Sheltowee Foundation Booklet

Sheltowee

FOUNDATION

1

Sheltowee Business Network LLC 7605 Woodridge Road, Louisville, KY 40056 Phone: 502-299-5079 Email: info@sheltowee.com 2 Web: www.sheltowee.com

TABLE OF

CONTENTS From the Founder

4

Get to Know Us

6

Alex Day Background

8

Five Objectives for 2023

10

Challenges with Historic Efforts in Kentucky

11

Study Reviewing the Past 20 Years of Entrepreneurial Ecosystem Support

12

Proposed Outline of Retrospective Study

14

Conduct State Wide Bench Marking Survey

15

Develop a 20-Year Strategic Plan

16

Introduce 2024 Legislative Session

17

Community Assessment Tool

18

What We Did-Ask the Enterpreneurs

19

Results of the 2017 Study

20 3

From the

FOUNDER It is time entrepreneurs take a leadership role in charting our strategy for helping entrepreneurs in Kentucky.

I 4

have been an entrepreneur in Kentucky for the past 30 years. I have watched as our bordering states have developed strong programs for

entrepreneurs and far surpassed Kentucky in the cultivation of their entrepreneurial ecosystems.

It is time that entrepreneurs in Kentucky take a leadership role to build our ecosystem and work

to help guide our state and local governments, on the programs and strategy that is needed. I founded the Sheltowee Foundation to provide leadership in Kentucky and around the country in helping entrepreneurs and startup investors create value and bring

amazing products and services to market. Our path in Kentucky will not be an easy or fast one.

It has taken us years to fall behind and it will take us years to get to where we need to be.

I hope you will join me on the journey.

5

GET TO

KNOW US

T 6

he Sheltowee Foundation is a non-profit that supports entrepreneurial ecosystem building through entrepreneur and investor education.

The Sheltowee Foundation promotes the core values of the Sheltowee ecosystem and provides real-world solutions from our entrepreneurial founders.

For an entrepreneurial ecosystem to be successful it must be led by entrepreneurs not other players like governments, universities or investors.

BRAD FELD, Techstars Founder

Mission

Core Values • Help others

Provide entrepreneurial leadership to help grow entrepreneurial ecosystems through education, provision of resources and support for entrepreneurs and startup investors

• Conduct yourself in a kind, ethical and transparent fashion • Honor those who assume the risk • Expect a financial return on your interactions

7

Alex Day

BACKGROUND

Studied at Western Kentucky University and the Leningrad Polytechnic Institute Physics, mathematics and Russian Language Founded Sheltowee in 2000 Founded the Kentucky Life Sciences Organization in 2000 Served on the KSTC board (2001 to 2004) Appointed by Governor Patton to serve on the Kentucky Tobacco Research Board (2002-2004) Served as first manager of the Kentucky Natural Products Fund (Commonwealth Seed Capital) (2003-2005)

8

Appointed by Governor Ernie Fletcher to serve as Chairman of the Governors Life Sciences Consortium (drafted strategic plan for growing life science companies in the state) (2004) Drafted strategic plan for Owensboro, KY on how to leverage life science assets for economic development, which resulted in over $100 million of investment in Owensboro Co-Founded Kentucky BioProcessing (2005) Secured $50,000 grant and orchestrated state wide survey in 2017 on entrepreneurism in Kentucky Participated in MIT REAP program in 2020

9

Five Objectives for 2023 for

SHELTOWEE FOUNDATION

10

Challenges with

HISTORIC EFFORTS IN KENTUCKY

Efforts not led by entrepreneurs

Entrepreneurs have not engaged to lead

Dependent on government funding

Collaboration hindered by turf building

Small business entrepreneurs feel left out and alienated

No one in state government ever asked the entrepreneurs what they need

Major changes in administrations

Rural communities were underserved

11

Study Reviewing the Past 20 Years of

ENTREPRENEURIAL ECOSYSTEM SUPPORT We need to look back and see what we have done right and what we have done wrong in building our entrepreneurial

12

ecosystem in Kentucky. This calls for an in-depth analysis of our efforts from the past 20 years.

To know where we are going, we need to understand where we have been.

Review what legislation was passed

Review how the funds were deployed

Review what agencies have made those investments

List the results from the individual companies

Review what funds were allocated

Review what investments have been made

List all companies which received investment

List the results of the entities that placed the investments Compare Indiana, Tennessee, and Ohio results

13

1.

Executive Summary

2.

Definition of entrepreneur

3.

Major pieces of legislation impacting Entrepreneurs

4.

Major programs for entrepreneurs Investment Tax Credits Commonwealth Seed Capital Keyhorse Capital

5.

Major successful entrepreneurs in Kentucky

6.

Key organizations

7.

Companies that started here and left

8.

Investments by year

9.

Indiana, Ohio and Tennessee Program Comparisons

10. Results of Survey

Proposed Outline of

RETROSPECTIVE STUDY

14

Conduct State Wide

BENCH MARKING SURVEY

1.

Survey six stakeholder groups

Entrepreneurs Risk Capital Corporates Government Entities Universities

2.

Establish a Bi-Annual Survey to track progress

3.

Utilize surveys in other states for benchmarking

Service Providers

15

Develop a 20 -Year

STRATEGIC PLAN Develop a plan based on

• Results of study • Results of survey Suggested plans for growth

Target goals

16

Introduce Legislation for

2024 LEGISLATIVE SESSION 1.

Keep legislators informed

2.

Develop recommendations from strategic plan

4.

Pass legislation

3.

Draft legislation to implement changes

17

Community ASSESSMENT TOOL

18

1.

In 2017, we conducted the Kentucky Entrepreneur Climate Survey.

2.

Based on what we learned in 2017, we developed a tool The Community Assessment Tool helps communities track their progress.

3.

It is designed to be utilized on a routine basis to establish metrics for entrepreneurial ecosystem building.

In 2017, Sheltowee secured a $50,000 grant to conduct a Study of the “Entrepreneur Climate” in Kentucky.

What We Did-

ASK THE ENTREPRENEUR Key Questions How is the Kentucky government doing at helping entrepreneurs?

Are you aware of the programs that exist?

As a small business owner, what do you need to grow your business that you are not being provided with?

19

Results of the

STUDY *

840

Total of respondents

74% of respondents (620) gave the state a failing score

13%

Only of respondents thought the state was doing a good to very good job Over half of the respondents took the time to leave comments

20 20

*2017 Kentucky Entrepreneur Climate Survey

Research

Legislation

Strategy

Support

21

22

Copyright Sheltowee LLC 2023. Design: Frontier Marketing LLC, Theresa Quine