Florida Tech Student Incubator to Open Soon

FLORIDA TECH BUSINESS SCHOOL

BREVARD COUNTY • MELBOURNE, FLORIDA — Florida Tech will soon open a high quality student incubator program at the Melbourne university.   

The excitement is building among the entrepreneurial students at Florida Tech.

For the first time, the College of Business will have a living-breathing student business incubator launched on campus.

Incubation Station

Known as the “Incubation Station,” the center will soon announce a grand opening which will take place in the coming months.

Program leaders at Florida Tech are currently in the process of setting up 1,600 square feet of fully functional office space for use by budding student entrepreneurs.

Scott Benjamin is the Director of the Center for Entrepreneurship and New Business Development.

Benjamin says that there are already eleven student-created,  business ideas ready to begin hatching at “the Station.”

“This is a very exciting time as we launch this new program which allow students from different parts of the university to collaborate and turn brilliant ideas into real-life products and services to potentially bring to market,” said Benjamin.

“This will create an incubator for the ideas of our highly talented students.”

Both undergraduate and graduate students from all majors can use services such as conference facilities, telecommunications support, internet services and research resources to help them develop business plans, incorporate their businesses and build revenues.

The Incubation Station, through its mentoring program, will also provide an extensive network of local business owners to facilitate the process of ideation and venture creation.

By utilizing all of the resources and capabilities of the university and the Space Coast community, Florida Tech is on the leading edge of entrepreneurship and new venture creation.

Facts/Stats about Business Incubation Derived From the National Business Incubation Association:

• Historically, National Business Incubation Association (NBIA) member incubators have reported that 87 percent of all firms that have graduated from their incubators are still in business.

• NBIA members have reported that 84 percent of incubator graduates stay in their communities and continue to provide a return to their investors.

• 1,275 business incubation programs were operating in North America in May 2012.

•NBIA estimates that in 2005 alone, North American incubators assisted more than 27,000 start-up companies that provided full-time employment for more than 100,000 workers and generated annual revenue of more than $17 billion.

• NBIA estimates that North American incubator client and graduate companies have in total created about half a million jobs since 1980. That is enough jobs to employ every person living in Denver, Colo.

• Every 50 jobs created by an incubator client generate approximately 25 more jobs in the same community.

• Publicly supported incubators create jobs at a cost of about $1,100 each, whereas other publicly supported job creation mechanisms cost more than $10,000 per job created.

About Florida Tech

Florida Institute of Technology is one of just nine public and private schools in Florida chosen by the 2013 Fiske Guide to Colleges. The university was included among 320 nationwide in the top-rated guide to the best colleges, which was just published earlier in July. Fiske places Florida Tech in the “inexpensive” category for private schools and lists it under the heading, “Engineering/Top Technical Institutes.” The listing describes the university as “A microcosm of intelligent people representing 97 countries.”

The Fiske Guide calls itself selective and subjective. It doesn’t try to cover all of the United States’ more than 2,200 four-year colleges but showcases the colleges it considers best, most interesting and the ones that students “most want to know about.” USA Today calls the book, “The best college guide you can buy.”

The 2013 edition selects the country’s best and most interesting colleges and universities from among all the four-year U.S. institutions.

In addition, an effort was made to achieve geographic diversity and a balance of public and private schools.

Fiske rates colleges separately, from one to five, on academics, social life and quality of life. A grade of three, which Florida Tech got in each area, is the typical score of schools in the book.

Florida Tech is regularly lauded in other guides, such as those by U.S. News and World Report, payscale.com and the Princeton Review.

For more information about the Incubation Station, please contact Dr. Benjamin at sbenjamin@fit.edu.

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