DEPARTMENT: Office of Innovation
DEPARTMENT HEAD: Brian Dillard, Chief Innovation Officer
COUNCIL DISTRICTS IMPACTED: City-wide
SUBJECT: Geekdom Incubator, Civic Tech Division Project
SUMMARY:
The purpose of this item is to provide the Innovation and Technology Committee with an overview of the development of the Geekdom Incubator and its Civic Tech Division project with the City of San Antonio.
BACKGROUND:
Geekdom is the largest coworking space in Texas and has been in San Antonio for nearly 8 years. Since its creation, Geekdom has helped support and fuel the downtown technology and entrepreneur communities. Each year, Geekdom provides programs and support services to independent entrepreneurs, students, veterans, and startup companies to foster entrepreneurship, tech talent, and economic development. This includes programs like the CivTechSA program launched in partnership with the City of San Antonio's Office of Innovation.
In response to the growing number of entrepreneurs and startups with innovative ideas in need of support, Geekdom has decided to create the Geekdom Incubator Program. The Incubator will help ideation- and early-stage teams and/or companies gain market and product validation through mentorship, education, and business support services.
In October of 2018, the City approached Geekdom about the need to support teams or ideas that were generated from the CivTechSA program outside of its 16-week Residency program and others, including independent entrepreneur- and/or student-generated ideas or solutions.
Since then, Geekdom has identified and maintained communication with three teams and developed programming to support a 12-month Civic Tech innovation division of its Incubator and made steps to receive an economic development grant from the City of San Antonio. The grant funds would support up to 6 teams over a two-year period for business development and support, product development and support, as well as access to entrepreneurial...
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