The Initiative for a Competitive Inner City selected 28 metro Detroit companies this week to participate in a program designed to inject capital into inner-city businesses.
Sponsored by Bank of America, Fortune and the U.S. Small Business Administration, the program matches businesses in capital-strapped urban areas with investors and banks.
To qualify, a company must be in the inner city and generate at least $2 million in revenue annually.
The local companies selected:
- Alan C. Young and Associates PC.
- All Inclusive Security & Investigation LLC.
- Atlas Wholesale Food Co.
- Clean Emission Fluids Inc.
- Corridor Sausage Co. LLC.
- Delray Mechanical Corp.
- Detroit Chassis LLC.
- Edibles Rex Inc.
- Energy Alliance Group LLC.
- FutureNet Group Inc.
- Greening Inc.
- Omaha Automation Inc.
- PMA Consultants LLC.
- Richards-Truvillion Trucking Inc.
- Sanders Business Services Inc.
- Savorfull, a dba of Stacy Goldberg’s What’s in Your Cart LLC.
- St. Regis Enterprise LLC.
- Stanek Rack Co.
- Sweet Potato Sensations Inc.
- Tompkins Products Inc.
- Vetbuilt Building Group Inc.
- Walker-Miller Energy Services LLC.
- Weldon Enterprise Global IT Services LLC.
- Williams Electrical and Telecommunications Co. Inc.
- I*Logic Inc., Madison Heights.
- eBabEx LLC, Pontiac.
- Future Help Designs, a dba of Future Help Inc., Pontiac.
- West Construction Services, a dba of West Investment Group LLC, Pontiac.
Most of the companies are in Detroit. I*Logic is in Madison Heights, and eBabEx LLC, Future Help Designs and West Construction Services are in Pontiac.
“There is a lack of capital availability in America’s inner cities,” Mary Kay Leonard, president and CEO of the Boston-based ICIC, said in a release. “In fact, 71 percent of inner-city businesses have, on average, only a quarter of the capital needed to compete in their industries.”
This year’s program selected 178 companies nationally. Since its inception in 2005, the ICIC has introduced 375 inner-city companies to 105 capital providers. The program has led to $703 million of capital for the companies — $171 million in equity and $532 million in debt.
Dustin Walsh, Crain’s Detroit
