{"id":70466,"date":"2017-11-03T11:13:08","date_gmt":"2017-11-03T21:13:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/?p=70466"},"modified":"2019-03-13T15:04:11","modified_gmt":"2019-03-14T01:04:11","slug":"uh-accelerator-wins-national-award-for-the-third-year-in-a-row","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/2017\/11\/03\/uh-accelerator-wins-national-award-for-the-third-year-in-a-row\/","title":{"rendered":"UH<\/abbr> accelerator wins national award for the third year in a row"},"content":{"rendered":"Reading time: <\/span> 2<\/span> minutes<\/span><\/span>
\"large
The XLR8UH<\/abbr> team and members of Cohort 5<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The University of Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span>\u2019s award-winning startup accelerator, XLR8UH<\/abbr><\/a>, was named one of only 20 national winners of the U.S. Small Business Association\u2019s (SBA) Growth Accelerator Fund competition<\/a>. This marks the third year in a row that the University of Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> accelerator has won the competition, which includes a $50,000 cash award.<\/p>\n

XLR8UH<\/abbr> was the only winner from Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> in this year\u2019s SBA<\/abbr>\u2019s Growth Accelerator Fund competition, which is designed to draw attention and funding to parts of the country with gaps in the entrepreneurial ecosystem. Winners were selected by experts in entrepreneurship, investing and business plans from both inside and out of the federal government and based on applications and pitch videos submitted by the finalists.<\/p>\n

“We are pleased to have our XLR8UH<\/abbr> program take home this prestigious SBA<\/abbr> national award once again,” said UH<\/abbr> Vice President for Research and Innovation Vassilis L. Syrmos<\/strong><\/a>. “It further validates our continuing efforts under the Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> Innovation Initiative<\/a> to diversify the state\u2019s economy by creating a third economic leg based on the commercialization of UH<\/abbr> research.”<\/p>\n

Building on XLR8UH<\/abbr>\u2019s national recognition<\/h2>\n

This award builds upon the national recognition garnered by XLR8UH<\/abbr> in 2017, which also includes being named one of the top 30 accelerators in the country by Forbes<\/em>. XLR8UH<\/abbr> is one of the first public university investment programs in the nation, revolutionizing the way innovation and research is commercialized.<\/p>\n

“We are honored, once again, to have won this award and be counted among the top accelerator programs in the country,” said Omar Sultan<\/strong>, co-founder and managing partner of XLR8UH<\/abbr> and Sultan Ventures<\/strong><\/a>. “The SBA<\/abbr>\u2019s recognition over the past three years has helped shine a national spotlight on the strong and growing entrepreneurial ecosystem here in Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> and on the innovations generated by Â鶹´«Ã½research.<\/p>\n

In accepting the SBA<\/abbr> award, the winning accelerators will be committing to bi-annual reporting of metrics on jobs created, funds raised, startups launched, corporate sponsors obtained and more. These metrics will allow the SBA<\/abbr> to better understand accelerators and their impact, and to develop long-term relationships with the startups and constituents in these innovative and entrepreneurial communities.<\/p>\n

Launched in 2014 as a public-private partnership between UH<\/abbr> and Sultan Ventures, XLR8UH<\/abbr> has mentored and trained five cohorts consisting of 24 companies. In total, these companies have created more than 100 jobs and generated over $5 million in revenue, nearly all of which remains in Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span>.<\/p>\n

“With only 20 awards available this year, the two tiered selection process made the competition even more difficult,” said Jane Sawyer, director of the SBA<\/abbr>\u2019s Â鶹´«Ã½<\/span> District Office. “Our team is extremely pleased that XLR8UH<\/abbr> once again was recognized as one of the nation\u2019s top accelerators.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

XLR8UH<\/abbr> was named one of only 20 national winners of the U.S. Small Business Association\u2019s Growth Accelerator Fund competition<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[734,332,911,947,1013,594],"class_list":["post-70466","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-community","tag-entrepreneurship","tag-hawaii-innovation-initiative","tag-program-recognition","tag-uh-system","tag-university-system-recognition","tag-xlr8uh","entry","has-media"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70466","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=70466"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70466\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":92588,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70466\/revisions\/92588"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=70466"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=70466"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.hawaii.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=70466"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}