The city of Roseville will consider investing more than $1.1 million over three years to develop a Roseville Entrepreneurship Center in a downtown city building, in a partnership with the Growth Factory.
The Growth Factory is a Rocklin-based business accelerator program launched in October by entrepreneur Mark Haney. It began its first 16-week accelerator program with 15 companies. Its second cohort started this month.
The Growth Factory plans to invest $10 million into 100 local companies over four years.
The Growth Factory makes early-stage and seed investments into its cohort companies ranging from $25,000 to $50,000, with additional money held in reserve for future investments.
In the proposed deal with Roseville, about 25% of Growth Factory events and programming would occur in Roseville, according to a city staff report.
In Rocklin, the Growth Factory accelerator operates out of an 18,000-square-foot building Haney owns.
In Roseville, the Roseville Entrepreneurship Center would operate out of 2,416 square feet of space in a city-owned building at 316 Vernon St., near Roseville City Hall.
The Roseville City Council will consider the proposal at its meeting Wednesday.
According to the city, it would provide $330,000 toward permanent tenant improvements for the space, which includes costs related to permitting, design work and construction. That would be the city investing in a city-owned asset.
The rest of the city money over three years would go toward some staffing and marketing, along with other expenses.
And over the same time, the Growth Factory would invest $416,000 in rent, programming and salaries for the Vernon Street operation, which would host events, office space and programming to bolster the startup economy in the city.
Roseville anticipates $9 million would be generated by the partnership in direct and indirect impacts after five years. The center would bring entrepreneurs and high-growth companies to downtown Roseville, which would support downtown businesses. It is also anticipated some of the incubated businesses would locate in Roseville, bringing in additional high-paying jobs.
After the first three years, it is anticipated that the Growth Factory in Roseville would find funding from various grants and partner contributions, according to the city’s staff report.
The Growth Factory is a nonprofit public benefit corporation that has an accelerator and incubator component. It supports and invests in local entrepreneurs growing businesses.
The Growth Factory seeks to support local entrepreneurs with access to office space, support services, partners, mentoring and seed funding to develop companies that can attract further outside investment. Most of the investors in the Growth Factory are local people.
