‘More mature’ Ezone bringing jobs, funding to N. Ky.

Business Courier of Cincinnati - by Laura Baverman Staff Reporter

The Northern Kentucky Ezone is no longer just an incubator for local tech companies.

In the year since its merger with Northern Kentucky Tri-County Economic Development Corp., the Ezone has recruited an entrepreneurship committee, proposed state legislation and created an angel investment group. It has given up two floors of incubator space and focused on providing resources rather than offices to local entrepreneurs.

“We’re getting more mature and adding new products,” said Casey Barach, who has served as executive director since the Ezone’s 2001 founding.

Over that time, Ezone has helped to generate $54 million in funding for more than 70 local companies and to create hundreds of new jobs.

The Tri-ED relationship has allowed the Ezone to further align with the goals of Vision 2015, Northern Kentucky’s strategic plan, to create and retain jobs. It also meshes with the state’s alignment of economic development and entrepreneurship. Three years ago, the commonwealth merged the Cabinet for Economic Development and the Department of Commercialization and Innovation, the state office that awards grants and loans to small businesses. Most statewide economic development agencies include Ezone-like resources.

“Economic development is recruitment, retention and venture creation,” Barach said. He assists local companies in the ABC process: assessment, business planning and capitalization, with emphasis on the third step. He submits applications to several statewide funds that award anywhere from $30,000 to $750,000 in grants.

Bringing capital to the table

Barach also pairs Ezone member companies with local venture sources like the Queen City Angels or Lexington-based Bluegrass Angels. And he’s adding a new source for Northern Kentucky entrepreneurs, lining up potential investors for a new angel group called the Northern Kentucky Angel Investment Network.

A third local group will add critical mass to the venture capital community, said Tony Shipley, founder and chairman of Queen City Angels.

“It gives us a better chance of bringing the right amount of capital to the table,” he said.

To attract more investors, Barach has proposed new state legislation that would provide the same tax credits available to venture funds to angel investors. Barach is working with the Northern Kentucky Chamber of Commerce to make the tax credit one of its legislative priorities for the 2009 General Assembly. Eighteen states, including Ohio, currently award the credit. Barach expects to launch the group once the economy stabilizes.

Firm benefits from its work

The ability to earn funding from local investors provides more fuel for member companies like Global Shelter Systems, which recently won the region’s largest grant to date at $500,000.

The Fort Thomas-based company, which manufactures blast-protective barriers for the defense industry, provides an example for what Ezone can do for entrepreneurs. It applied to each of the three grant programs over the past two years and now has a product hitting the market.

“The Ezone helped us very quickly find and network with those important resources,” said CEO Stephanie Herron, who hopes to secure contracts with the U.S. Department of Defense.

Barach also led Herron to the Bluegrass and Queen City Angels, which eventually invested in the company. And those relationships led to the University of Kentucky’s Center for Manufacturing, which helped her determine how to manufacture the product, what materials to use and how to optimize use of those materials. Professors there suggested a host of local companies that could make the product.

“Casey is out there every day being a champion for entrepreneurs,” Herron said. “He’s built a great list of contacts around the region that have served us very well.”

Members of the entrepreneurship committee include Ezone founders Chad Bilz and John Beehler, Tri-ED’s Dan Tobergte and Roger Griggs, founder of Drug Enhancement Company of America.