Emerging life sciences companies grabbing more in government grants
More emerging life science companies have found life in the form of federal
Small Business Innovation Research grants.
Entrepreneurship
Articles
Candle company cooks up products with a ‘green’ twist
After working in retail management for four years, Rich and Jodi Scheve decided to take business into their own hands—and
their own garage. Passing on business plans for Subway and South Bend Chocolate Co. franchises, the couple
skirted heavy franchise fees and started Twisted Wick Candle Co.
Seniors are nation’s fastest-growing group of entrepreneurs
For four decades, Jim Ashby worked as a manufacturing floor manager, first for General Motors Corp., then, after a buyout,
for an Ingersoll Rand subsidiary. He likes to relax and fish, but Ashby considers himself too energetic for retirement. He’s
now 67 years old. And a first-time entrepreneur.
A taste of summer: CPA spends summers as ice cream man
Certified public accountant Dave Norris bought a 1976 Good Humor truck and started his family-owned U Want Ice Cream mobile
route in 2007, aiming to make a personal connection with people—along with
a little extra money.
The latest fads in business names
Nobody familiar with the intricacies of naming a business thinks the process is easy. Not if the messages
words send to potential customers are grasped.
So itâ??s easy to understand why the Indianapolis area is filling up with companies one way…
Businesses discover dangers of relying too heavily on a single client or industry
In this deep recession, many local small-business owners suffer a harsh dilemma: Heavily tied to a single supplier,
customer or industry, they must diversify or die.
Innovation drought?
Beneath Americaâ??s financial woes lies a lack of innovation, a recent BusinessWeek article argues. A paucity
of breakthrough products could have triggered the nationâ??s borrowing binge and ultimately the financial meltdown,
it says.
Hereâ??s the logic: A decade ago,…
Goldsmithâ??s latest venture
Former Indianapolis Mayor Steve Goldsmith, never one to let grass grow under his feet, has started a not-for-profit
with one-time presidential candidate Howard Dean to promote Goldsmithâ??s pet cause of public-private partnerships.
The Council of Project Finance Advisors aims…
Heartland Distillers joins mini-boom in artisan spirit-making
Since January, Heartland Distillers has turned out several small batches of its first signature spirit—Indiana Vodka—available at about 300 area retailers.
Recession forces small-business owners to take second jobs
With sales slowed to a crawl, some entrepreneurs must take second jobs working for others to make ends meet.
Recession has a domino effect on venture capital
Call it a trickle-down effect, but not the kind President Reagan would have liked. The recession has cost most institutional
investors, such as university endowments, about a quarter of their value. As a result, venture capitalists’ primary source
of funding has dried up. The implications for Hoosier entrepreneurship are stark.
‘Peanut King’ diversifies to keep 52-year-old company thriving
Richard Green Co., founded in 1957, is a mini-conglomerate of sorts, selling pretty much anything necessary for work in the food-concessions business.
Indy Power drops electric-car focus for more lucrative control boxes
After a stint making parts for electric cars, Symphony Motors recently became Indy Power Systems, changing course to make power control boxes for a variety of vehicles and also industrial and military applications.
Small business banks on IT backup
BlueLock provides IT infrastructureâ??or serversâ??to companies for loading software applications, and the startup is growing at a fast rate.
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Proprietary developments withering from recession
Financing is the lifeblood of companies turning intellectual property into a product or service, but turbulent economic conditions
have made it increasingly difficult to raise cash from investors who are content to wait
out the storm by concentrating on their existing portfolios.
How to innovate your way out of this recession
It doesn’t matter what industry you are in or how well you have prepared–we will all be affected by what has taken place
in the financial markets over the past several months.
Broad Ripple natives grow up to be neighborhood entrepreneurs
Many Broad Ripple business owners say the neighborhood is an oasis for eclectic and independent small entrepreneurial ventures.
Fast-growing Tuitive seeks to put unintuitive programmers in back seat of software, Web design
Jonathan Arnold sees big business potential in his firm “Tuitive,” which specializes in cleaning up the confusion caused by
programmers, who often put features and functionality ahead of making their product intuitive to use.
Foreign-born entrepreneurs
Midwestern cities donâ??t attract a lot of immigrants, and Indianapolis is no exception.
The weather is uncomfortable and the region has a reputation for close-mindedness â?? not the kind of place
where newcomers want to sink roots.
A recent blog…
A remarkable comment
Indiana has never been known as a hotbed of venture capital deals. That recognition has long gone to California
and Massachusetts, and the numbers fall off quickly in other states.
So a statement in this weekendâ??s IBJ was noteworthy…