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Hi, I'm Sarah Hemann
and I am the Director
of Marketing Operations
at the Enterprise Center
of Johnson County.
I'd like to welcome you
to our venture development
organization.
We're a nonprofit
in Johnson County
that helps startup companies
and early stage businesses
either through consulting,
providing office services,
networking opportunities,
access to angel capital,
and also entrepreneurial
education workshops.
One of the great resources here
is Jenn Hackett.
She is our administrative
assistant and office manager.
She's the first point of contact
to anyone who comes
into the Enterprise Center.
She greets guests,
receives packages,
sorts the mail,
answers the phone,
pretty much does anything
that anybody needs help with
in the center.
The Enterprise Center facility
is located in Lenexa, Kansas.
We have a large,
13,000-square-foot
flexible office space solution
for entrepreneurs with offices
ranging from smaller
175-square-foot spaces.
This is one
of our larger offices.
So the Enterprise Center
began back in 1995
really through the vision
of many of the community leaders
here in Johnson County.
Business incubation is
what it was called then
and still today.
It was just new to our community
at that point
to help young companies grow,
and it was really part
of an economic development
strategy to grow
our own companies
in our community
rather than just to attract
companies to our community
from outside.
So my name is Joel Wiggins
and I'm the President
and Chief Executive Officer
of the Enterprise Center
of Johnson County.
We are a business assistance
center here
that helps businesses start up
in Johnson County.
Now when we mean startup,
we're talking about companies
that generally have maybe
a business plan, maybe not,
just one or two people,
and oftentimes they're looking
for help to help them grow
their companies.
Me as an entrepreneur
really, you know, appreciate
the value that we derive
from the Enterprise Center
of Johnson County.
I mean, Joel Wiggins
and Rick Vaughn
and even the, you know,
the receptionist
and the other consultants here
help us whenever we have a need
or want to bounce somethin'
off of 'em.
And many times, Joel and Rick
have actually come in
and helped us put together
presentations
and given us feedback
on how to, you know,
present things better.
And PropertyTrak
is a web-based, you know,
facility management,
operations management toolset,
so it keeps everyone accountable
and writes a record.
It's like Carfax for buildings;
everything that's happened
to the building during the time
that PropertyTrak has been
implemented.
Really, this center is really
excellent for any entrepreneur
because the cost is right,
the facilities are wonderful,
everything's very clean,
it's consistent and secure.
Great conference rooms
and big presentation rooms
if you have a big meeting
or something,
which we've had a couple.
One of the great resources
here is our conference room.
Anybody that is a client
of the Enterprise Center
of Johnson County
gets to use this facility.
It's completely high-tech.
We have lots of workshops here,
and even today we're going
to be leading a workshop
on advanced Facebook
for business.
That'll be led by a member
of the social media community
in Kansas City.
One of the great benefits
of the Enterprise Center
of Johnson County
is our shared resources.
In this room, any tenants
or affiliate companies
get to use our copy machine
for scanning, faxing, printing.
It's wired to their computers
in their offices
so it's very easy to use.
We also have mailboxes,
shared United States
Postal Service, UPS, FedEx,
and as well as confidential
shredding services
all provided complimentary
and billed as used.
The advantage of having
shared resources
when you're a startup company
is that you don't have
to put the up-front capital
into investing
in a large copy machine
or having someone be available
to answer your phone calls
or sort your mail
or help you put together
a FedEx shipment.
Money is tight
when you're a startup,
and this helps ease them
into really focusing on what--
their most important thing,
and it's their business.
We're working with companies
in the IT area,
some medical device companies,
some biotechnology companies
and companies that have
an intention to grow
and generate jobs and wealth
in our community.
I'm Angela Kreps
and I'm President
of Kansas Bio.
We are a 501(c)(3)
industry organization
for bioscience
covering the human, animal,
and plant science technologies,
and we work with entrepreneurs
at small and large companies
in bioscience
to help get them further faster.
Bioscience in Kansas
is actually growing at twice
the national average,
and our bioscience industry
jobs in Kansas
are growing four times faster
than any other sector of jobs
in Kansas,
so there's a tremendous amount
of opportunity in bioscience
industry growth.
We decided to locate here
at the Enterprise Center
of Johnson County
so that we could be close
to the emerging companies
and provide connectedness
with the bioscience industry,
so we're connecting the benefits
of small companies
and additional resources
that are provided here
at the Enterprise Center
with the services that are
provided by very large
companies.
Hi, my name is Gary Hicks.
I'm the CEO OF Skillsniper, LLC.
Come on in, this is our office
here at the Enterprise Center
of Johnson County.
And over here we've got Tim
and Jim,
and if you come this way,
this is where I sit right here,
and you know,
it's not fancy,
but when you're an entrepreneur,
you make do with what you can.
We created a technology
to match employers
and jobseekers faster.
This targeted technology
will allow employers
to find jobseekers
at a much higher rate.
And I think
for any entrepreneur,
especially
in this Midwest region,
it does help to have
a great ecosystem
of entrepreneurs around.
There's so many things
with the Kauffman Center here,
the Pipeline,
the Enterprise Center--
there's a lot of different
things going on in this area
for entrepreneurs
and it's really startin'
to get on the map.
It's not just Silicon Valley
anymore,
but there's other areas
that are makin' big impacts
on entrepreneurship.
♪
We often think of helping
these companies in four ways.
I like to call them
the Four Ms.
So we talk about magic, money,
management, and marketing.
Most of the companies have
some sort of interesting
technology or business model.
We call that their magic,
whatever it is
in their dark black box
that they, you know,
don't like to talk about
and they're developing.
And we usually expect
the company to know what
they're doing in that space,
but we come alongside of them
and help them with the other
three Ms,
which are money--
they often need other people's
money to launch;
marketing, helping them
understand their customer set
and their marketplace
and competitors
in the marketplace;
and then also
their management team,
helping them identify
good people, managers,
advisers, and so forth
in the community.
And so we come alongside
of them and help them
in those ways.
♪
I think one of
our entrepreneurs'
favorite things
about this center
is the free coffee
that's available.
It's also a great gathering
place.
People tend to always meet
around here in the mornings,
about mid-morning
and mid-afternoon
when they need a little bit
of caffeine.
If they're lucky,
we'll have some free food
available for our entrepreneurs,
and they also get shared dishes,
microwave, ice maker,
refrigerator, fridge,
and a place to kind of sit down,
relax, enjoy,
catch up on the news,
grab a snack
from the vending machines,
and just get together
with some of their fellow
entrepreneurs in the building.
One of the great benefits
of being part
of the Enterprise Center
is the opportunity to interact
with other people--
companies that are starting out
and entrepreneurs, advisers,
entrepreneurs in residence,
investors,
and people who understand
how to build businesses.
Starting companies is
a risky adventure,
probably an exhilarating
adventure,
but oftentimes it ends up
in failure
because the entrepreneur
just doesn't seek out help.
They think they understand
how to do everything
on their own
or they don't want
to share their ideas
or they don't want to become
part of a larger network.
And we think
that being collaborative
and gaining all the resources
that you can
is the best way
to succeed in your company.
One of the most important
resources we have
at the Enterprise Center
of Johnson County is people,
and that includes
the Women's Business Center.
♪
Hey Brande, how are you doing?
Hi Sarah, how are you?
Good.
Good!
Anything new and exciting
going on?
When I first purchased
the company,
my first place was to go
to the Women's Business Center,
which is part
of the Enterprise Center
of Johnson County.
And the reason I chose that,
I had been in operations
working for a company
for many years
and knew a lot
about the operational side,
but I needed a lot
of the financial side,
the marketing side,
the legal side,
and the Women's Business Center
was able to offer all that
and some great programs
to help me.
I'm Brande Stitt.
I'm the Program Director
for the Women's Business Center.
We provide assistance
to women of all different
demographics on both sides
of the state line.
Our role is to provide
counseling services,
training courses,
and some funding assistance
for women that are wanting
to start a business
or have an existing business
that they wanna grow
and take to the next level.
Well, my company is NCES
and my name is Chris Jackson
and I'm the owner,
and we are a company
that provides
nutrition education materials
to hospitals,
health departments, schools,
and I first came to know
the WBC when the doors
were opened.
It was back in 2000,
and I came and I was
looking for some help
to help me kind of guide
my business,
and I ended up joining
one of their round table groups,
and so early on,
they provided that direction
and even the learning
opportunities to help me
to learn the fundamentals
of business
and to help me grow my business.
The Women's Business Center
has provided
a lot of mentoring programs
that I've been involved in,
and they've had
some great talent,
people here in Kansas City
that are so willing
to lend of their time and talent
and help other business owners.
I've been on both sides of that,
I've been a mentee and a mentor,
and I can say that the program
is just a win-win.
A lot of networking events
go on here,
training programs,
and everything is really geared
and focused on relevant material
for business owners
and to help them
and help them grow
their businesses.
♪
When I moved here in 2005
from Austin, Texas,
I didn't really know where
entrepreneurs went to
to find the kinds of
financial help that they need
to grow their businesses,
so we launched
the Mid-America Angel Network
in 2006,
and also the Women's Capital
Connection in 2008.
And since that time,
we've worked with hundreds
of investors to invest
more than 10 million dollars
into 29 companies
here in our region.
A lot of times
I'll meet with somebody
they won't even know for sure
if they're ready
to raise capital
for their business
or if they might need
a little bit more education
on starting a business.
If they are truly ready
to get Angel funding,
then I work with them
on getting their pitch ready.
The main thing that the Angels
are after is
can this entrepreneur do
what they say they're gonna do?
Now Angel investing comes down
a few steps as far as raising
money for your business.
The entrepreneur really needs
to put their own dollars
into their business first.
Then they kind of need to look
around for friends and family
money, they call it,
sometimes friends, family,
and fools money,
and they need to find
some strategic people
surrounding them
to get that next push
up the ramp.
Then it might be time
for the Angels to look
at their deal
and to invest in their deal.
Now Angels really only look
at deals that are
highly scalable,
because Angel investors
don't get their money back
out of the company
until that entrepreneur exits.
♪
Kansas City is undergoing
an entrepreneurial boom.
There's an explosion
of opportunities
for entrepreneurs to find help
from incubation programs.
Funding is becoming
more readily available
for companies.
So it's a great area
to start a company
and to grow a company.
♪
A coproduction of KCPT
and Outpost Worldwide,
at home in Kansas City.
♪
Captioned by