FAYETTEVILLE -- The Fayetteville Chamber of Commerce announced Thursday that it is purchasing a building on the downtown square and dedicating one floor to the Arkansas Regional Innovation Hub.
The chamber plans to purchase the building at 21 W. Mountain St. and move its offices to the building's second floor by Jan. 1.
"We want to create an ecosystem of innovators," Steve Clark, the chamber's president and chief executive officer, said during a news conference Thursday with the building in the background.
Clark refused to provide a purchase price, but the Washington County assessor's office estimates the building's market value at $1.15 million. The sale is set to close in October.
The chamber plans to build a third floor for meeting space within the next two years, he said.
The Arkansas Regional Innovation Hub is a North Little Rock-based nonprofit organization that started two years ago to help entrepreneurs grow ideas and businesses, said Warwick Sabin, the Arkansas Regional Innovation Hub's executive director. Sabin is also a Democratic state representative from Little Rock.
A plan to open innovation hubs in other Arkansas cities was announced last week by Sabin and Jeff Amerine, the founder of Startup Junkie Consulting in Fayetteville. Startup Junkie offers free assistance, events, networking and work space to help entrepreneurs. Startup Junkie's offices are also on the Fayetteville Square in the Pryor Center at 1 E. Center St.
The new Fayetteville Innovation Hub will have equipment that can be used to design or create prototypes of ideas. Equipment will include high-tech products such as 3-D printers and simple tools such as sewing machines.
Membership rates will start at $40 a month for students and senior citizens and top out at $60.
The Fayetteville Square has become a magnet for groups with a mission to help entrepreneurs. Earlier this month, local entrepreneur John James opened Hayseed Ventures in the historic post office in the square's center.
James and his employees fill the main floor, there is room for four startup companies to work on the second floor, and the basement is being turned into a 5,000-square-foot work space.
"If we don't have 100 people working out of that building by year's end, we aren't doing it justice," he said.
James has nine workers on staff and plans to expand to 15 later this year.
He wants to raise $6 million to help startup companies grow and said he is about halfway there, with all the money coming from Arkansans. He said this is the fourth time he's raised money and created a business, and he learned something new each time. He was a co-founder of Acumen Brands and helped the firm secure $100 million.
"I'm trying to build a great company, but really trying to change Arkansas," he said.
The growing entrepreneurial presence in downtown Fayetteville helps set up what James calls "creative collisions."
"Great things happen when you get great people together," he said.
Sabin compared the innovation hub to a training camp that a sports team uses to evaluate and select players.
The space also could help an entrepreneur get a prototype he may not been able to produce, said Joel Gordon, an Arkansas Regional Innovation Hub director.
"Most new product ideas die before they even get to the manufacturing stage," Gordon said. "It's about creating accessibility."
Business on 06/26/2015