By Katja Schroeder, Expedition PR
Earlier this year, I joined the Advisory Board of the newly created Center of Entre
preneurship at St. Francis College. The Center is an amazing initiative by the college to inspire entrepreneurial thinking among students and support New York based entrepreneurs with the school’s expertise and resources. Since its launch past September the Center has developed a cross-disciplinary entrepreneurship curriculum for students that already jump started the first business ideas by SFC students. The Center also brought together a network of partners that strive to help entrepreneurs and small businesses prosper in New York City.
To provide support for entrepreneurs that are not SFC students, the Center just launched a Person-to-Person (P2P) Virtual Incubator. To P2P Virtual Incubator addresses the need of many entrepreneurs: get advice in response to specific challenges the company faces.
The Center’s Incubator tailors its support and services for program participants based on the company’s maturity using an on-demand toolbox, which includes but is not limited to the following:
- access to knowledge experts for key areas (i.e., finance, investment, legal, real estate, marketing, PR & social media marketing, operations, and human resources, etc.)
- assistance for business plan development
- building of entrepreneurial skills
- workshops and educational forums
- access to human capital (interns, skilled workers)
- advisory services, mentorship and coaching
- investor connections and referral services
- idea lab to develop concepts and ideas for viable business
- technology services
- strategic partnerships
Some companies need the Center’s entire tool box; others only require access to a few tools in order to accelerate their business growth. The incubation period can vary from three months to two years.
Companies that are part of the incubator program include rabit, Rabt, Open Assembly, Lawschool Pro, Lukly, and NestEgg.
The Center is currently accepting submissions by startups to become part of the Virtual Incubator program.
For more information on the SFC Center of Entrepreneurship and its Virtual P2P Incubator, go to www.sfc.edu/entrepreneur and watch this video about the Center.
