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Philadelphia’s newest entrepreneurial incubation space is ready for business –and ready to help businesses get their start. The Innovation Center @3401, a collaborative effort of Drexel University and the University City Science Center to help attract and nurture start-up businesses in the region, officially opened its doors on Monday, July 28.
The Innovation Center @3401 (ic@3401), which is located at the corner of 34th and Market Streets, is the new home of DreamIt Ventures and Point.io –two companies committed to making their home in a vibrant urban location at the intersection of University City’s research and innovation communities. In addition, six companies have taken memberships in the collaborative space that ic@3401 offers. And it will also play host to seven healthcare start-up companies for the next 10 months, as part of the Science Center’s new Digital Health Accelerator program.
“Looking at the caliber of companies already on board, I’m confident that the Innovation Center will have a transformative impact on information technology, digital media, health care and many more fields,” Drexel President John Fry said at the grand opening celebration on July 28. “We have made it part of our mission to provide this sort of economic catalyst, and we’re off to a great start.”
Science Center President & CEO Stephen S. Tang, Ph.D., MBA, said at the opening, “By bringing companies of different sizes, stages and sectors together in one space, along with students and faculty, we’re increasing the probability of serendipity that can lead to increased collaboration and innovation – and make our great city and region stronger and recognized as a successful and supportive innovation hub.”
DreamIt Ventures is an accelerator program that has launched more than 125 start-ups since 2008 by working hands-on with entrepreneurs to rapidly validate, de-risk or disprove the assumptions underlying their businesses. Through its startup boot camps DreamIt helps entrepreneurs achieve in three months what typically takes companies 12 to 24 months to achieve on their own.
Point.io, the first mid-size company to put down roots in ic@3401, is a high-tech company that helps its clients streamline the development of mobile apps from their existing digital information. Through Point.io’s patent-pending, API-as-a-Service Platform (APIaaS), enterprise clients can dramatically reduce development time for mobile applications, and therefore realize significant cost savings and faster time to market.
All in all, ic@3401’s 17,000-square-feet of collaborative space can accommodate 50 tech entrepreneurs and freelancers who will work alongside DreamIt Ventures’ world headquarters and Point.io while joining a community that bridges the creative minds of academia and industry and taps into the start-up and knowledge resources of Drexel University and the Science Center.
As partners in the project, Drexel and the Science Center are sharing in the management and programming at ic@3401.
Entrepreneurs can participate in ic@3401 through an open membership that offers access to flexible workstations or dedicated office space. Fees include rent, utilities, internet services and amenities such as shared office equipment, conference rooms and kitchen facilities. Residents will join a community of innovators with its center at ic@3401, and will also have access to the Science Center’s Quorum programming and activities at Drexel’s ExCITe Center.
For more information about how to get involved with ic@3401, contact Kristin Hart at 215-966-6005 or khart@sciencecenter.org.