Springwise.com: There's a new on-line shopping retailer who just might revolutionize the purchase of pre-packaged consumer goods: Alice. Here's the scoop: "Just launched into beta this week, Alice offers more than 6,000 unique products from hundreds of different manufacturers. Its prices are 20 percent to 30 percent lower than those at other online stores, it says, and shipping is always free. US consumers begin by creating a free account and then selecting a list of all their favourite products, ordering only the items they need right then. Each shipment is bundled together in a single 'Alice' box and delivered directly to the consumer’s door. Meanwhile, Alice organizes all the products on the member's list, finds coupons and deals for them, and reminds them to reorder when they are likely to be running low." Free shipping? Coupons? Up to 30 percent off? Where do I sign up? Oh, wait. They don't ship to Alaska. For those of you lucky enough to be in the Lower 48 states, check out Household goods, straight from manufacturers for the details on this innovative business concept.

San Francisco Chronicle: Looks like US-based biotech is in need of a big shot of innovation to continue to make profitable discoveries and remain globally competitive. California is especially in need of some new energy to keep its world-famous biotech industry pumping. Tom Abate explains some of the ways biotech firms can keep on going even in tough times: "As money becomes tighter, biotech firms are keeping their core staffs lean and outsourcing every function they can to stretch their cash. Many companies also are moving beyond drug discovery - which can have huge payoffs but takes a long time - into fields like creating diagnostic tests that help determine with greater precision whether a patient is likely to respond to a given remedy. 'This is one of the best ways to control medical costs and improve medical outcomes,' said Jeffrey Peterson, chief executive of Target Discovery, a Palo Alto firm that is developing diagnostics to guide ovarian cancer treatments." There are other ways that biotech firms can diversify in order to keep the lights on until the return of better market conditions. Find out more in Abate's Innovation called vital for biotech to survive.

Patent Baristas.com: In other biotech news, a renewed call for increased exclusive rights to medical discoveries is creating quite a stir in the Obama administration. Stephen Albainy-Jenei has some pertinent facts to share from his topical post, Administration’s First Volley on Biosimilars: 7 Years of Exclusivity is Long Enough. "The Biotech Industry Organization has called for 14 years of market exclusivity, while generic makers want the period limited to no more than five years of protection. Not to be confused with patents, data exclusivity is the period after the FDA approves a product during which an imitator can’t rely on the innovator’s clinical data for safety and effectiveness. It can run during and longer than the period of patent protection." Why not give biotech this increase in protection? Here's the FTC's position (which surely influenced the White House stance): "The potential harm posed by such a period is that firms will direct scarce R&D dollars toward developing low-risk clinical and safety data for drug products with proven mechanisms of action rather than toward new inventions to address unmet medical needs. Thus, a new 12- to 14-year exclusivity period imperils the efficiency benefits of a FOB [Follow-on Biologics] approval process in the first place, and it risks over-investment in well-tilled areas." Whether or not biotech can manage to sway all the President's men remains to be seen but one thing is sure: biotech would definitely benefit from a favorable policy change just as greatly as FOB firms would suffer.

PEHub.com: Connie Loizos recently interviewed San Francisco-based True Ventures' co-founder Tom Callaghan and learned more about the venture capital fund's recipe for success. From Loizos' The True Story of True Ventures, Callaghan explains the fund's mix of ingredients: "We have three products. The first we call our 'real deal product,' which is one where we write you a check for $1.25 million for 25 percent of your company. We have the 'seed deal product,' which is a check for $500,000 for 20 percent of your company. And we have our 'super seed product,' which is $250,000, for 10 percent of your company. There, the entrepreneur has an idea but he’s not really sure if it’ll turn into something. We’ll still write him that check, though, because you know what? That’s one-tenth of one percent of our fund, and because our LPs want us to take risks. It also means that if a company sells for $10 million or $20 million, that still makes us a lot of money." That's a perfect trifecta of opportunities for a sound return on a variety of investments. The rest of the interview should be a fine way to occupy yourself for a few minutes and plus, you'll gain some valuable knowledge in the bargain. Don't be shy: click the link!

Wisconsin Technology Network: Here's a primer on the benefits of choosing either a trademark or trade secret to protect your businesses intellectual property: The Best Protection: Trade Secret or Patent? Author Gina Carter's piece has both the necessary length and breadth to warrant more than a cursory review, including gems like this: "Importantly, unlike a patent, owning a trade secret does not come with exclusive rights. While the owner can take action against third parties who misappropriate the secret, the owner has no recourse if a third party independently invents the information, discovers the information through reverse engineering, or obtains the information due to accidental disclosure. Once any of these events occurs, the owner loses his or her property rights in the secret." Trade secrets have their own maintenance costs, much like a trademark or patent, but there are some important distinguishing differences. For those, you'll just have to visit the WTN site and read Carter's full guide.

Bonus piece o' the day: ArsTechnica.com's Casey Johnson throws his hat in the ring with NRC wants government to support venture-funded businesses.