May 2008 article in May Port City Life, listen to an interview on Maine Public Broadcasting, and read the feature article in the Times Record.  MTI Clients Figure Among Winners of of the 2008 Tech Maine Technology Awards The winners of all five 2008 Technology Awards of Tech Maine were MTI clients Blue Marble Graphics, Clynk, Quantrix, Parco Merged Media, and RainStorm Consulting. Of the 15 finalists, 11 were MTI clients, some nominated for more than one category, and also included Pet Health Network, BioAnalyte, Inc., and Fluid Imaging.  Read about the May 20 awards ceremony and MTI winners and nominees. MTI Seed Grants Helped Start Frozen Pop Treats on the Road to National Distribution Three MTI Seed Grants for product research, business plan development and market testing, analysis and forecasting helped Wise Acre, Inc., of Blue Hill develop and launch frozen organic tea treats that are now being picked up for distribution from Maine to Florida. Read the full story in Mainebiz of May 19, 2008. MTI, SBDC and Other Maine Organization Offer Breadth of Resources for Business Development and Growth MTI, SBDC and other Maine governmental organizations have worked together to support Mitokine Bioscience of Hancock and Simply Divine Brownies of Brunswick take advantage of a network of support to launch and bring new products to market. Read the story in the Bangor Daily News. MTI Seed Grant Awardee Wins U.S. Department of Defense Contract for Nearly $13 Million In January 2007, Maine Secure Composites, LLC, of Oronowon an MTI Seed Grant for market analysis of composite maritimecontainers. In April 2008, the company announced the contract with theDepartment of Defense to continue to develop tamper-resistantcontainers for international shipping that may create new jobs and opena new lab. Read the story in the Bangor Daily News. U.S. Department of Energy Award Follows MTI Award to RSE Pulp & Chemical, LLC, for Ethanol Pilot Plant In February 2008, MTI made a Development Award to RSE Pulp & Chemical LLC of Old Town tofund research and development efforts to integrate UMaine'sproprietary, patent-pending pre-extraction process to establish andvalidate on a pilot commercial scale the extaction of hemicellulosesfrom wood chips. RSE and UMaine announced lin mid April 2008 that theU.S. Department of Energy had awarded RSE a $30 million grant to takeUMaine's research out of the lab and apply it full scale. Read the story in the Bangor Daily News.  MTI Award Supports Blueberry Study That Includes Call for Volunteers The University of Maine Department of Food Science & Human Nutritionis looking for volunteers to test theories about the effects of wildblueberry consumption on hunger and blood chemistry. The study, fundedby the Maine Technology Institute, the Wild Blueberry Comission ofMaine and the Maine Agricultural and Forest Experiment Station, isslated to start in the near future. Read about the study in the Bangor Daily News. Executives of Two MTI Client Companies Named as Mainebiz 2008 Business Leaders of the Year. This year, Mainebiz chose three chief executives in three categories as its 2008 Business Leaders of the Year: Ford Reiche, president of Safe Handling in Auburn, as business leader of a large company (50 or more employees); and Kent Peterson, CEO of Fluid Imaging Technologies in Yarmouth, as business leader of a small company (less than 50 employees). Read the article in on Mainebiz.biz. MTI Awards Help Support UM Advanced Wood Composites Center's List of Successes The University of Maine's Advanced Wood Composites Center has a long list of successes and partners in innovation that MTI awards have supported. Read the text of Bangor Daily New's article. Aiko Biotechnology Credits MTI and SBIR Awards with Boosting its Development Read how MTI and SBIR awards have helped Aiko move along the development path to commercialization in Mainebiz. MTI Awards Help Artful Wares, Inc., Takes First Place in New England Products Trade Show Artful Wares, Inc., of Old Townwon first place in the giftware category for its cutting board madewith recycled lobster and mussel shells. The company had used its MTISeed Grant and Development Awards for market research and the testingof innovative manufacturing for its tablewear featuring unique,composite handles created with indigenous shells and stones.Approximately 2,000 wholesale buyers from across the country attendedthe show, where over 120 companies from Maine and the other New Englandstates displayed a wide variety of goods, from handcrafter clothing tospeciality foods, furniture and home goods. Read the press release from the show's primary sponsor, the Department of Economic and Community Development. MTI Awardees Collaborate to Bring Maine's Ship Building and Composites Industries' Strengths to Bid for Navy Contract In response to Navy interest in replacing its fleet of fastZodiac-type vessels for deployment of its SEALs, a Maine-based team hasbeen working for two years on preparing for the competition. Read the Portland Press Herald article about how MTI award winners from the ship building and composite materials sectors have joined together to respond: Maine Marine Composites in Portland as lead, Kenway Corporation in Augusta, Small Craft Engineering in Portland, Tex Tech Industries in Monmouth and the University of Maine's Advanced Engineered Wood Composites Center in Orono. MTI Seed Grants Help Flagsuit, LLC, Go to Work in Space Flagsuit of Southwest Harborshipped its first commercially produced space suit gloves toLos-Angeles-based Orbital Outfillers under a joint-developmentagreement. The gloves, which could one day be worn by NASA astronauts,are designed to be used with the Industrial Suborbital Space Suit-Crew(ISC3) that was unveiled by Orbital Outfitters in October 2007. Thegloves will be used for integrated suit testing and evaluation andfeature patent-pending joint design that makes the fingers moreflexible under pressure. Two MTI seed grant awards covered intellectualproperty protection and proof of concept. Readthe press release about how Flagsuit is currently implementing apreliminary production capability with the support of MTI awards. The Export Market Is Hot. MTI Awards Help Develop, Position, Move Innovative Technology Products to Markets Abroad. MTI seed grants helped Maine Distilleries in Freeportconduct a feasibility study of potato vodka distillation and then amarket analysis. The company lauched its Cold River Vodka, participatedin a Maine International Trade Center trade mission this October 2007and recently launched its vodka in England. Read about MaineDistilleries' export marketing and the export market in general in the Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram. Cold River Vodka is also featured as an Editor's Favorite on the Web site Visit New England that touts its innovation and added-value to a traditional state product and, by extension, the Maine brand. The current issue of MTI's periodical, the MTI Innovator, also covers the export market with features on two MTI awardees, Rynel, Inc., of Wiscasset and Quantrix of Portland. Click hereto read Quantrix's related announcement that it has partnered withBaker Newman Noyes, LLC, one of Maine’s largest certified publicaccounting firms, in delivering integrated 10-year strategic planningand forecasting models to the National University of Singapore. MTI Awards Help Test the Water, Move the Product to Launch An MTI Seed Grant helped Hydro-Phyton of Blue Hillconduct a market anaysis and an MTI Performance Grant helped in thebeta testing and certification of the SteriPen LCD. The new wandlikedevice disinfects clear water for drinking with continual swirls ofultraviolet light over a short period of about one minute and more. AnLDC screen shows a countdown and a smiley face signals when the processis done. The lightweight device will be sold at camping, travel andother stores, as well as on line beginning this April. Read the article in the New York Times. MTI Seed Grant Opened the Way to $100,000 Grant for University of Maine Two enquiring minds at the University of Mainewanted to know whether there was a way "to have a portal on a user'scomputer that would be adjusted to literacy and comprehension levels"to deal with complicated language on healthcare of government Websites. An MTI seed grand of $10,000 funded market research thatanswered yes, but that no such software existed. Read the story on the University of Maine Web sitethat relates how the University, working with an Orono softwarecompany, then received a $100,000 grant to translate and simplifyanti-smoking Web site text. MTI Awards Help Launch Hodgdon Yachts' Composite Prototype Patrol Boat for Navy On January 11, Hodgdon Yachtsunveiled an 82-foot research prototype designed to help delivercombat-ready Navy SEALS to their destination with fewer injuries byabsorbing the impact as the vessel crashes through the waves at 50-plusknots. Dave Packhem of Hodgdon explains that the MTI award monies wereused to "perform market analysis that helped us target a customer thatmatched our capabilities and to advance our functional designs thatwere used to advance the state of the art in carbon/Kevlar compositedesign and construction." Read the coverage on cnn.com. The company subsequently delivered its patrol boat to the Navy forevaluation. Confident in its use of composites as the future forsimilar vessels, the company is marketing its design around the worldand exploring production expansion in Hampden. Read the March 28, 2008, article in the Portland Press Herald. Technology Systems, Inc., Applied MTI Awards to New High-Tech Defense Software Development MTI grant and awards have played an important role in supporting innovative R&D at Brunswick-based Technology Systems, Inc.(TSI). Tom Zysk, the company's chief operating officer, explains thatthe biggest hurdle is the stage between developing new technologies andand making the leap to integrating the technology into real life. Read the Mainebiz article about TSI's "spy games." Aegis Bicycles Relies on MTI Seed Grants to Research New High-Tech Designs   Aegis Bicycles' Van Buren shop designs and individually builds someof the most high-tech carbon fiber competitive racing bicycles in theworld. Two MTI Seed Grands have enabled the company to design, developand produce two new hand-made models, the Zaero and the Victory forwomen. View the feature presentation of the company on Channel WCSH 6's 207 Weekend.  MTI Client CrossRate Technology Works to Solve GPS Limitations In early December 2007 hunter Stephen Wright survived nearly threesnow-filled days lost in Northern Maine. The primary reason for hisdilemma, he said, was his faulty global positioning system (GPS). "Ittook me farther and farther away from my truck," he explained. Lessthan 90 miles away, MTI awardee CrossRate Technology, LLC, was working on technology to prevent such problems and their consequences. Read the story in Mass High Tech: The Journal of New England Technology. MITC Trade Mission Supports MTI Awardees In responses to the interest shown during governor's trade mission to Japan and South Korea this past October 2007, Cold River Vodka in Freeportexpects its potato vodka to be on the shelves in Tokyo this spring.Intelligent Spatial Technologies, another MTI awardee, alsoparticipated in the mission and made many valuable contacts. Theweeklong trip, organized by the Maine International Trade Center incooperation with the U.S. Foreign Commercial Services Offices in Tokyoand Seoul and the Foreign Agricultural Services FoodExport USA program,gathered a wide range of Maine businesses. Read more in the BangorDaily News at www.bangordailynews.com.