Super-small startups led by young entrepreneurs will proliferate and play an increasingly important role in the economy this year, according to Jack Templin, a technology consultant and entrepreneur in Providence.
These tiny companies, sometimes called micro-businesses, are most common in the Internet sector, but they are starting to be seen in other industries, too, said Templin, who also heads RI Nexus, the R.I. Economic Development Corporation’s program for the information technology and digital-media sector.
Creative and resourceful young people will be the driving force. “If they can’t find a challenging, compelling position for themselves they’re going to create their own, and they’ve got a real opportunity to do that on the Internet,” Templin said.
“A number of forces continue to push this trend,” he said. One is the falling cost of starting a business, thanks to the development of open-source software, falling hardware prices, cloud-computing services and top-quality, Web-development tools.
“In the past it took [significantly] more money to build the equivalent functionality,” Templin said. “I’ve seen projects today that I know would have cost a couple million dollars a [few] years ago done for next to nothing.”
Providence is well-positioned to capitalize on the micro-business trend, with a top industrial design program at Rhode Island School of Design and a long history in manufacturing, Templin said. •
