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What Spark does is, well, just about everything to help entrepreneurs to build a better business, or even to start one. Some of the services that Spark provides are the Business Accelerator, Online Business Planning, and, of course, Financing.

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Filed under: Ann Arbor Spark | Ann Arbor, MI | Education & Training | Financing | Start-Ups | Venture Capital

What's out there to help future entrepreneurs to succeed? As previously mentioned, there are many options available for students. As it turns out, there are also plenty of opportunities that aren't run by a university.

One organization that is trying to help innovation in the area is Ann Arbor Spark. The website says that "Ann Arbor Spark is a public-private partnership whose mission is to advance innovation-based economic development in the greater Ann Arbor region." It's an organization drawing from some of the businesses, communities, universities, and government resources in and around the Ann Arbor area.

What Spark does is, well, just about everything to help entrepreneurs to build a better business, or even to start one. Some of the services that Spark provides are the Business Accelerator, Online Business Planning, and, of course, Financing:

In addition to attempting to connect entrepreneurs with venture capitalists and Angel funds, whose mission "is to make equity investments in early stage and emerging growth companies," Spark also provides lots of information on credit enhancement and Tax-Exempt Industrial Revenue Bonds (IRBs).

Spark has received great press from Fortune's 100 best places to live and launch, particularly for its role in The Michigan Pre-Seed Capital Fund. Spark also runs a Regional Incubator for interested businesses.

Spark's network is very large, and there is much more information available on www.annarborspark.org. The website is a useful tool for anybody interested in getting help with their business. Also, as an added bonus, Spark keeps track of positive news regarding Michigan and its businesses. It's not surprising to see that Spark has received awards for all its tremendous, and necessary, services that it offers to everybody.

What's worse is that, of all the (meager) investments done by Michigan-based venture capital firms in the first three quarters of 2001, only 5.9% of those investments were given to Michigan-based companies!

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Filed under: Financing | Start-Ups | Venture Capital

When trying to bring an innovatoion to market, one of the largest issues is always money. True, there can be design, manufacturing and production issues, too, but those can usually be solved with time and money. And time can be bought.

So how does a fledgling company get money? There's always venture capital, right? Well, yes, if you live in California or Massachusets. Those two states accounted for 54.28% of the U.S.'s annual venture capital investments between 1999-2001. In that time period, Michigan was ranked a distant 22nd in the nation, with only 0.41% of the annual venture capital investments, slightly behind Arizona, which ranked 21st with 0.50%.

What's worse is that, of all the (meager) investments done by Michigan-based venture capital firms in the first three quarters of 2001, only 5.9% of those investments were given to Michigan-based companies! Michigan ranked 30th in in-state investments as percentage of total investments made by state venture capital firms. But, Arizona ranked 5th in that same time period with 57.0% of their VC investments staying in Arizona!

That same article reads, "While Michigan’s venture financing has grown considerably in recent years, the level of seed stage venture capital financing in Michigan is still weak." Its recommendations include to "continue efforts to encourage the development of venture capital and seed funds in Michigan," and to "encourage universities to create early stage funds to promote technology start-ups." In the very near future, I plan to examine how universities such as the University of Michigan present opportunities for their students to navigate their way through the early stages of bringing innovation to market.