DuPage business accelerator taking shape

Travis Linderman is looking for hands to shake. Then, after the introductions that come with meeting people, he hopes his new acquaintances will talk to him about their businesses - even if those businesses haven't quite started up yet.

Linderman is the newly appointed managing director of Innovation DuPage, a business accelerator. He's been here about a month and while he is waiting for construction to be completed on Innovation DuPage space in what once were police department offices in the Glen Ellyn Civic Center, Linderman is spreading the word about Innovation DuPage. Perhaps more importantly, he's listening to his marketplace.

With a facilities opening probably about year end, Linderman expects to spend "the next six months listening to stakeholders.

"I want to meet a new startup, or an entrepreneur, or potential entrepreneur or a mentor every day," Linderman says. His first priority is identifying select mentors who can work with small business start ups or small businesses that already are on the startup trail.

"There's such a wealth of expertise" for Innovation DuPage to draw upon, Linderman marvels - "entrepreneurs who have done this multiple times."

The goal at Innovation DuPage is to boost regional economic growth and, at the same time, create jobs. However, suburban businesses have options when it comes to seeking growth assistance:

• Chicago's 1871 accelerator is perhaps the best known and most respected entity. (Business accelerators and incubators provide similar support services, but accelerator programs normally move at a somewhat faster pace.)

• Elgin's Dream Hub provides extensive support services to food-oriented businesses.

• North Central College, Naperville, has its own ConVerge approach where the focus tends to center on college students and how they might fit into the small business world.

• Support at Illinois Small Business Development Centers is mostly free. The SBDC at College of DuPage will move to the Glen Ellyn Civic Center when space is ready.

• There are dozens of small business consulting firms - which, interestingly, might gain from Innovation DuPage activities.

Still, the suburban business community should benefit from the fact that Linderman has done this before. His College of DuPage supplied biography lists three venture incubators where Linderman has played a key role: at Princeton, NJ; Ann Arbor, MI and in downtown Chicago.

In addition to its birth home at COD and the facilities being made available by the Village of Glen Ellyn, Innovation DuPage seems poised to draw support from DuPage Impact LLC, an investor organization; Choose DuPage, a public-private partnership with the goal of bringing businesses to DuPage County - and then retaining them; Rev 3, which describes itself as a "diverse community" of small business tech startups; and Lisle's Benedictine University, Northern Illinois University in DeKalb and Elmhurst (IL) College.

Also part of Innovation DuPage, at least to the extent of making facilities and brainpower available, are Argonne National Laboratory, based in Lemont and operated by the University of Chicago, and the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab) near Batavia.

© 2018 Kendall Communications Inc. Follow Jim Kendall on LinkedIn and Twitter. Write him at Jim@kendallcom.com. Read Jim's Business Owners' Blog at www.kendallcom.com.