Agenda - 11-17-2015 - 7a - New Interlocal Agreement Between Orange County and the Town of Chapel Hill to Continue Funding the “Launch Chapel Hill” Small Business Incubator

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11 9 To round out the new cohort, Waterless Buddy's—another Carolina Challenge winner— has in a matter of months created a business plan for a waterless car-detailing service, tested it with customers, won various pitch competitions, gained attention from national media and attracted funding — all before taking part in Launch's accelerator program. "They really made us think and dive deeper," Buddy's co-founder Austin Helms says of the mentors at Launch, who he says preach long-term stability over short-term momentum. Mentors include serial entrepreneur, professor (and Launch co-founder) Jim Kitchen and Chris Mumford, founder of Joe Start up and an investor and corporate leader. "In short, they saved us a ton of money." Launch is planning its first Demo Day in December, where the new cohort will pitch to members of the UNC and Chapel Hill communities, along with investors. "We're in the final stages of planning it," Rousset says, adding that Top of the Hill Restaurant or Varsity Theatre serve as potential locations. Building a startup pipeline in Orange County The space is also occupied by several "tenant ventures"— graduates of the accelerator program that are not yet in position to rent their own office space but continue to make substantial progress toward scaling. Launch is currently housing 11 tenant ventures, including a handful that have recently made large steps forward. UConnection, which provides exclusive coupons and daily specials in college towns, has grown from two colleges to 17 in the past year and has doubled its users this month. That's leading to fresh funding discussions. Sticker Farm, which creates toys and other children's' items, finished in the Top 20 of a recent Shopify contest with 63,000 total entries and has an upcoming pitch in front of Shark Tank's Mark Cuban. Tooth-friendly caramel maker Tom & Jenny's has also fared well in business competitions as a recent winner of the Samuel Adams "Made in America" contest, building off a Carolina Challenge victory and an appearance in front of Steve Case in April's Rise of the Rest event in Durham in May. While the growth of the tenant ventures is encouraging, Rousset acknowledges that companies cannot stay at Launch forever. "Every six months I have the very difficult job of sitting here and figuring out how many people can fit," she says, noting that January is the next transition period, as Cohort 4 graduates and a new group of ventures enter.