By Ohio Development Services Agency

Ohio House Bill 64, Section 257.90, requires the Ohio Development Services Agency to produce a publicly available report mapping and reviewing entrepreneurial business incubators in Ohio. The bill defines an entrepreneurial business incubator as “an entity supporting startup companies, offering a collaborative environment, and providing access to support services, technical expertise, and business assistance resources to help innovators grow their business ideas into independent job-creating companies.”
Specifically, the report must:

Identify locations and available support services, unmet service areas, and duplication of services at entrepreneurial business incubators;

Classify the industry of member entrepreneurs receiving services by the following categories: advanced manufacturing, aerospace and aviation, agribusiness, food processing, automotive supply chain, biohealth, energy, information technology, polymers, chemicals, or any other industry sectors;

Gather data on member entrepreneurs based on jobs, capital investment, and sales; and

Describe characteristics of entrepreneurial business incubators that successfully graduate companies to be independent job creators for Ohio.

Development Services Agency staff broadened the report requirements to include entrepreneurial business accelerators and the Entrepreneurial Services Provider Program partners across the state. The ESP is a robust network of regional entrepreneurial services and capital to accelerate the growth of early stage Ohio technology companies.