Business incubator seeks to aid job growth

A business incubator that seeks to nurture start-up business from around the world as well as some from northern Nevada is set to begin operation in Reno early next year.

Organizers believe the incubator could generate 400 to 500 new jobs a year once it's in full operation.

The privately funded, nonprofit Center for Unique Business Enterprises CUBE, for short plans to bring a strongly disciplined approach to the creation of new businesses.

The goal: Creation of new companies and more jobs in the region and the development of more opportunities for investors who are hungry to do deals in northern Nevada, says Ky Good, a co-founder of the incubator and chairman of its board of directors.

The nonprofit business incubator will provide mentoring and other support for young businesses.

A related for-profit company, C4 Venture Accelerator, will provide a group of seasoned executives to help entrepreneurs prepare to win funding from angel investors or venture capitalists.

The incubator expects to open Jan. 22 with five to eight companies, and the organizers expect that as many as 20 companies might sign up by the end of 2009.

Gearing up will be no small task as organizers expect they'll need to sift through as many as 900 business plans a year to find the 20 or so proposals that make sense.

Good says organizers expect that companies will be in the incubator for two or three years before standing on their own.

"It's going to be 12- and 15-hour days for them," he says. "They will have milestones they have to meet." The incubator's Web site cautions that the program isn't designed to be summer camp for entrepreneurs.

Organizers have focused their recruitment on companies in three industries green and alternative energies, security and nutraceuticals. Also getting a close look will be start-ups in industries such as business software, mining and gaming technologies and biomedical devices.

And CUBE and C4 Venture Accelerator will consider companies that fall outside their primary focus so long as they have management teams that are willing to learn and products that are unique and can be quickly scaled up, Good says.

Some of those companies are likely to come from northern Nevada. Organizers of the incubator see a growing pool of young entrepreneurial talent in the region, Good says.

At the same time, organizers will be talking to entrepreneurs from across the nation and across the world, pitching them on the business advantages of Nevada as well as the quality of life in the Reno-Tahoe region.

Both Good and and Norman Smith, the executive director of the project, have extensive backgrounds in international business.

Some of the start-ups, Good says, are likely to be recruited by venture capital groups that like an entrepreneur's idea but want to see a more-developed company before they're willing to provide financing.

The incubator will start operation as a virtual program, but organizers are looking for low-cost space to house start-up companies.

A physical presence would allow start-ups to share costs copiers, receptionists and allow entrepreneurs to provide support to one another.

Along with space, organizers also are making calls on potential sponsors and supporters such as economic development agencies or businesses that want to provide services-in-kind, seed funding or other help.

"If the community is involved, the community will not let it fail," says Good.

Lynne Keller, the former general manager of the Gold Dust West Casino and a member of the advisory team to the project, says she believes the incubator is a key element in further diversification of the northern Nevada economy.

Other members of the advisory team range from executives of the University of Nevada, Reno, to lawyers, bankers and successful entrepreneurs.

Another business incubator is in the planning stages near Desert Research Institute. DRI officials say that facility is likely to draw many of its tenant companies from efforts to commercialize research conducted at DRI.

Jeff Pickett of DRI Research Parks Ltd. says recent efforts have focused on development of the infrastructure necessary to support a business incubator at DRI.