The city of Dallas is looking to accelerate its economic recovery from the pandemic through an industry known for high-growth potential – startups.
Earlier this week, Mayor Eric Johnson announced the creation of a task force focused on innovation and entrepreneurship, with the purpose of finding ways to connect startups, enterprise businesses and the public sector in an effort to boost economic growth and the region’s standing as a hub for startups.
“Coming out of COVID, now it’s as important as ever. Now, so many entrepreneurs are engaging and seeing opportunities that didn’t exist before,” Trey Bowles, co-founder and chairman of The DEC Network, told NTX Inno. “The world is changing and as a result the services and products that we offer the world will need to change as well. So, it’s as good a time as ever to be an entrepreneur, to be an innovator, to come up with new ideas.”
The task force will be co-chaired by Mandy Price, co-founder and CEO at local startup Kanarys and Bowles. Other members will be announced later on. Findings from the task force are expected to be presented to the mayor’s office, as well as the city’s Economic Development Committee, which is chaired by Council member Tennell Atkins.
“We’re in a place where we can write our own future for startups here, and we can focus on what type of environment here,” Bowles said. “People started to recognize that being a Dallas startup was a pretty damn good thing, so people have embraced that.”
Tasked with finding ways the city can work to attract, retain and support entrepreneurs, Bowles notes the group will be limiting that scope to startups rather than small businesses. And while he said it is too early in the process to start listing off potential solutions the task force will be looking at, he said there are a number of areas the city can improve on to create a stronger startup ecosystem, largely in the raising awareness. Bowles said the reason many don’t think of Dallas as a major startup hub stems from it being seen largely as a big business city and that its startup scene doesn’t skew heavily towards one industry or another.
While specific recommendations and options for funding will follow city approval, Bowles said one of the key focuses of the task force will be to identify ways to bring community stakeholders – investors, government, schools, enterprise businesses and startups – to understand the individual roles they play in creating the entire ecosystem.
“I believe in order for an ecosystem to be truly, truly robust and functioning at its top optimization, you need a bunch of different stakeholders in that ecosystem and those stakeholders have to be creating an environment that is full of resources and capital and talent, and all these different things for entrepreneurs,” Bowles said. “But in addition to that, you have to make sure the stakeholders are playing the role that the stakeholders should.”
Other cities across the country have developed public-private partnerships to attract startups an entrepreneurs. However, as Bowles notes, that can be difficult in a state like Texas, where there is no income tax and most extra funding for initiative would potentially come from property taxes, which is a difficult prospect. However, he notes that by having the mayor out in front of the initiative, it helps drive more attention to the issues and the task force’s role.
A key part of the task force’s mission will also be to focus on inclusivity, something which is aided by Price’s leadership experience at a startup focused on diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives. Bowles said the group, will also be keeping in mind the different needs of different communities.
“My hope is that we develop something that supports all entrepreneurs regardless of industry, regardless of age or gender or ethnicity, that we’re building something that all startups can have access to and utilize to increase their likelihood of being successful,” Bowles said.
For Bowles and Mayor Johnson, the time to invest in the local startup ecosystem is right. Bowles said he hopes the task force, through raising awareness of the local scene and building Dallas’ brand as a tech hub, can attract and build more startups locally, which in turn will create more tech talent that may go on to build even more companies.
“We are a city that was built on the shoulders of pioneers, wildcatters, entrepreneurs and innovators, and it’s no different today,” Bowles said. “The individual entrepreneur, the individual startup, which in and of itself doesn’t create a substantial amount of economic impact… become more successful, then you develop an ecosystem that is hugely valuable. If we can convince the big businesses and the leadership organizations and the cities that startups need to be a part of who we are here, then it becomes a part of our ethos… then we start to move forward in a way that is just a self-fulfilling prophecy.”
