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Just three months after opening its doors the University of Southern Mississippi’s
unique business incubator called the Accelerator is operating in high gear. The new venture
became the first facility to open in The Garden, the university’s Innovation and Commercialization
Park back in March of this year. In 60,000 sq. ft. the Accelerator provides state of
the art space, technology and professional advice for startup companies.
The National Business Incubator Association did a study and found out that 85% of business
incubator graduates remain within their founding community. So, a business incubator is a terrific
investment from a university from an economic development standpoint. It creates long term
sustainable growth for creating jobs in a very high paying industry here at the Accelerator.
The Accelerator was designed to enable companies with the ability to create refine and produce
first product sales all within one building. The future of cancer therapy may be gene therapy,
where you manipulate the genes that have gone wrong with the cancer cells. So we’re developing
a method to deliver these genes. We successfully turned off the genes in several different
cancer cell lines, pancreatic cancer cell lines, and bladder cancer cell lines.
Coral says the Accelerator is strategically positioned to provide fledgling companies
a blueprint for success in today’s highly competitive marketplace.
On the campus of Southern Mississippi in Hattiesburg, Mississippi I’m Stephen Rouse.