Why should you vote yes on Issue 1 to renew Ohio Third Frontier?

I've given you many reasons, I hope, in my two previous posts. But here's the most urgent reason: the economy.
Since 2001, Southwest Ohio's gross regional product has grown 24 percent less than the national average.  The state's rate of growth has lagged the nation as well. Why has this been the case?  My reading of the data leads me to conclude that it is our industry mix.  Many industries in Ohio are either mature or in decline.

The Ohio Third Frontier is helping the growth of new firms in emerging industries, most of which are based on technology and innovation.  It is doing this by stimulating new industry-university partnerships and seeding the start up of new high potential firms, as I outlined earlier.

The program also was designed to be fiscally responsible. According to a study by the Ohio Business Roundtable, the activity created by Third Frontier is generating enough tax revenue to pay back Ohio taxpayers on the $1.35 billion invested in the Third Frontier by 2014. That is impressive by any measure.

I'm proud of how CincyTech has used Third Frontier money to seed the start up of new companies in Southwest Ohio. Since May 2007, we have reviewed more than 850 opportunities, assisted 157 companies, conducted extensive due diligence on 85 companies and invested almost $4 million in 13 companies. Because of our work, private investors have put another $43 million of their money into those companies alongside us. 

That money gives companies incentives to stay here, too.  One company in CincyTech's portfolio, AssureRx Health, demonstrates this point. In 2006, AssureRx received an offer of funding from a San Francisco-based fund.  But they said AssureRx had to move to San Francisco to get the money. Fortunately, AssureRx's local investors, with assistance from a Third Frontier seed fund, rejected the offer.  The company elected to stay and grow in Southwest Ohio and expects to have 30 employees by the end of the year.

The Third Frontier program represents support for entrepreneurial capitalism at its best:  market driven, with a public purpose - to grow jobs and our economy. That's why I, for one, will vote yes on Issue 1.

Cincinnati has a newfound culture of innovation.

Everyone is talking about it - from Chamber president Ellen van der Horst to the energetic YP Twitter-ers and Cincy Women Bloggers to CincyTech portfolio company founder Chris Ostoich of Blackbook - a true innovator himself. So how do we make the most of this exciting new movement? It takes partnerships between the public and private sectors. And that's exactly what Ohio Third Frontier is creating.

Consider a new partnership between GE Aviation in Evendale and the University of Cincinnati. They received a $27 million Ohio Third Frontier grant to study new jet technology and longer life for engine parts. The grant helped set up the Center for Intelligent Propulsion and Life Management Systems. But the Third Frontier grant was only the start to the funding - matched by money from NASA, the Air Force and GE Aviation itself, as well as $32 million in smaller grants from various sources awarded to UC's aerospace department.

Dozens of people will be hired, from specialized jet-engine researchers to engineers to support staff. And it all started with money from Ohio Third Frontier that supported this innovative idea.

Innovation doesn't have to start so big. CincyTech invested $250,000 recently in a search engine company created by the former chief technology officer of Intelliseek, Sundar Kadayam, in partnership with local serial entrepreneur Mahendra Vora. Intelliseek, as you may remember, bought Pete Blackshaw's company, Planet Feedback, and then Nielsen swooped into town and bought that company. Today Nielsen Buzzmetrics and employs about 700 people here.

Now Kadayam and Vora are on to their next adventure, Zakta.com, a "social networking" search engine that organizes results by categories such as news and reference and makes it easy to share search results. Try it out at www.zakta.com and enjoy the spirit of innovation behind it. William Procter and James Gamble would be proud.

Ohio voters are being asked to renew the Ohio Third Frontier program on May 4 - or earlier if they select to vote absentee. The Yes on Issue 1 campaign is called United for Jobs and Ohio's Future because the goal of Ohio Third Frontier is to create the jobs of the future here, with a little bit of government investment - to "plant the seeds," if you will.

Frankly, the name Ohio Third Frontier is a little confusing. But the idea is simple - invest in research that will lead to new companies that will create jobs as well as in entrepreneurs creating high-growth companies. And while it can sound remote and academic, I'll bet that you or someone you know has benefitted from the program.

That's because since Ohio Gov. Bob Taft launched Third Frontier in 2002, it has created more than 55,000 well-paying jobs. It has launched nearly 700 start-up businesses. And it has generated more than $6.6 billion in economic impact. That's $10 of tax revenue and product sales returns for every dollar the state has invested so far in the program. And all this during one of the worst recessions our country has ever seen.

Mark Collar is former president of Procter & Gamble Pharmaceuticals and helped create Ohio Third Frontier. He says the program was designed to create incentives to attract private money into the state and not, he says, as a "government-spending spree." It targets high-tech industries and encourages partnerships between corporations and public institutions to bring forward their best ideas to build businesses.

So today we can look with hope to the future. Where once our economic drivers were machine tools, steel casings and auto assembly lines, now, increasingly, our economy is being driven by biomedicine, information technology and renewable energy.

Those are growing, thriving industries. Supporting them -  "seeding them" - in Ohio is the promise of Ohio Third Frontier - and the reason to vote Yes on Issue 1.