Resources for Austin’s Startups from CoA’s Emerging Tech Program

2 comments / Posted on 27. Oct, 2009 by Royal Frasier in Startup 101

A recent ReadWriteWeb article got us thinking – what local government initiatives are out there to help the local startup community? So, we did a bit of investigating and here is what we found out:

I sat down with with Eve Richter, coordinator for the City of Austin’s Emerging Technology Program, to discuss the program and Austin services available to the local startup community.

She explained that the Emerging Tech Program’s main goal is “to attract, retain, and facilitate the growth of emerging technology firms in Austin.” That includes Austin startups. The Emerging Tech Program consults with Austin startups to help them meet their networking, financing, market development and business development needs. If you would like to take advantage of any of these services, contact Eve Richter at eve.richter@ci.austin.tx.us.

Other City resources and partners available to the startup community include:

Greater Austin Chamber of Commerce: In need of data on Austin? The chamber has loads of spreadsheets available for you to research the area you’ll be running your startup. Also, they provide a Business Retention & Expansion program aimed at fostering “an innovative and diverse business community”.

Small Business Development Program: SBDP encompasses many new business solutions; however the most useful to startups seems to be the BizAid Program, created to help entrepreneurs move from one growth phase to another.

Austin Entrepreneurs Network: AEN offers help for an array of startup issues including networking, mentoring, and funding. They’ve also compiled a very comprehensive list of Austin resources for startups ranging from networking to VC funding sources.

Austin Technology Incubator: A partner of the City of Austin, ATI “works with early stage technology companies to increase their odds of success and decrease their time to capital and markets.” ATI includes a Wireless, IT, Clean Energy, and BioScience incubator.

The life of these services are largely based on the demand for them. If you read about a City resource you found interesting or potentially useful to your startup, contact them – show that there is a need.

For more resource ideas, see the ETP’s website.

Posted by Royal Frasier http://twitter.com/royalfrasier Royal Frasier writes the Informavore column for Austin Startup, covering everything from emerging data applications to charts that will have you drooling. She has a particular interest in spreading the value of better predictions and recognized relationships from mining, visualizing, and applying data for different situations and tasks. That or just spilling over the newest data porn. When not digging up information on the Web, Royal enjoys playing Frisbee at Zilker park, kayaking, perusing creative design magazines and sites, reading some elitist fictional novel, or just planning her next adventure. Royal is a PR hacker by day and works with a highly skilled team to bring early-stage technology companies to market To read more posts click here.

Tags: Austin Emerging Tech Program, Eve Richter, Featured, Resources