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KPMG announced their commitment to strengthening the Canadian impact investing marketplace and driving social innovation as a founding partner of the MaRS Centre for Impact Investing (CII).

"Toronto-based engineer and venture capitalist Tom Rand has come out with what I'd call the most important book of the year. Kick The Fossil Fuel Habit: 10 Clean Technologies to Save Our World is a flashy five-pound coffee table book available everywhere. Instead of photos of Renaissance art or horses, it features glossy spreads of giant solar farms, geothermal energy installations and state-of-the-art wind complexes. It's weirdly beautiful. Not because geothermal energy installations are gorgeous. It's thrilling to finally see so many potential solutions to the gravest and most intractable problems laid out so clearly."

Looks like Toronto/Ontario/Canada is not the only place having problems... A report released by the Center for an Urban Future, a Manhattan-based think tank, finds that while New York City is home to several of the world's leading scientific research institutions, these universities and research centers have not yet become powerful catalysts for entrepreneurship and local economic development the way similar institutions have in a number of other regions. The study concludes that New York has long failed to harness the full potential of its pre-eminent academic research institutions to build a meaningful innovation economy; an enormous missed opportunity given that the city desperately needs to diversify its economy and cultivate new engines of job growth.

Donors are placing nonprofits on the hot seat to measure social performance. Problem is, there is little agreement on what those metrics should be. Professor Alnoor Ebrahim on how nonprofit managers should respond. Key concepts include: * Rather than simply complying with the demands of the most powerful actors, nonprofit leaders need to focus their attention on accountabilities that really matter for achieving their missions. * Measuring results is valuable as a discipline for nonprofit managers, even if they don't find universal metrics for social impact. * We might not see agreement on a common set of metrics in the social sector for a while, but could see a convergence on what constitutes critical reflective learning processes within the organization.

Article about Tom Rand's geothermally cooled, solar-powered hostel

The review: a must-read for product engineers. "A perfect addendum to the works of Donald Norman, The Human Factor explores a number of examples in which major engineering problems and disasters initially attributed to user error were approached from a humanist perspective, and simple enhancements with the user in mind have helped prevent future catastrophes from airplane malfunction to nuclear power plant explosions. Vicente does a wonderful job of explaining with the phrase "user error" is often used erroneously, and attention given to the way a product is used, not just the way it is intended to be used by engineers, will continue to produce safer, more efficient products and avoid unnecessary accidents."

Since ancient times, people have believed that breakthrough ideas come from the brains of geniuses with awesome rational powers. In recent years, however, the paradigm has begun to shift toward the notion that the source of creativity lies "out there," in the network of connections between people and ideas. In this provocative book, Richard Ogle crystallizes the nature of this shift, and boldly outlines "a new science of ideas." The key resides in what he calls "idea-spaces," a set of nodes in a network of people (and their ideas) that cohere and take on a distinctive set of characteristics leading to the generation of breakthrough ideas. These spaces are governed by nine laws--illuminated in individual chapters with fascinating stories of dramatic breakthroughs in science, business, and art. "Smart World" will change forever the way we think about creativity and innovation.

The "singularity"--in which technological change becomes so rapid and so profound that our bodies and brains will merge with our machines.\n The Singularity Is Near portrays what life will be like after this event--a human-machine civilization where our experiences shift from real reality to virtual reality and where our intelligence becomes nonbiological and trillions of times more powerful than unaided human intelligence. In practical terms, this means that human aging and pollution will be reversed, world hunger will be solved and our bodies and environment transformed by nanotechnology to overcome the limitations of biology, including death. We will be able to create virtually any physical product just from information, resulting in radical wealth creation. In addition to outlining these fantastic changes, Kurzweil also considers their social and philosophical ramifications.

The Green Energy Act Finance Forum is taking place at the MaRS Centre on January 29, 2010. Tom Rand, MaRS Cleantech Advisor, states, "The one-day event, held at the MaRS Centre, was put together to "unlock" local capital and help accelerate the flow of investment into Ontario's booming renewable power sector."

International financial experts meet in Toronto to encourage local investment in renewable power at The Green Energy Act Finance Forum on January 29, 2010.

Canasia Solar Corp., a wholly owned subsidiary of Canasia Power Corp. announced they are pleased to welcome Mr. Tom Rand as Special Advisor to their Board.

Light From A Stone, a MaRS Client, has just launched a new product. Light From A Stone combines powerful LED lights, fibre-optic cable and concrete to create a new dimension in lighting.

The booming brain-fitness industry hopes to help with computer puzzles designed to sharpen your mental power. Baycrest and MaRS launched a company, Cogniciti, that aims to develop brain fitness products based on scientific principles introduced by the Rotman team.

Tom Adams, Independent Energy and Environmental Advisor, and Tom Rand, author of Kick the Fossil Fuel Habit and Senior Advisor at the MaRS Discovery District discussed the benefits and drawbacks of geothermal power on Business News Network - Headline on July 6th, 2011.

Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada provides free up-to-date access to local and global market reports (via subscription only). Market reports on the following industries are included: manufacturing, materials, aerospace and defense, agriculture (technology and food), arts, automotive, bio-tech, building products, chemicals, consumer products, electric power, environment, fish and seafood, forest, health, IT, metals, ocean tech, oil and gas, plastics, rail and urban transit, space, and tourism.