RMII readies to help region’s entrepreneurs

In what could become a model for interagency cooperation in Northern Colorado, eight public and private organizations are coming together to form the Rocky Mountain Innovation Initiative.

The not-for-profit organization will leverage regional resources for assisting entrepreneurs through the often-arduous journey of developing and growing their businesses. RMII is the result of a partnership between the cities of Fort Collins, Greeley and Loveland, Larimer County, Colorado State University, the Northern Colorado Economic Development Corp., Colorado State University Research Foundation and Platte River Power Authority. Each agency will have a representative on the RMII board.

RMII will be led by Mark Forsyth, who has served as the executive director for the Fort Collins Technology Incubator since March. Forsyth’s role will be to oversee the regional umbrella of RMII. He said that additional staff will eventually be hired – specifically a point-person for the Loveland Innovation Center – but that the roles and responsibilities have not all been hammered out yet. The program will seek to grow an already blossoming group of volunteers.

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Forsyth explained that RMII will not be an entirely new set of programs for local startups, but instead will be a combination of existing services available throughout the region brought under a single program.

“It expands our network of advisers, service providers and investors,” Forsyth said.

Assets in the mix

RMII will use many of the processes and models that are already in place at the Fort Collins Technology Incubator, which will be renamed the Fort Collins Innovation Center. Additionally, Greeley and Loveland will extend the tools and resources of their economic gardening programs.

“Each community brings its own unique assets into the mix,” Forsyth said.

One of the major expansions under the RMII umbrella will be the addition of a Loveland Innovation Center. A physical location has not been selected yet, but Forsyth said the group is hoping to find something in the downtown area. He added that eventually RMII would like to open an office in Greeley, but that there is not “a burning need for space immediately.”

More immediate are the needs for space in Loveland and new space in Fort Collins. The Fort Collins Innovation Center will continue the search for a new location that it began several months ago. Forsyth said a committee, headed by Fort Collins economic adviser Mike Freeman, reviewing options for an expanded site for the Innovation Center.

The hope is to bring all of the incubator companies in need of space under one roof so that the cost of services will be reduced. Forsyth said that several developers have come forward willing to discuss what the Innovation Center’s needs would be.

The Loveland Innovation Center will not officially launch until 2008. Betsy Hale, business development manager for the city, said that this is not the first time that Loveland has looked at this type of program. In late 2006, the city began to ponder the possibility of creating a traditional bricks-and-mortar incubator. But city officials decided that it was not in the best interest of the community for Loveland to become a landlord instead leaving that to the private sector, Hale explained. She said that Forsyth approached the city in the summer to discuss the idea for RMII.

“We hope that RMII will be a sophisticated network of service delivery that is staged and phased,” she said, explaining that what services a company receives will be determined by its maturity and needs. RMII will walk companies through the different steps of business development, she said.

Having the ability to package a gamut of services quickly will make a big difference.

“It will reduce the frustration. It will streamline the process,” Hale said.

Improved retention

Hale recalled the recent loss of Loveland technology startup Rebit Inc. She said that the company was looking for a variety of services to help it grow its media storage business. The services were available in Northern Colorado, but there was no mechanism in place for Rebit to access them easily. When the company found all it needed in Longmont, it moved there. Hale sees that as a big loss because the company very much wanted to remain in Loveland.

Hale said that the formation of RMII is a “baby-step” toward retaining local startups.

“It’s really about the establishment of the group,” she said. Loveland hopes that the city’s “seeding” of the organization will eventually lead to a self-sufficient model, she explained.

As a first step, RMII is seeking a physical location in Loveland. Hale explained that the group is not looking for free space, but rather for below-market leases like the city of Fort Collins is currently offering incubator companies.

Hale said that a partnership with a local building owner could be mutually beneficial. For example, an owner of a property in the enterprise zone in Loveland stands to receive a 12.5 percent state income tax credit on the value of the donation of space, she explained.

The availability of resources is one of the major issues RMII will address. Forsyth hopes that the large footprint of RMII will help to draw more attention to the region and to the companies using the network. Specifically, he hopes that it will create enough critical mass in Northern Colorado to attract the attention of venture capital firms and angel investors.

“Access to capital has been one of the biggest limiters for our local entrepreneurs,” he said.

The program will also attract entrepreneurs to the region. Forsyth said he has fielded several calls in recent months from startups and entrepreneurs from outside of the region. In fact, one of the newest incubator additions, Czero Solutions, is relocating from Colorado Springs.