Techstars Atlanta, an accelerator program for some of the city’s most promising startups, is changing its model from being backed solely by a corporate sponsor to being community supported, the organization said.
“We’re definitely looking to create a system where Atlanta can pick its winners and can really champion them,” Tim Dorr, co-chair of Techstars Atlanta’s board of directors, told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Techstars is an accelerator that helps startups around the world work on their company, get access to mentors and network with other founders. It also provides some funding to founders accepted into the program.
Some major Atlanta companies have gone through a Techstars program when they were starting out, like Salesloft, a sales software tech firm that was valued at more than $2 billion in 2021.
The company did the Techstars program in Boulder, Co., in 2012, according to Dorr, who is one of Salesloft’s co-founders. Founders can attend a program in a city in which they are not based.
Techstars was first brought to Atlanta by Sandy Springs-based Cox Enterprises, and Cox provided funding, mentorship and connections for the dozens of startups that went through the accelerator over the nine years Cox backed it.
Cox Enterprises is an Atlanta-based broadband, automotive services, indoor agriculture and media company, with sizable interests in cleantech and public sector software. Its holdings include The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Credit: Julian Alexander
Credit: Julian Alexander
Last year, Cox ended its partnership with Techstars. The company launched its own accelerator program focused on companies in the clean technology sector, but is supportive of this next Techstars iteration, Dorr said.
“As the startup venture ecosystem grows and evolves in Atlanta, we are proud of our nearly ten-year partnership with Techstars. Cox remains committed to supporting the entrepreneurial community and contributing to its continued growth, as demonstrated by the recent launch of the Cox Cleantech Accelerator,” Morgan Phillips, Atlanta Ventures lead at Cox Enterprises, said in a statement.
The community-supported model is not a new approach for Techstars, according to Dorr. In fact, it’s how the accelerators were initially set up, like the program Salesloft offered in Colorado.
“The way that Techstars Boulder originally worked was they had a fund that they raised internally, that was raised from folks in the Boulder community and the Colorado community,” Dorr said.
What then happened is those investors also became mentors to that fund and “that created a system where, when Kyle (Porter, Salesloft co-founder) walked into that room, despite being from, you know, several thousands of miles away, everyone was super eager to help him,” Dorr explained.
He said it will be a community effort to fund this next iteration of Techstars Atlanta, which he hopes creates a system where everyone is pushing for the success of the chosen startups because it benefits them as well.
“If we’re creating a system where everyone in our community is really focused on these companies and pushing them forward,” Dorr said, “I think that’s going to have a greater chance of continuing to, you know, spin out these unicorn companies that are going to make a big splash in the world.”
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