By Ann Craig-Cinnamon
It’s Tuesday, late morning, and the Launch Fishers parking lot behind the Hamilton East Public Library is full. Inside, there are people scattered around tables and work stations in the large open space that is Launch Fishers. A quiet hum of creativity hangs in the air. It’s the sound of entrepreneurship and the maestro is John Wechsler who, with help from the Town of Fishers, created Launch Fishers just 16 months ago.
He came up with the idea from his own needs as an entrepreneur to find a place in Fishers in which he could start his businesses. The objective was to give start-ups a place to call home and give them the tools they need to conduct business all in one place. The goal was to have 200 members by the end of 2013. Instead, they had over 300. Several of the businesses that began in the basement of the library are now breaking out into space of their own. For instance, Blue Bridge Digital, which was Launch Fishers’ first member, also became the first member to launch out. They recently leased 4500 square feet of space at the Forum building and announced 199 new jobs would be created in the next decade. Wechsler said Launch Fishers is also organic economic development because members develop a “live, work, play” core in Fishers, which will help keep them in the community.
The success of Launch Fishers led Wechsler to go statewide with the recent announcement of Launch Indiana, which is headquartered at Launch Fishers. He says that while Launch Fishers is the place; Launch Indiana is about the people. “Launch Indiana is exclusively focused on bringing entrepreneurial mentorship to statewide high-potential start-ups. And, by high-potential, I mean there are very unique brands of start-ups called innovation-driven enterprises and these are usually technology-leveraged companies; usually hyper-growth; these are the future Exact Targets and Angie’s Lists of the world,” he said. Launch Indiana will identify these companies and bring all the parties together to help get these businesses off the ground.
The state of Indiana is kicking in some funding for the project along with the Town of Fishers. “One of the things that attracted the town’s interest to this particular program is that we are putting Fishers on the map as an entrepreneurial city. While we are going statewide, the whole thing is based here at Launch Fishers. So, when we go on the road to Terre Haute, Bloomington, Evansville, Lafayette and Muncie, we’re carrying the Launch Fishers banner, but this is still under the Launch Indiana initiative,” said Wechsler.
