CABI Call for Award Nominations

CABI will honour Canadian Business Incubation with the prestigious 'INCUBATOR OF THE YEAR' award at the 21st Annual Conference this October in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.

This award is accessible to all incubators in Canada. To be eligible, incubators must meet all five (5) of the following criteria:

1. CABI membership in good standing
2. Began serving clients at least three years ago, and at present
3. Board approved entrance and exit policies
4. A history of successful graduate companies
5. Deliver a full incubation program through on-site management

Completed nominations must be received by CABI's Awards Committee Chair (David McNamara, CABI President) on, or before, September 14th, 2012. Please send your completed nominations package to [email protected] or by mail to:
CABI Awards Nomination Committee
955 - 1 Yonge Street
Toronto, ON
M5E 1E5

The winning incubator will receive both national and international recognition for its achievements. If your incubator qualifies, we encourage you to nominate it! We solicit your support in making this annual awards endeavour a success.

Judging will be completed by September 21st, 2012. The winner will not be notified or announced until the Awards Luncheon on Monday October 1st during the 2012 CABI Conference.

Please complete the Nomination Form.

(Please note, that although the total application should be no longer than 10 pages in length PLUS appendices, judging will be contingent on quality, and not quantity; therefore, CABI will not limit the length of any submission.)

WHAT ARE THE ACCOMPLISHMENTS THAT MAKE YOUR INCUBATOR WORTHY OF 'INCUBATOR OF THE YEAR' CONSIDERATION?

To help you respond, please consider the following questions:

1. What is the Mission Statement of your business incubator and how do your incubation activities fall within the guidelines of that mission (entrance and exit policies should be discussed in this section)?


2. What business incubation services do you offer your client companies; who delivers these services and, how; how are these services received by your client companies?


3. What positive results has your incubation program produced over the past four years? Please use aggregate quantitative results such as the number of companies served each year, the number of new jobs created each year, the number of companies graduated each year, and the number of graduate companies still in business. Please also discuss your overall success rate for client companies that are accepted into your program.


4. Is your business incubator financially stable? If so, please indicate your funding sources and what types of agreements you have in place. Be sure to include information on how the start-up of your business incubation program was financed as well as how current operations are financed. Also include any innovative approaches to generating revenue. Your goal is to demonstrate that your incubator is a dynamic model of a sustainable, efficient business operation. A copy of your business incubator's fiscal 2011 'Statement of Operations' is required to support this section.


5. Provide at least two current client company success stories in a case study format to exemplify the effectiveness your business incubation program. Where appropriate, provide statistics to support your statements (company revenues, new products to market, employees, third-party investments, etc.). Place particular emphasis on how the interaction between the business incubator and the companies led to those successes.


6. Provide a summary of how your management and board have incorporated business incubation 'best practices' into the ongoing operations of your business incubator.


7. Additional Information Appendix: Along with a list of your client companies, you should also submit informative documents such as incubator brochures, a sample newsletter, client information handouts, an annual report, various news clippings, any copies of awards received or recognition materials, etc.

Once you have answered these questions, you are then requested to write a two page, Executive Summary of your presentation, and insert it at the front of your submission, immediately after the page of general information.

If you have any questions, please contact:
Ed Hobbs, CABI Chair ([email protected])
David McNamara, CABI President ([email protected]).

Please complete the Nomination Form.

PLEASE NOTE: You must be present to accept the award at the awards luncheon to win. Should an award winner be absent from the conference, the judges will then present the award to the runner-up. In order to win, you must plan to attend. All applicants and their applications will be treated in the strictest of confidence, with all judges signing a confidentiality agreement. All entries will be destroyed after the awards ceremony in October. Good luck to all the entrants!