A Tampa Bay startup hub is celebrating a decade of work with a new home.
The Tampa Bay Wave officially opened its new headquarters, which spans roughly 8,000 square feet in the same building as WeWork.
It’s not too far of a jump for the organization — it was previously across the street at 500 E. Kennedy Blvd. But the new space, CEO Linda Olson said, will not only allow the organization itself to grow but also facilitate growth for its startups.
“The largest conference room could no longer hold our accelerator cohorts when they were in town; you add in a few extra people, and it was not really functioning well,” she said in a previous interview with the Tampa Bay Business Journal.
The Tampa Bay Wave received its first federal grant, which catapulted it from a nonprofit with no official team members or programming to the full-fledged group it is today. It now oversees multiple cohorts throughout the year, including the TechDiversity and Cyber|X programs, which bring in startups from across the globe.
“Where we are today was beyond my wildest dreams 10 years ago,” Olsen said. “And it’s crazy to think maybe we weren’t even dreaming big enough back then. Now when you take away the limits, it becomes, where can we go? So I’m just excited for the Tampa Bay community and us.”
