U.S. Small Business Administration

The U.S. Small Business Administration supports the nation’s small businesses with access to capital, counseling and training, disaster assistance, and pathways into federal contracting. Its programs help business owners start, sustain and grow at every stage.

State of California GO-Biz

The Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development is California’s central point of contact for economic development and job creation. Through its Office of the Small Business Advocate, GO-Biz supports small businesses across the state with access to capital, technical assistance, and pathways into public procurement.

LA County Department of Economic Opportunity

The Los Angeles County Department of Economic Opportunity works to build a stronger and more equitable regional economy, connecting residents and small businesses across the county with capital, training, and workforce programs.

Sunstone Fund

Sunstone Management, Inc. is a diversified private capital management and investment firm offering comprehensive wealth management solutions to its worldwide clients with a focus on investments in U.S. based small businesses and middle markets. Its investment offerings are carefully structured to meet targeted investor goals ranging from short term senior debt products to longer term, equity, growth capital and venture capital investment strategies.

Sunstone invests on behalf of a diverse client base across the globe, including institutional investors and high net worth individuals and families. Sunstone is deeply committed to building trust through its proven asset management and operational expertise, and to create value that is sustainable and aligned with the needs of clients.

Sunstone’s Venture Capital funds including the Sunstone Long Beach Accelerator Fund invest in emerging US start-ups developing innovative solutions in the industries such as Healthcare, Artificial Intelligence, Biotechnology, Data Science, Aerospace & Aviation, Logistics & Transportation Technology, Clean Technology, Mobile Technologies and Applications. These funds offer Sunstone investors a unique opportunity to eventually catch the value of those high growth start-ups by obtaining a small piece of their equity in early stages such as the “seed round”.

CSULB

The Institute of Innovation and Entrepreneurship also known as the IIE was founded in 2017 as part of the city of Long Beach’s commitment to build a tech ecosystem. The IIE led by Dr. Wade Martin provides ongoing programming for innovators and entrepreneurs alike on and off campus.

The amount of programs and workshops are constantly growing and developing to support individuals on their entrepreneurial journey. The IIE supports many programs and include:

• Beach Incubator – open to anyone and occurs every Tuesday between 7-9PM during the academic year
• CSULB Innovation Challenge – campus wide annual business plan competition
• DLBA Entrepreneurship Education Series
• Beach Entrepreneur Bootcamp
• Centro CHA Boot Camp
• DLBA Woman Owned Entrepreneur Accelerator
• Climathon
• Professional Networking Events