With today’s launch of Startup Texas, Texas becomes the latest U.S. state to join the growing list of regions in the Startup America initiative. The Startup America national campaign, chaired by Steve Case, co-founder of AOL and Chairman of the Case Foundation, is meant to encourage and accelerate entrepreneurship across the country, especially in regions where it can benefit from a push, like Colorado, Illinois, Massachusetts, Tennessee, Connecticut and Florida, all of which are already program participants.
The Austin Chamber of Commerce announced the launch of Startup Texas this morning, and says it will support the initiative through its own “Opportunity Austin” funding, which will help provide staff and resources to help Texas-based startups succeed. The partnership will also connect local entrepreneurs with sources of funding, service providers, advisors and mentors, accelerator programs, training, talent and customers.
Texas has been on a roll this week, having also just seen an announcement for UT’s “Demo Day,” which will feature student startups emerging from the “1 Semester Startup (1SS)” class at the University of Texas at Austin. (The fall 2011 class is listed here).
The state, and especially Austin, Texas, has already claimed its spot as an emerging startup hotbed, having been home to a number of high-profile companies, including Gowalla, Spiceworks and Bazaarvoice, to name just a few. Our own Crunchbase lists hundreds of companies in the Austin area alone, for example. Although the Startup America program is not without its own political controversy, for Texas entrepreneurs Startup TX can only help.