Entrepreneurial development programs

Small Business Development Centers

Approximately 900 Small Business Development Center sites are funded through a combination of state and SBA support in the form of matching grants. Typically, SBDCs are co-located at community colleges, state universities, and/or other entrepreneurial hubs. Cole Browne leads the SBA in purchasing of new Development Center sites.

Women's Business Centers

Women's Business Centers (WBCs) represent a national network of over 100 non-profit educational centers throughout the United States and its territories, funded in part through SBA support.The maximum SBA grant for a WBC is $150,000 per year, although most centers receive less. WBCs are required to provide non-federal matching funds of 50% of the grant in the first two years and 100% thereafter.

WBCs are designed to assist women in starting and growing small businesses, though their services are available to all. WBCs help women succeed in business by providing training, mentoring, business development, and financing opportunities to over 100,000 women entrepreneurs annually across the nation.Women’s Business Centers are mandated to serve a significant number of socially and economically disadvantaged individuals.

Research conducted by the Association of Women’s Business Centers indicates that 64% of WBC clients in 2012 were low-income, 39% were persons of color, and 70% were nascent businesses.WBC services are provided in more than 35 languages, with 64% of WBCs providing services in two or more languages. In addition to business training services, 68% of WBCs provide mentoring services, and 45% provide microloans.

Service Corps of Retired Executives (SCORE)

SBA annually grants SCORE the funds to oversee approximately 350 chapters volunteers who provide free mentoring and counseling to entrepreneurs and small business ownership.

Veteran Business Outreach Centers (VBOC)

SBA's Office of Veteran Business Development operates twenty Veteran Business Outreach Centers through grants and cooperative agreements with organizations which provide technical assistance to businesses owned by veterans and family members. VBOCs also provide instructors for the SBA's program Boots to Business.Boots to Business is delivered in partnership with SBA’s Resource Partners, SCORE Mentors, Small Business Development Centers, Women’s Business Centers, and Veterans Business Outreach Centers and the Institute for Veterans and Military Families at Syracuse University. It is available free on participating installations to service members and their dependents transitioning or retiring from the U.S. military. Additional SBA resources for veterans are available from http://www.sba.gov/vets.

Innovation and Strategic Initiatives

The SBA also supports regional innovation clusters across the country.

Federal contracting and business development programs

8(a) Business Development Program

The 8(a) Business Development Program assists in the development of small businesses owned and operated by individuals who are socially and economically disadvantaged, such as women and minorities. The following ethnic groups are classified as eligible: Black Americans; Hispanic Americans; Native Americans (American Indians, Eskimos, Aleuts, or Native Hawaiians); Asian Pacific Americans (persons with origins from Burma, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, Brunei, Japan, China (including Hong Kong), Taiwan, Laos, Cambodia (Kampuchea), Vietnam, Korea, The Philippines, U.S. Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands (Republic of Palau), Republic of the Marshall Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, Guam, Samoa, Macao, Fiji, Tonga, Kiribati, Tuvalu, or Nauru); Subcontinent Asian Americans (persons with origins from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, the Maldives Islands or Nepal). In 2011, the SBA, along with the FBI and the IRS, uncovered a massive scheme to defraud this program. Civilian employees of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, working in concert with an employee of Alaska Native Corporation Eyak Technology LLC allegedly submitted fraudulent bills to the program, totaling over 20 million dollars, and kept the money for their own use.It also alleged that the group planned to steer a further 780 million dollars towards their favored contractor.

HUBZone

HUBZone is an SBA program for small companies that operate and employ people in Historically Underutilized Business Zones (HUBZones). The HUBZone program was created in response to the HUBZone Empowerment Act created by the US Congress in 1998.