A longtime startup accelerator program is living up to its name and will now have a presence across Tampa Bay.
The Tampa Bay Wave, which celebrated the opening of its downtown Tampa office in February, is expanding to St. Petersburg. The startup hub has partnered with Thrive Downtown St. Petersburg coworking space, where the Wave will have two private offices.
The spaces will be available for Wave staff and Wave companies.
“Over the years we’ve been asked, ‘When are you going to open an office in St. Pete?’” Tampa Bay Wave CEO Linda Olson said. “Honestly, we hadn’t gotten the funding out of St. Pete or Pinellas County to make that happen; we’re a small nonprofit and [it was a matter of] if the right partner comes along, we would explore it.”
With a partnership now realized, the Wave’s new office grand opening will be at 4 p.m. on March 20. Thrive DTSP, located at 136 Fourth St. N, has 90 private offices and roughly 300 members.
“Our collaboration with Tampa Bay Wave was a natural,” said Brooke Beeler, Thrive’s general manager, in an email to the Tampa Bay Business Journal. “Both of our organizations are passionate about communities, our region and the power of entrepreneurs to shape our economies, and we share the same values of cooperation, diversity and the power of connectedness to bolster collective success.”
Tampa Bay Wave joins a growing number of startup supporters in St. Pete. There’s the Tampa Bay Innovation Center, which has long existed in St. Pete. It is currently working on a 45,000-square-foot building at 1101 Fourth St. S and will work in conjunction with formerly New York-based Ark Invest. There’s also St. Pete-based Tampa Bay Tech, which works to connect tech organizations and leaders.
“I don’t think this in any way would compete with the ARK Innovation Center; we would love to explore options there as well when they’re finished building,” Olson said, “In our mind, it’s all about how to maximize the work we do throughout the Tampa Bay region; if it allows us to reach more entrepreneurs or better support them through bringing some of our programs or session to parts of the region, that’s what we will try to do.”
When asked if Tampa Bay Wave will eventually expand to Clearwater as well, Olson responded there could be a similar partnership as the Wave’s new St. Pete one.
“That topic has come up a few times by our friends in Clearwater; again it’s a matter of when the right partnerships or opportunities come along,” she said. “It just hasn’t been realized yet; I don’t have a target date, but we would be open.”
