We had a great kick off session to BES last week. With candid advice about the skills you need and the reality of working in a small company from Mikael Maksimov from Faron Pharmaceuticals. We changed gears to a more philosophical lecture on Scientific Innovation in Business & the Role of Academia from Yrjö Neuvo. Juhani Lahdenperä from Biotech Startup Management Oy (BSUM) gave some great advice on Developing Commercialisation Strategies and the students even got the chance do some practical examples in teams.

Today’s lecture kicked off with Accounting in Practice with Kaj Grussner from KPMG. We switched gears to talk about ICT entrepreneurship with Pasi Malinen from Brahea. This was a very lively, colourful and entertaining talk. He shared the Socialnomics video “Social Media Revolution” which is pretty telling for how ICT developments are changing the way things are done nowadays. EDIT: I found the Fat Boy Slim version & being from near Brighton I couldn’t resist updating the link.

On a completely different note. Here’s a fun TED talk I came across this morning ” Life Lessons from an Ad Man” sees Rory Sutherland giving a very entertaining talk. For those who are interested in marketing, communication, decision-making, value perception and creation (and want a laugh along the way) this is a very worthwhile way to spend 15 minutes. Lessons from an Ad Man – Rory Sutherland