Business Incubator Series: An Interview With Chris Heivly, Executive Director, LaunchBox Digital (Part 5)

By guest authors Irina Patterson and Candice Arnold

Irina: Do you compensate mentors who come in to help your entrepreneurs?

Chris: They’re all volunteers.

Irina: What are your metrics of success at LaunchBox?

Chris: There’re two measuring sticks today. The ultimate measuring stick, as a venture fund, is a return on investment to our investors. That’s obvious. We all know that that’s probably three, five, or seven years out that we see that.

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Business Incubator Series: An Interview With Chris Heivly, Executive Director, LaunchBox Digital (Part 4)

By guest authors Irina Patterson and Candice Arnold

Chris: The board of advisors for each company enrolled will include two LaunchBox partners and two to three outsiders, who will meet every week for an hour and help to drive this company through the 12-week program. It’s really great. I sit in on every one of those [meetings]. It’s just the most fun thing in the world. >>>

Business Incubator Series: An Interview With Chris Heivly, Executive Director, LaunchBox Digital (Part 3)

By guest authors Irina Patterson and Candice Arnold

Irina: Do you announce in a press release or on the Web that the next program session open, and companies start applying?

Chris: That’s correct. We do some outbound marketing. We get some mentions in the technology and entrepreneurial press. We’ve run for three years now. There’s a very strong word of mouth in this community for these accelerator programs.

Irina: When will you start accepting applications for the next accelerator? What is the process? >>>

Business Incubator Series: An Interview With Chris Heivly, Executive Director, LaunchBox Digital (Part 2)

By guest authors Irina Patterson and Candice Arnold

Irina: What would be the ideal company to have in your incubation program?

Chris: For the most part, first-time entrepreneurs who have a reasonably mature concept of what they want to build in a fairly large market or large market opportunity; something where the value is [so] obvious that they succeed in implementing their vision.

On an individual basis, the team is a bright, well-rounded team. We do not accept, for the most part, one-person teams. We like for there to be at least one, if not two developers on the team. We’re looking for A teams and really nice market opportunities. >>>

Business Incubator Series: An Interview With Chris Heivly, Executive Director, LaunchBox Digital (Part 1)

By guest authors Irina Patterson and Candice Arnold

I am talking to Chris Heivly, executive director of LaunchBox Digital, an accelerator program for  entrepreneurs based in Durham, North Carolina. The program structure and workings are similar to Y Combinator and TechStars. >>>

An Interview With Debera Johnson, Founder And Executive Director, Pratt Design Incubator For Sustainable Innovation (Part 6)

By guest authors Irina Patterson and Candice Arnold

Irina: Are there any other metrics that you measure?

Debera: No, just whether [the companies are] able to shift from needing the support of the incubator to being their own companies. That’s our goal, basically, that they’re launched and they’re successful. >>>

An Interview With Debera Johnson, Founder And Executive Director, Pratt Design Incubator For Sustainable Innovation (Part 5)

By guest authors Irina Patterson and Candice Arnold

Irina: What other business development tools do you use?

Debera: There are lots of tools for developing business plans. We use those. That’s fairly structured. Then, around [such tools] is the fairly chaotic experience of the other people in the incubator as well as all the mentors we have. >>>

An Interview With Debera Johnson, Founder And Executive Director, Pratt Design Incubator For Sustainable Innovation (Part 4)

By guest authors Irina Patterson and Candice Arnold

Irina: How many companies were funded by angels during their incubation period?

Debera: At this point, Sam Cochran, [the CEO of SMIT, which runs] the Solar Ivy company got about $250,000 in angel funding. The other companies are less needy, less technology based. They’re not actually looking for angel money.

They’re looking to keep their businesses. We encourage them to hang on to as much as possible. They may go into a friends and family round. We don’t necessarily encourage them to try to get financing. >>>