Automation Alley and Macomb-OU INCubator are making up the core of a new regional alliance for economic development - the Business Accelerator Network for Southeast Michigan.
The new collaboration brings together Metro Detroit's four major business accelerators - Automation Alley, Macomb-OU INCubator, Ann Arbor SPARK, and TechTown - so they can share resources and strategy. The idea is to work together in order to more effectively play the hands they're dealt and to grow local start-ups and small businesses.
"For southeast Michigan to be great, we need to embrace the notion that we need to grow our own," says David Egner, executive director of the New Economy Initiative, which is supporting the network with a $3 million grant over three years.
The business accelerators have already been quite successful on their own. They have invested $18 million in 339 start-up companies that have created more than 1,000 jobs and have helped secure more than $101.2 million in additional capital for local businesses.
"That's one year," Egner says. "That's not even our best year. I think more will be coming."
Enabling such collaboration is nothing new. Other major metropolitan regions have utilized regional partnerships to reinvent their economies and images. For instance, the Pittsburgh Regional Alliance harnesses the economic strengths of the entire 10-county area in the southwest section of Pennsylvania to continually create new businesses and jobs. The Business Accelerator Network for Southeast Michigan hopes to mimic that success.
"To me this is a perfect example of regional cooperation," says Ken Rogers, executive director of Automation Alley.
As one of the Top 10 technology
organizations in the U.S., Automation Alley is the big dog in this group. It could stand alone, but its leadership looks forward to utilizing the resources of fellow organizations to save on time and money spent on developing its own. The Macomb-OU INCubator, which is just getting started, sees this as a big hand up in building its organization.
"By all means, it's about the businesses," says David Spencer, executive director of the Macomb OU INCubator. "It's about the people they hire."
Source: David Egner, executive Director of the New Economy Initiative; Ken Rogers, executive director of Automation Alley; and David Spencer, executive director of the Macomb OU INCubator
Writer: Jon Zemke
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