Grant From the KeyBank Center for Technology, Innovation and Inclusive Growth will Fund New Program to Help 50 Minority Businesses Grow and Hire Over the Next Five Years

On Friday, the KeyBank Business Boost & Build program, powered by JumpStart, awarded $100K in funding to the Cincinnati Chamber Minority Business Accelerator (Accelerator) through the KeyBank Center for Technology, Innovation and Inclusive Growth.

The Accelerator is an initiative of the Cincinnati USA Regional Chamber, one of the largest chambers in the country with more than 4,000 members. The Cincinnati Chamber is also a part of the eight-member Cincinnati Minority Business Collaborative (CMBC).

Using this funding, the Accelerator will collaborate with other members of the CMBC, as well as Northern Kentucky University, to execute a newly launched business development platform that will help 50 high performing minority businesses grow their revenue to $5 million and create 500 new jobs over the next five years.

The KeyBank Business Boost & Build Program, funded by a grant from the KeyBank Foundation in 2017, is designed to stimulate economic growth in Ohio by helping startups and small businesses grow and preparing the workforce for the needs of those companies. The KeyBank Center for Technology, Innovation and Inclusive Growth will make grants to organizations across Ohio that are focused on connecting female, minority and rural individuals with the innovation economy, high growth companies in growing, competitive industries, and the related careers.

“We are thrilled to establish this partnership with JumpStart as we collectively strive to grow more larger-scale, job-creating, minority-owned businesses,” said Darrin Redus, vice president and head of the Cincinnati Chamber Minority Business Accelerator. “This investment from the KeyBank Business Boost & Build program will enable us to continue this important work, and certainly expand our efforts.”

“We are proud to be supporting the important work of the Cincinnati Chamber Minority Business Accelerator and the Cincinnati Minority Business Collaborative,” said KeyBank Cincinnati Market President Mike McCuen. “We believe these organizations, and the businesses they serve, are absolutely critical to our region and its economy.”

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About the Cincinnati Chamber Minority Business Accelerator
The Cincinnati Chamber Minority Business Accelerator is the flagship economic development initiative of the Cincinnati USA Regional Chamber focused on growing sizable minority firms. Its mission is to accelerate the development of sizable minority business enterprises and strengthen and expand the regional minority entrepreneurial community.

About the Cincinnati Minority Business Collaborative
Launched in 2010, this joint initiative is comprised of eight separate nonprofit organizations serving the regional entrepreneurial community. The collaborative’s members include Cincinnati USA Regional Chamber, Hamilton County Development Corporation, Greater Cincinnati Microenterprise Initiative, the African American Chamber of Greater Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky, Cincinnati USA Hispanic Chamber, Greater Cincinnati Urban League, Ohio Minority Supplier Development Council and SCORE.

About KeyCorp
KeyCorp’s roots trace back 190 years to Albany, New York. Headquartered in Cleveland, Ohio, Key is one of the nation’s largest bank-based financial services companies, with assets of approximately $135.8 billion on June 30, 2017.

Key provides deposit, lending, cash management, insurance, and investment services to individuals and businesses in 15 states under the name KeyBank National Association through a network of more than 1,200 branches and more than 1,500 ATMs. Key also provides a broad range of sophisticated corporate and investment banking products, such as merger and acquisition advice, public and private debt and equity, syndications and derivatives to middle market companies in selected industries throughout the United States under the KeyBanc Capital Markets trade name. For more information, visit https://www.key.com/. KeyBank is Member FDIC.

About JumpStart Inc.
JumpStart unlocks the full potential of diverse and ambitious entrepreneurs to economically transform entire communities. For more information, follow @JumpStartInc on Twitter.