First Off

Lucy: What’s up, gang? Here’s a fun task for you. For a story I’m working on, I want to know which companies…*drumroll*… have the coolest business cards in Boston tech. Ideally, the final piece will be along the lines of the top 10 creative conference room names story we did during the summer. Hit me: lmaffei@americaninno.com

Now, let’s kick a Beat.

The Big One

A breakdown on the day’s biggest Inno story.

Lucy: Harnek Gulati likes building things.

His latest creation, a startup based at the Harvard Innovation Labs called MakerFleet, combines the sharp focus of an engineer with the world domination ambition of an early-stage founder.

The idea? Connecting the manufacturing world to the Internet through a worldwide network of 3D printing ‘farms.’

Gulati, a recent computer science graduate from Harvard, moved his first steps into the entrepreneurial world by building something very tangible: wood watches. The Kickstarter campaign he launched to fund his project raised over $75K in less than a month.

With demand for watches quickly rising, Gulati noticed how hard manufacturing a product for hundreds of people was. Also, he had a dream.

“I’ve always had the dream of building a factory that was connected to the Internet,” Gulati, 23, said. “Didn’t know how to build it, but I was, like, ‘I can learn all this stuff.’”

This story was written in partnership with NBC Boston, which produced the embedded video for this feature. Check it out.

In The Know

The Inno stories you need to read today.

11 Startups from 11 Cities to Watch this Giving Tuesday— BostInno
Artificially Intelligent Bookkeeping Service Raises $18M Series A— BostInno
Is Boston the Best City to Find a Job in the World? This Global Study Says So — BostInno
UMass Lowell opens defense-focused workforce institute — BBJ

Elsewhere in Inno

Stories from around the Inno network we think you’ll dig.

Inside Amazon’s Newest Cashierless Convenience Store in Chicago — Chicago Inno
D.C. Startup Sorcero is Creating a Search Engine for Your Business Data — DC Inno
This Company Wants to Bring the ‘Power of the Sun’ to Anyone— Rhode Island Inno

Making Moves

Inside the people, companies and organizations making moves in Boston.

Sri: The future is happening right now: The Second International Summit on Human Genome Editing is underway and scientist He Jiankui, a Chinese-born, American-trained biophysicist, said that the second CRISPR baby or gene-edited baby is already on its way. Jiankui claims to have created the world’s first gene-edited babies — a set of twins, with CRISPR-edited DNA. Jiankui was working on making the twin girls HIV resistant.

Lucy: In other M&A news, QDiscovery, an eDiscovery and digital forensic solutions provider, announced the acquisition of Evidox, a Boston-based eDiscovery provider with a legal-centric approach. The acquisition expands QDiscovery’s presence in New England with additional offices in Boston and Portland, ME.

Sri: According to a new survey that polled the best American cities to start an online business, Boston came in at 23. The first on the list was Detroit, MI, followed by Cleveland and Cincinnati. The study was based on factors including venture setup costs, standard of living, rent, access to financing, living costs, unemployment benefits and health care.

New Money

Your daily funding roundup.

Sri: Educational fintech startup LearnLux raised $2M in a seed round from Ashton Kutcher’s investment firm Sound Ventures, Salesforce’s Marc Benioff, Underscore VC and former Wealthfront CEO Adam Nash. LearnLux partners with businesses to sell a ‘digital financial wellness product.’

Lucy: Numerated, a financial technology company offering banks a real-time lending and growth platform, announced it has closed $8M in additional financing—bringing its total funding to $17M. Current Numerated investors Venrock, FIS and FINTOP Capital led the financing.

Sri: Corvus Insurance, a Boston-based startup that predicts and prevents losses for food and pharma companies, raised $10M from .406 Ventures and Hudson Structured, with participation from Bain Capital Ventures. It collects data from IoT sensors, videos and social media.

Player Personnel

Who’s moving where.

Lucy: ClearGov, a provider of transparency, budgeting and forecasting solutions for local governments, announced that Sarah Webber and Vartan Hagopian have joined its executive leadership team. Webber, VP of client success, is a former director at Kronos Incorporated; Hagopian, VP of sales, was head of sales at PeopleFluent.

In The Community

The events and happenings to know about tonight and this week.

Sri: Interested in learning about Origin Protocol, that’s building a platform for creating decentralized marketplaces? Head over to the Boston Crypto Meetup next Wednesday, Dec. 5, from 6 to 9 p.m. at 501 Bolyston St. The event kicks off with networking and drinks. Details here.

Read This Right Now

Insight and analysis from the community and beyond.

Lucy: What’s like to transition from CMO to first-time CEO? In a piece for business.com, Mike Volpe, CEO of Lola.com and former CMO at Cybereason, shares three pieces of advice. No. 3: Embrace imposter syndrome. “One of the most important revelations I’ve had during my transition from a CMO to CEO is that no one knows everything. At the start of my career, I assumed that the CEO had all the answers. I was wrong.”