Anderson said of Musk, “He is the most impressive entrepreneur alive today. His ability to see which sectors will matter most, to get there with just the right timing, and to muster all the necessary skills for success in worlds as disparate as rocket design and electric cars is inspiring to all of us, and of benefit to the world. His successes justify our optimism.”

In giving the award, Anderson noted Musk’s early successes with PayPal and Zip2 Corp. prior to helping create the U.S.’ largest solar panel installer, the first viable electric car company in the modern era, and the first company to achieve the launch of a payload into Earth orbit with an entirely privately developed rocket.

On receiving the award, Musk said, “As someone who has attended the FiRe conference for many years and heard some of the most prominent people in the world speak there, I feel honored to receive this award.”

Future in Review, called “the best technology conference in the world” by The Economist, exposes world experts and participants to new ideas, producing an accurate portrait of the future. The conference pioneers in bringing technology solutions to current local and global problems.

Last week included four eventful days at the annual Future In Review conference put on by the Strategic News Service. This year, the last at San Diego’s Hotel del Coronado [FiRe 2010 is moving to the Terranea; future FiRe locales aren’t yet scheduled – Ed.], was the best of the five I have attended, of the seven that have been held. (Full disclosure – I am on the planning committee, offering my thoughts as a futurist consultant and speaker.)

What began as a high-level conference about the 5-year future of technology has become over time a 360-degree look at the issues and challenges facing the world, the near-term potentials in technology, and the need for concerted system-wide action to produce a more just and prosperous world. This is quite an evolution and has made the FiRe conference one of the most influential global events each year.

You can read more about FiRe 2009 here, and also learn how to register for FiRe 2010, which will be held in the Los Angeles area (Palos Verdes) next year.

FiRe is the kind of conference that begins early each day and runs more or less non-stop till late evening. Thus this report hits only the highlights, for me.

Two themes dominated the program – “earth in peril” and “technology driving the economic rebound.”

Here are tech innovations discussed in the general program that seemed particularly important…

…The Cloud. This concept is subject to hype and is dismissed by many for that reason. Simply defined it means the ability of servers to hold all personal data and to run applications so that personal computing machines can go back to the future as terminals that access the cloud. In practice it may mean that you could walk up to any terminal, anywhere, and access your own “desktop” that actually resides in a variety of servers. One Cloud expert explained to me that this would enable schools, for example, to resurrect obsolete computers, turn them into terminals, and provide inexpensive high-level computing to everyone. There are many hurdles to jump before this becomes a robust and stable reality, but the cloud is a clear trend in future computing.

…The Gigabit Age. A great story around the world, less so in the U.S., is the continuing installation of much-improved bandwidth via fiber and wireless. We learned about an economic stimulus project in Australia, for example, to replace copper wires with fiber to something like 90% of all buildings and homes, enabling Australia to leap ahead in the information economy by providing net speeds dozens of times faster than available in the U.S. This $43 billion project would cost $350 billion in the U.S., but the U.S. is spending only $7 billion on enhanced bandwidth as part of the stimulus, a missed opportunity. In Australia, a key driver for more bandwidth is the Square Kilometer Array Pathfinder project.

…The Web Becomes the Stream. As we move beyond Web 2.0 into an ever more interactive network, in which users send as much material as they consume, via social nets and video sites, and so on, it becomes obvious that we are progressing from the Internet through the Web to the Stream. It is the constant flow of information that matters. (When Sonia Sotomayor is nominated to the Supreme Court, within about 90 seconds her bio on Wikipedia has been updated.) No static website or traditional media company can keep pace.

…Electric Cars Progressing. Elon Musk brought the Tesla Roadster for more test drives (below is my turn), but more importantly reported a just-completed agreement with Daimler to partner in producing the Tesla Motors sedan set for delivery in 2011, at half the cost of the Tesla sports model, with a 300+ mile range on a single electric charge. (Elon also reported on progress with [his company SpaceX’s] private space launch, including the contract with NASA to be a cargo delivery vehicle for the space station.)

Other Tech Tid-bits – Mark Hurd, CEO of HP, explained why printing will continue to grow when only 20% of current printing is digital. He also noted that they build manufacturing capacity overseas so that they can manufacture close to the buyers; only 8% of their cost is labor, so cheap labor is not the driver; being close to customers is. This was interesting.

Apple is reported to be purchasing 7-inch screens; the question is for what?

Thorium Power may be the nuclear fuel of the future – it is more abundant than uranium, cannot be processed into weapons grade material, decays in about 75 years instead of thousands, and can be used in current reactor designs. Since the energy future may depend on getting energy from many sources, this may keep nuclear in the game.

A smart grid will dramatically reduce energy consumption, especially if humans become part of the “smart.” A recent test in Colorado by Accenture energy showed that installing a small screen on the refrigerator in homes that monitors electricity usage around the house and makes the numbers visible led to a 50% decrease in energy consumption. Knowing what is going on in real time makes a difference.

Calit2 “FiRe Lab” Open House at UCSD: Larry Smarr once again organized an evening at Calit2, the future of computing and telecommunications program at UCSD. I will blog about some specific things there in the future as well – highlights included progress with super-hi definition screens and real-time telepresence, life-like robotics, and the use of wide arrays of sensors to learn about geographic information.

…FiReStarters – the breakthrough companies. Each year at FiRe new companies are nominated to be “FiReStarters,” those early-stage companies with a compelling product or service and a chance to change the world. This year there were 13 companies. One of my tasks was to interview the principals in these companies for short web-video introductions. Those videos will roll out over the next weeks, and I will blog about each company separately, but here are a couple of standouts:

Smaato – bringing order and scale to the world of mobile advertising.

Blue Mars, from Avatar Reality – soon to debut a robust, multi-user, next-generation online virtual world.

SIMtone – bringing cloud computing closer to reality and making it greener.

Vesta Health Systems – developing a technology platform for a simple, strong disinfectant effective against virus and bacteria.

Earth in Peril

The second and dominant theme at FiRe 2009 was “earth in peril.” This was kicked off by the opening dinner keynote from Professor V. “Ram” Ramanathan. Dr. Ramanathan is a distinguished researcher in climate science and global warming. His databased explanation of where global warming is now was sobering to all, even those most knowledgeable on the subject. His program title, “Practical Strategies for Solving the Climate Problem,” was intriguing, and he delivered. It turns out that while CO2 is the biggest long-term problem in that we are producing so much, and it is so long-lasting in the atmosphere, the other greenhouse gases offer some hope of faster success in reducing global warming. Methane, soot, and other greenhouse emissions are easier to reduce, and what is already in the atmosphere dissipates in months or years, not centuries. Thus, if we can eliminate these greenhouse gases soon, the impact will be immediate, and will buy time for the more difficult problem of reducing CO2.

Beyond climate change, there was a major emphasis on the health of the oceans and ocean species. Roger Payne and Lewis Douglas from the Ocean Alliance reported on new research showing chromium to be a problem pollutant in ocean species. Paul Watson of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society reported on the battle with the Japanese over whaling. And film director Louie Psihoyos presented a premier showing of his documentary The Cove, winner of Sundance and Cannes festival awards. This powerful film highlights the plight of dolphins and the secret industry that kills them. The film opens theatrically in August 2009.

CTO Design Challenge – The Global Water Shortage

A final feature of the FiRe event has become the “CTO Design Challenge.” Chief technology and information officers are given a problem to solve, and a couple of days to solve it. This year the challenge was the looming water shortages in and around San Diego [and the world – Ed.] The team did an outstanding job which we will report more fully as well, but a highlight was the idea of covering canals with anti-evaporation covers, and those with solar cells to collect energy to run the pumps and provide excess energy from an already established right-of-way. Great idea.

Final thought – best FiRe yet. Join the party next year.

Every spring, KPLU technology commentator Mark Anderson (of Strategic News Service) hosts the Future in Review (FiRe) conference in San Diego. The Economist calls it “the best technology conference in the world,” and it’s attended by executives and scientists from the computing and telecommunications industries. Mark has just returned from San Diego, and spoke with KPLU’s Dave Meyer about air and water quality issues that came up at the conference

Listen Now

Sesions include:

A Keynote Conversation with Mark Hurd, Chairman and CEO, Hewlett-Packard

“What We Can Do About Climate Change”:
by Professor V. Ramanathan, Scripps Institute of Oceanography (UCSD)

“Infrastructure 2.0: The Coming Network Revolution”: A panel discussion with Doug Gourlay, Vice President, Data Center Solutions, Cisco; Erik Giesa, VP, Product Management and Product Marketing, F5 Networks; Richard Kagan, VP Marketing, Infoblox; and Mark Thiele, Director, Business Operations for R&D, VMware; hosted by Greg Ness, Senior Director, Infoblox

“How the World Really Works, and Why Technology Will Lead the Economic Rebound”: Mark Anderson; hosted by Stephen Evans, Business Daily, BBC World Service

“The Future of Wireless Broadband”: A panel with Hugh Bradlow, CTO, Telstra; Scott Richardson, Chief Strategy Officer, Clearwire; Fred Kitson, Vice President, Motorola; and Chris Pearson, President, 3G Americas; hosted by Chetan Sharma, President, Chetan Sharma Consulting

And much, much more!   View the complete agenda.

We are also pleased to announce that Tesla Motors is offering test drives to FiRe 2009 participants of the new Roadster Sport.

Just a  few seats are still available. Sign up now!

This week’s exercise in Party Management (what can we give these disparate folks to do, so they will feel important?), no doubt cooked up by some PR firm on K Street in DC, was to have mini tea bag parties around the country.  The real picture, if you ignored Fox TV : groups of 10-100 people, average age 67 (Fox, this is your demographic), whining in the rain about taxes.

IF someone had been at each event, asking: “Do you make less than a quarter of a million dollars in income per year?”, I can guarantee you that almost all of them would have said, Yes.

And then, with their No New Taxes signs on their shoulders, the interviewer could have asked the final question: do you realize that, under Obama’s budget, you will have a tax reduction?  Boy, that would have spoiled their party.

Is this current crisis an IQ test?  Of course it is: life is an IQ test.  Is it Darwinian?  You bet: life is Darwinian (unless you live in Louisiana, which just voted to put Creationism on school curricula).  Will some lose, and some win?  Absolutely.

The days of Karl, and his antics, are really over.  In fact, the Pentagon’s propaganda office was taken apart by the Obama people this week.  Now, the message of the nation will again come from the White House, and the State Department, and not from the Pentagon. 

Staging goofy tea bag parties against tax increases that the people in the crowds would not be paying?  Was it the ghost of Karl? 

Had to be. 

It certainly was not for the benefit of: the town, the county, the state, the country, the world.  Did it benefit the party?  On the face, the answer would be Yes.  But, a day later, when they all realize that they actually were not paying higher taxes?  Will they have that moment?  Are they smart enough? 

That’s the next test.  Who will they be more angry with, since anger is the currency of the current party hacks?  With the party hacks?  Or with Obama, who didn’t raise their taxes after all?

I’m afraid the answer, again, will be (b).

The Blue Lava Technologies product “iLovePhotos” is free software for your Mac that solves a very simple problem: people have too many photos on their hard drive, and they never have time to look at them. iLovePhotos uses facial detection to make it effortless to organize, share, and enjoy your photos. Its desktop software applies advanced technology to automatically create personalized slideshows for your friends and family to watch on the Web, iPhone, and TV. Given thousands of personal photos, iLovePhotos automatically creates new 60-second slideshows every day. It’s like a personalized radio station for your pictures.

iLovePhotos is not creating a photo management platform as much as a photo enjoyment platform. Unlike traditional photo platforms that emphasize archiving, organization, or printing, iLovePhotos sees organizing as a necessary evil. Its technology makes organization extremely fast and simple, but the end goal is to use organizational data to make it effortless to enjoy your photos in a slideshow format on any platform. Put simply: iLovePhotos brings your photos back into your life.

About the FiReStarter program: For the third year in a row, Strategic News Service (SNS) is selecting up to 12 businesses – top startups or businesses with new startup technology – for world promotion, based on nominations by trusted strategic investment SNS Members. We believe that these FiReStarter businesses, which will be integrated into the FiRe 2009 program, will change our world in a positive way. They are businesses we believe you should know about.

For more information about the FiReStarter program, please contact the SNS Programs Director, Sharon Anderson-Morris/”SAM”: sam@stratnews.com.

Last week, I gave a keynote talk at the CRIM Crystal Ball Conference in Montreal, and the speech seemed to be really well received. I had decided ahead of time that the best way to talk about today’s problems was to have a frank conversation about how the world really worked – not how it was supposed to work, nor how we all thought it worked a few years ago, but how it really was working during the already-infamous Bush era.

 This was an era in which many systems were broken, and whole sectors were coming apart, driven by the failures of key players. The media have already blamed the regulators (or lack of regulations), greedy CEOs, off-balance sheet banking practices, unethical hedge fund operators, removal of the uptick rule, general short-selling in wolf packs, the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act, program trading, physicists coming to Wall St., the ethical collapse of the rating agencies, the fall of Fed power, the global liquidity bubble, speculation-driven oil pricing, oil price manipulation by oil providers, and bad luck.

 There is a simpler way to describe what happened: intellectual honesty, and real honesty, went by the boards.

 The people involved in all these things generally knew they wouldn’t work for long, knew they were unethical, knew they were skirting the legal (or were illegal), and knew they were lying to themselves, their families, and their colleagues about the long-term effects of what they were doing.

 I had dinner last week in Washington, D.C., with a top lobbyist, who told me proudly that she had led the charge in repealing the Glass-Steagall Act. (This allowed banks to get involved with non-bank, high-risk activities.) I had heard that the bankers spent $1B to get rid of this iconic piece of learning from the Great Depression; she confirmed it. Ten years later she is 38, and she laughingly told me over hors d’oeuvres that she now recognizes it was a huge mistake, adding that she no longer represents the banks.

 Oops. I guess that’s how you destroy empires.

 Which leaves the obvious unfortunate impression: the banks themselves must have known what a mistake this would be.

 Yesterday, in a lunch discussion with serial entrepreneur Al Davis, we covered all this ground in about an hour, and then he said, “You know, this all comes down to the board of directors.” And that brings us to today’s subject.

 We can blame the regulators who really came from industry, we can blame the bankers and CEOs and their lobbyists, we can blame the politicians who pretended that no regulation was good regulation, we can blame co-presidents George Bush and Dick Cheney. But, with the exception of the last two, there is another layer of governance that should take most, if not all, of the responsibility: the board of directors.

 Too much is made of the symptoms of bad management, and much too little is made of those really responsible for the quality of this management.

 At different times, I’ve written open letters to specific boards, but today I wanted to write an open letter to all boards. If you are a corporate board member, please read this carefully; I’m betting that, after reading it, you’ll agree: you were probably not doing your job.

 Let me start by breaking the neck of the good-old-boy scheme: most board members are friends (or even relatives) of the CEO, or work for him or her. Those who are not – even the most independent “outside” directors – tend to be selected on a rank of the CEO’s ability to direct, manipulate, or intimidate them; OR because they are guaranteed not to look too closely at the company.

 This formation step is the first place where things go wrong.

 A good board of directors should number 9 to 11, and have the following composition:

 The Chairman, often  the past CEO, and certainly NOT the current CEO.

The CEO.

The CFO. This will surprise most readers.

At least half the directors should be “outside” directors.

There may be a rotating spot for one or more employees (the German model).

The General Counsel.

The CTO or CIO should also be considered, since most strategic decisions involve technology inputs that others may miss entirely.

 Outside directors should be just that; not just golf cronies or the targets of interlocking board favors. Rather, they should bring strengths from areas of current or planned company operations.

 In the old model of governance, it was generally agreed that the primary job of the board was to hire and fire the CEO: he/she was its primary, and often its only, point of contact with the company.

 There are some things we can now say about this Old Model:

1. It did little or nothing to prevent corporate fraud and misbehavior.

2. Despite words to the contrary, it did nothing to protect shareholders, and much to protect the CEO.

3. It delivered any pay scheme the CEO wanted, via the Exec or Compensation Committee.

4. It did not prevent the current collapse of today’s many broken systems and companies, but rather encouraged this tragedy; i.e., it didn’t work.

 Let me give a few examples of what I mean by “it didn’t work.”

 AIG wrote insurance in amounts far greater than its total book value, or the value of all its reserves, creating liabilities infinitely beyond its ability to pay. Today, the now-defrocked longtime CEO Hank Greenberg continues to “protest too much” on TV: that he is the good guy, the government got it all wrong, if only he were still in charge all would be fine, the government wrecked his company, and so on.

 How did Hank and his short-term successor, Milton Sullivan, get away with it all? It would appear, among other things, that they used the usual tricks: find famous, busy people who make you look good and have no time to dig deeply into company affairs; and make sure your board is too large, so that nothing ever really happens at board level. In AIG’s case, that number was 17, or about eight more than are really useful.

 Over-large boards are the first sign of an errant CEO.

 How, exactly, did the board let this most egregious set of affairs take place? Obviously, they could not rely solely on their CEO; he’s lost it. But THAT’S WHY THEY ARE THERE: to hire and fire the CEO. This whole board should be named, shamed, and pictured somewhere, so that no one ever hires them again for any but the most menial types of yard work. (We have saved you the trouble. See our “TakeOut Window” below.)

 What about the board of Lehman Brothers? Or Bear Stearns? Who exactly  authorized 30/1 leverage on contracts that no one could understand, in numbers beyond count? Some board members, from the Old Model, would say: Well, that’s a level of detail beyond what we were asked to look at.

 Of course! Because, like Bernie Madoff’s accountant, they wanted you to stand up and sign off on something that was illegal, unethical, or just plain stupid. We can blame the hedge jackal packs, unrestrained by the uptick rule or anyone at home in the SEC, but let’s put the real blame where it belongs: on the board that got the companies into these messes.

 In the New Model, a board member would take the initiative to get answers for him or herself. In the New Model, the CEO looks to the board for real guidance and assistance. In the New Model, the CFO has twin allegiances, to the CEO and to the board. In the New Model, we substitute the charismatic, closed dictator for the engaging, transparent leader.

 In this vein, I’d like to suggest a checklist of questions for new board members:

 1. Are you going to be a good director, or a bad director? Define this now, so you can read it later when you’re under pressure.

 2. What kind of ethical leadership will you bring to the board, and to the company?

 3. How will you know if the company is meeting its Mission, and how will you assist in this?

 4. Who do you answer to? Who else?

 5. Are you willing to be fired or replaced if the company appears headed in the wrong direction? If not, please resign now; you’ll be saving yourself big legal bills later.

 6. Do you accept responsibility for corporate impacts beyond those on shareholders? Impacts on employees? Impacts on customers? Impacts on the planet?

 7. Are you going to miss some meetings, sit quietly, and collect your checks, or will you ask tough questions, make all meetings, and delve into areas needing more explanation?

 8. Are you emotionally prepared to fire the CEO? If circumstances required it, would you be prepared tonight?

 Let me give you a couple of surprising examples of failed boards and failed CEOs, in my opinion.

 Let’s take the two most famous, hero-worshipped idols of the modern corporate age:

   Lou Gerstner, IBM

   Jack Welch, GE

 What if it turned out that Lou smoothed earnings throughout his time as CEO of IBM in order to look great to the Street and to max out his personal compensation plan by keeping stock prices up? What if this smoothing was done illegally or unethically, by ransacking the company’s pension program, violating mandates for funding his own employees’ futures, and taking the money instead to buffer earnings shortfalls?

If that were true, you’d probably say he should go to jail, rather than be a hero. AND you’d say that his board of directors should have known about this transgression all along, and stopped it! Right?

What if it turned out that Jack smoothed earnings throughout his time as CEO of GE in order to look great to the Street and to max out his personal compensation plan by keeping stock prices up? What if this smoothing was done illegally or unethically, by ransacking the company’s insurance reserves, violating government mandates for funding the risk taken by his own insurance firms, and taking the money instead to buffer earnings shortfalls?

If that were true, you’d probably say he should go to jail, rather than be a hero. AND you’d say that his board of directors should have known about this transgression all along, and stopped it! Right?

 This brings us to quarterly earnings reports. Some modern-day CEOs have claimed that the combination of quarterly reporting and Wall Street’s savage punishment of any company not beating pre-set expectations by at least a penny – well, it’s impossible for a CEO, under today’s stock-heavy compensation plan, to stay above the law.

 Remember when SNS broke the story on Microsoft smoothing its earnings, back while Billg was CEO? And then, a bit later, the company’s internal auditor apparently sued the company over this very issue, settled in court, got his payoff, and all the papers were sealed by the court forever?

 See, it really isn’t hard to find these things.

 So maybe the board of directors has another problem to solve: how to pay CEOs.

 Today, it’s all about the stock price: cash for stock prices, bonuses for same, stock grants and stock options for the same thing; often tens of millions in compensation, all keying off the stock price.

 I would like to suggest that all F500 boards, worldwide, instruct their Executive Compensation Committees to immediately restructure the CEO compensation package, in this way:

1. Reduce dependency on quarterly performance, and reward longer-term goals and timeframes.

2. Expand the parameters beyond stock price, to include customer satisfaction, employee engagement, and sustainability. Define these to your own satisfaction.

3. Offer bonuses for attracting and retaining especially important talent, one of the CEO’s most important tasks.

4. When appropriate, also offer incentives for “real” innovation, in everything from processes to products. At the top, make these grants large and rare. At the bottom, make them small and common.

 Great companies don’t fail because of one madman; they fail because of one too-timid board. And great civilizations don’t fail because of one company gone awry; they fail because core beliefs and values fall away, which we’ve seen in the U.S. recently.

 When Rome collapsed, it wasn’t because the city burned. It was because the dream that once was Rome, of a great and civilized empire, stopped burning in the heart of every Roman.

 This is the task of being a board member: to bring that fire to the enterprise, insist that it spread throughout, and make sure it survives through intellectual, and real, honesty.

 Keep in mind: the CEO needs you. If she doesn’t, either fire her or resign.

 Your comments are always welcome.

SKYFIBER, originally founded in 1996 as Dominion Lasercom Inc., has built upon a rich patent portfolio to overcome limitations inherent in earlier generations of free space optical (FSO) technologies and today delivers the industry’s most reliable, cost-effective, and high-value wireless light network solutions. SKYFIBER holds more than 17 granted and pending patents that significantly differentiate its products and services from all other competitors in the market, including the foundational patent for the use of FSO in a point-to-multipoint (PtMP) network environment.

SKYFIBER’s patented technology addresses the rapidly growing global requirements for fast, secure, and affordable wireless communication solutions. SKYFIBER solutions have the flexibility to meet a broad range of customer needs, including mobility backhaul, enterprise and campus area networks, last-mile connectivity, fiber-coupled networking, and emergency response networks.

The demand for next-generation free-space optical technologies is here. SKYFIBER is prepared to lead the industry in providing wireless light networks to connect the world. For more information, please email info@skyfiber.com.

About the FiReStarter program: For the third year in a row, Strategic News Service (SNS) is selecting 12 businesses – top startups or businesses with new startup technology – for world promotion, based on nominations by trusted strategic investment SNS Members. We believe that these FiReStarter businesses, which will be integrated into the FiRe 2009 program, will change our world in a positive way. They are businesses we believe you should know about.

For more information about the FiReStarter program, please contact the SNS Programs Director, Sharon Anderson-Morris/“SAM”: sam@stratnews.com.

The first national, publicly traded ancillary care network services company, American CareSource Holdings offers a comprehensive national network of approximately 2,500 ancillary service providers at over 25,000 sites through its subsidiary, Ancillary Care Services. The company’s ancillary network and management provide a complete outsourced solution for a wide variety of healthcare payors and plan sponsors, including self-insured employers, indemnity insurers, PPOs, HMOs, third-party administrators, and both federal and local governments.

About the FiReStarter program: For the third year in a row, Strategic News Service (SNS) is selecting 12 businesses – top startups or businesses with new startup technology – for world promotion, based on nominations by trusted strategic investment SNS Members. We believe that these FiReStarter businesses, which will be integrated into the FiRe 2009 program, will change our world in a positive way. They are businesses we believe you should know about.

For more information about the FiReStarter program, please contact the SNS Programs Director, Sharon Anderson-Morris/“SAM”: sam@stratnews.com.

Since the inception of Rearden Commerce in late 1999, founder and CEO Patrick Grady has been building the company in its mission to revolutionize the way companies and individuals buy and manage services online, and to deliver the ultimate Internet personal assistant. Its flagship product, the Rearden Personal Assistant™, is an intelligent Web and mobile application that provides companies and individuals with one place to conveniently purchase a variety of services, such as travel, entertainment, shipping, and conferencing. Companies can establish and enforce corporate spending policies that deliver significant cost savings, while employees can easily find the services they need at the best value. The Rearden Personal Assistant is the only online destination one need visit to find and book a range of services, whether based on company policies, personal preferences, location, or the context of a given project.

About the FiReStarter program: For the third year in a row, Strategic News Service (SNS) is selecting 12 businesses – top startups or businesses with new startup technology – for world promotion, based on nominations by trusted strategic investment SNS Members. We believe that these FiReStarter businesses, which will be integrated into the FiRe 2009 program, will change our world in a positive way. They are businesses we believe you should know about.

For more information about the FiReStarter program, please contact the SNS Programs Director, Sharon Anderson-Morris/”SAM”: sam@stratnews.com.