Working so small business CAN BE
Incubator offers entrepreneurs equipment, expertise to get started
August 7, 2005
Hazleton Standard-Speaker
By Mark Katchur
Have an idea for a new business, but not sure where to turn?
The Greater Hazleton Business Innovation Center is, literally, a place to start.
Local business incubator CAN BE opened the center earlier this year to assist and provide space for eight new technology-related companies.
For their rent – as low as $300 a month in some cases – entrepreneurs get access to broadband Internet, a copy machine, a secretary, and other services that new businesses often struggle to pay for.
“It's the ideal place for people who are starting a business and need help,” said David Haupt, spokesman for CAN DO, which is behind CAN BE. “Four of five new businesses fall in the first five years. Four of five businesses started in an incubator succeed.”
Equally important, officials say, is advice available at the center from at least 10 local mentors – from accountants to lawyers to marketing strategists.
Penn State University is on board, as well; tenants can talk to professors from the Hazleton campus or even scientists from University Park 's research and development department.
The goal now is to put the center's resources to work.
“I'm no sure many people know what is available to them here,” said Joseph Barrett, director of CAN BE – Community Association for New Business Entrepreneurship.
Brian Reese, the center's first tenant, found out.
Reese joined AeroSolutions, a Boulder, Colo.,-based company that upgrades cellular telephone towers, last year as vice president of operations and worked out of his Drums home for nine months.
He pitched an idea for a satellite office on the East Coast, and officials agreed. A call to CAN DO seeking a vacant office put him in touch with Barrett, and his business opened in the center in April.
He's not sure his spinoff business would have made it without help from the center.
“I would think it would have been much more costly and much more painful,” Reese said. “I probably would still be in the throes of it.”
With Reese settled in, there are four more offices and three light manufacturing warehouses available at the center, just off Rotary Drive in the Valmont Industrial Park .
There has been some interest, Barrett said.
One local entrepreneur developed a new fly fishing lure, and needs help casting a mold for mass production.
Another wants to start a tool-and-die company, and may rent one of the manufacturing spaces, which average 2,325 square feet.
The cost to rent one of the four available offices is $311 to $427 per month depending on size. The rooms range from 460 to 650 square feet.
“We handle snow removal, trash removal; just about everything is taken care of,” Barrett said. Tenants must pay for telephone service.
Also, the facility is located in a Keystone Innovation Zone, so there are tax crdits available, stipends to pay interns, and other savings.
Garry Miller has an office n the Innovation Center, but he's not starting a new business. Rather, Miller represents PennTAP – the Pennsylvania Technology Assistance Program, an initiative of Penn State.
He can help connect entrepreneurs with PSU professors and the school's research and development department. He also helps them find grant funding set aside for startups.
Eleven federal agencies, such as NASA, the Department of Defense and others, are required to spend $2.5 billion a year on small businesses.
Through the federal resources, entrepreneurs may be eligible for $100,000 over the first six months, and up to an additional $750,000.
Some agencies also share technology. Miller has a list of thousands of NASA ideas developed for the space program but no longer in use.
“They're looking to transfer out these technologies, and the're there for the taking,” he said. “A NASA scientist might not be thinking about what something could be used for outside of his application.”
NASA, for instance, designed energy-absorbing material for spacesuits, then offered it to NASCAR to ease crashes in stock car racing.
“What about the auto industry?” Miller asked. “Maybe someone around here can find a way to use the technology in their passenger cars.”
Entrepreneurs don't have to be developing space-age technology to set up in the Innovation Center, however. Any business even remotely technology-related, such as one that is Internet-based, is eligible for the incubator.
People that have no business experience but fresh ideas can benefit from the center, Barrett believes.
“If they're even thinking about a business, they need to come here and talk,” Miller said.
Although AeroSolutions' home office was already established in Colorado, Reese's new branch qualified for assistance through the Innovation Center.
Starting from scratch, Reese accepted office furniture and computers donated by PPL. He also receives technical support and holds meetings in a community conference room that will be available to al of the center's tenants.
“These are the little things that sound so simple, until you're actually starting,” Reese said.
Once the only employee in Hazleton, Reese now has two others working alongside, and may hire two more by the end of the year.
He would like for his office to expand beyond its space in the center, but acknowledges “that's not in the near future.” He's happy for now to be working with CAN BE.
Barrett said businesses in similar incubators typically stay three to five years.
“Hopefully, they outgrow this facility and have solid footing to go off on their own,” he said. “But even when they go off, they can still get help from the incubator.”
CAN BE officials hope to outgrow the facility, too. There are plans for a new building right next door if the Innovation Center is successful.
Others who have supported the center include Ben Franklin Technology Partners, Luzerne County and the Great Valley Technology Alliance.
For more information, call 455-8834 or visit www.canbe.biz.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
||
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
||
 |
 |
|
||||
