Applications are available for another week for startup businesses to participate in the Iowa Startup Accelerator (ISA) spring cohort. The program has a rolling admission, but the deadline to participate in the spring accelerator cohort is Feb. 11.
The Spring cohort is scheduled to begin five weeks later on March 21, and will culminate in June during EntreFEST in Iowa City. Applications are available on the NewBoCo website or contact Managing Director Alex Taylor at Alex@iowastartupaccelerator.com with questions.
ISA provides a comprehensive six-month program for qualified Iowa-based startup businesses to accelerate organizational development, revenue growth and scaleup/expansion success. In addition to receiving startup funding from ISA Ventures, entrepreneurs get on-going executive coaching and mentoring from industry and subject matter experts.
Instructional programming includes Agile Methodology, Project/Product Management, Customer Discovery, Product Branding, Market Traction, Customer Discovery, Sales, Legal Contracts, Term Sheets, Financial Reports and Reporting and Investor Readiness.
“The Iowa Startup Accelerator uniquely offers venture funding and programming designed to scale along with the startup’s growth and success,” Alex Taylor, managing director for ISA, stated in a release. “While the comprehensive six-month program focuses on early stage companies, ISA supports all stages of startups with guidance and a range of funding opportunities.”
In addition to coaching, mentoring and instructional programming, participating startups get access to NewBoCo’s robust agency support to include marketing and design services, software development, web design, social media support, copywriting, and public relations consultation, and use of the Vault Coworking & Collaboration Space in Cedar Rapids.
ISA is generally industry agnostic, but requires the startups to be Iowa-based with a scalable solution for a clearly defined customer segment. Early revenue businesses with a demonstrated competitive advantage are preferred, but pre-revenue startups are considered if they can demonstrate a clear path towards revenue growth and scale-up success on a regional/national basis.
The Iowa Startup Accelerator was established in 2014 as the first accelerator in the state. Since then, 67 startups have participated in the program, and received more than $6 million in direct investment. Combined these startups have gone on to raise almost $100 million in additional venture funding, and added more than 300 jobs to the Iowa’s economy.
