Indiana minority investment fund deemed small but promising
New fund is one of few in the nation focused on minority businesses.
Small Biz Funding
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WOJTOWICZ: Lots to consider when weighing mortgage payoff
You certainly don’t want to keep paying a mortgage if it restricts your business in other areas. But you don’t want to cough up too much at once and have the same effect.
New seed fund aims to make Indiana a hotbed for digital health startups
Infuse Accelerator hopes to make early-stage investments in 12 to 15 companies a year.
Venture capital favoring later-stage firms
Getting $50,000—often from friends and relatives—to develop a product and set up a company still is easy enough in Indiana, small-business leaders and venture capitalists say. But once a firm needs a few million dollars to grow into a revenue-generating operation, the area can’t compete with Silicon Valley’s magnetism for venture capital.
IU medical school’s push to launch startups bears fruit
The Indiana University School of Medicine has launched 12 companies in the past 18 months—a burst of startup activity the school has never seen before.
Urban biz accelerator giving leg up to startups
Indianapolis-based startup Dreamapolis is finalizing the details of its first Dreamapolis Accelerator class, a 12-week crash course designed to help high-potential urban businesses get up to speed quickly.
WOJTOWICZ: Prepare, then apply for small-business loan
To write (or refresh) your mission statement, think about what you do, how you do it and why you want to do it.
Crowdfunding startup ready to make connections
The founders of Indianapolis-based LocalStake aren’t in any rush for the SEC to write the rules governing crowdfunding. It can match private companies with small investors now.
Allos Ventures raises $40 million for early-stage tech firms
Allos Ventures has raised $40 million from local tech industry luminaries and others to invest in early-stage tech companies in the Midwest, a segment that has seen funding dry up. The fund, Allos II, aims to invest $3 million to $7 million each in about a dozen early-stage companies—not upstarts but those already generating solid revenue streams.
Maker of app that helps not-for-profits gets seed funding
Cause.it, founded by students from I.U. and Purdue, was awarded $500,000 by Innovate Indiana.
Microlenders aim to help businesses grow, survive
Indiana has three certified, not-for-profit SBA microloan intermediaries, which not only make short-term microloans—as any lender can—but also use the SBA grants they receive to offer business coaching along with the financing.
Indiana SBA lending drops in 2012, but still exceeds 2010
Indiana businesses borrowed $424.7 million through U.S. Small Business Administration programs in 2012, an 18-percent decline from 2011, latest SBA statistics show.
WOJTOWICZ: Is small-business ownership for you?
The horror stories are sobering: Dun & Bradstreet reported earlier this year that businesses with fewer than 20 employees have only a 37 percent chance of surviving four years and just 9 percent will be around 10 years.
Banks eager to loan, but small firms hold back
Indiana banks can tout more success in small-business lending since the recession ended, but the success is hard-won because the masses of entrepreneurs remain cautious about borrowing.
Small loans for small businesses
Business Ownership of Indiana is ramping up its micro-lending program, awarding a $10,000 loan to Indianapolis-based Stage Ninja LLC. Can such small amounts make a difference to fledgling firms?
New rules open door to ads for private placements
In accordance with the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act, the Securities and Exchange Commission will lift the long-standing ban on “general solicitation” of unregistered securities.
WOJTOWICZ: Lenders need financial statements to protect investment
The bank needs to know how your business is doing right now (usually the most recent 30 or 60 days), rather than rely on your current year’s tax return that may have aged several months.
Web startup aims to connect private businesses, investors
Private firms that need to raise relatively modest amounts of capital have a hard time finding money. Now three Indianapolis entrepreneurs think they have the answer: crowdfunding. Individuals make small investments that are aggregated to fund a business. Indianapolis-based Localstake wants to be the matchmaker.
Venture funding falls 12 percent in second quarter
Funding for U.S. startups fell 12 percent in the second quarter as venture capitalists poured less money into fewer deals than a year earlier. But the number of companies getting funded in the earliest stages of development reached the highest level in more than a decade.
WOJTOWICZ: It pays to know environmental requirements
Unexpected problems add to the headaches of opening or relocating a business, and we hear a lot about the hang-ups of required, but annoying, environmental investigations.