06/16/17 Tom Rainey, Ex. Director, Maine Ctr Entrepreneurial Development

Tom Rainey - Maine Center for Entrepreneurial Development (MCED) 

Tom started by telling us he was casually dressed in red and orange because next week is Lobster Appreciation week, which started his casual conversation with Portland Rotary. Tom is newly arrived from Arizona, where he spent the last 10 years. He joins MCED during its 20th anniversary year. Tom has a love of working with entrepreneurs, helping them avoid critical errors. Tom landed in Portland when he and his wife, a French Canadian, wanted to get to New England to be closer to his wife’s family. Portland is a great place because Tom says that there has never been a better time to be entrepreneurs in Maine. Next week is ‘Startup and Create Week,’ with a new food festival coming to Thompson’s Point on June 22nd.

MCED is planning a 20th anniversary gala event in fall, with details to follow. The Top Gun program is a hallmark of MCED, where 144 companies have completed it, with 121 still in business and going strong. This compares with a typical 50% failure rate. These companies enjoy $25 million revenue and have secured $9 million in outside funding.  5% are food, beverage or agriculture ventures.

The Top Gun is a 15-week intensive training program that matches companies with mentors and service providers. In this process, it is critically important to get chemistry right between companies and mentors/providers. MCED is planning a new pilot program to help $1-15 million companies scale up to $20 million plus. Six companies have been targeted, and are in the assessment and roadmap phase. It is planned to use fractional executives, experienced people who work 1-2 days per week for a company to manage areas where needed to allow the companies to step up to the next level. 

New federal funding has allowed Top Gun to expand from Portland to Rockland, Lewiston, and UMaine locations. The next program has 32 companies, 44 entrepreneurs, and 48 guest speakers, with significant economic diversification. The program is designed to plant seedlings and nurture them to grow.  Companies are taught how to pitch their company to investors. There is a pitching competition, where 8 finalists deliver pitches to 220 people, with 2 prizes, $10K cash and $120K of Microsoft services. The Top Gun program de-risks a company in the eyes of investors.

The goal of MCED is to come alongside other strategic organizations, Coastal Enterprises (CEI), the Defense Adjustment Program for ME, the Ship Building industry and others to diversify businesses and prepare for change or growth. There are several co-working spaces popping up, such as Cloudport on Federal Street. MCED has relocated to Cloudport to be near a target rich environment. Other co-working spaces are the ThinkTank on Congress Street and the business incubator, TechSpace in Brunswick. MCED works with several partner organizations including Maine Technology (MTI), Finance Authority of Maine (FAME) and the University of Maine.

(Photo L-R: Bob Martin, Tom Rainey and President Laura Young.)