Northeast Ohio was once a thriving, prosperous community that was the envy of many Americans. That’s because entrepreneurial icons like B.F. Goodrich, Charles Brush, and Charles Diebold had innovative ideas, received support and funding from risk takers in the region, and grew those ideas into Northeast Ohio’s largest employers, spreading wealth across the region. The effects of companies founded more than 100 years ago are still being felt today; eight companies started by entrepreneurs between 1859 and 1921 still employ over 60,000 people in Ohio.
Beginning in the 1980s and for the next thirty years, however, the region lost tens of thousands of jobs and it didn’t have companies growing to replace those jobs. In fact, in a ranking of major metropolitan cities in terms of friendliness for entrepreneurs, Entrepreneur magazine ranked the Cleveland metropolitan area in the bottom three out of 61 cities for 12 straight years beginning in 1991. Northeast Ohio was in desperate need of job and wealth creation.
The region’s civic, community, and philanthropic leaders came together in 2004, providing the vision and leadership for the solution: a unique partnership between public and private entities charged with creating economic transformation in Northeast Ohio through the growth of an entrepreneurial ecosystem. From this concept, JumpStart was born.
Almost six years later, JumpStart is now a nationally recognized non-profit creating economic transformation by efficiently securing and providing resources to entrepreneurs leading high potential, early-stage companies.
- JumpStart’s primary resource is intensive entrepreneurial assistance delivered by former successful entrepreneurs; JumpStart also selectively invests in the highest potential companies through one of its programs.
- JumpStart is also a champion for entrepreneurs, aggressively advocating for the entrepreneurial economy in order to secure a continuous stream of resources for entrepreneurs. We engage and act with federal, state, and community policy makers, civic leaders, and leaders in the venture capital and angel investing communities to secure the resources necessary for growth. Often times, those resources go to entrepreneurs directly or are deployed by other non-profit economic development organizations or investors.
- In everything we do, JumpStart maintains a specific focus on economic inclusion and activities that increase the success of minority and women entrepreneurs in growing high impact companies.
Learn more about what we do.