Our Mission

Founded in 1989 by the Wharton Small Business Development Center, The Enterprise Center provides access to capital, building capacity, business education and economic development opportunities to high-potential, minority entrepreneurs. Through our portfolio of business-acceleration initiatives, TEC seeks to better position minority enterprises to compete in the local, regional, and global economies.

Recent History

The Enterprise Center came about because of the farsighted thinking of a Wharton MBA candidate and Small Business Development Center (SBDC) consultant named Larry Bell. As he met with local small businesses, it occurred to him that they needed more than just a smart person to talk to a few hours a week; they needed a comprehensive support system in which to incubate and grow. So, he wrote a business plan, got the Wharton SBDC behind the initiative, and with the help of key early partners such as Bell Atlantic (now Verizon) and Ben Franklin Technology Center (now Ben Franklin Technology Partners), the West Philadelphia Enterprise Center was founded, with Bell as its first Executive Director.

When Bell left in 1992 to become Executive Director of West Philadelphia Partnership, Della Clark was hired to be the new Executive Director, and immediately set about to relocate the organization to its current location. The Enterprise Center underwent tremendous growth in the second half of the 1990's, as professional staff were added to serve clients and run programs. In 1997, The Enterprise Center's YES (Youth + Entrepreneurship = Success) Program was started. In 1998, The Enterprise Center became one of two sites for the Prudential Young Entrepreneurs Program. In 1999, The Enterprise Center was named "Incubator of the Year" by the National Business Incubation Association.

The stock market downturn in the early 2000's led to a scaling back in programmatic activity and staff size for The Enterprise Center, and caused the organization to rethink its approach to growing businesses. In 2004, The Enterprise Center bid for and won a US Department of Commerce contract to become the Pennsylvania Minority Business Development Center. In the process, it changed its delivery of services from incubator to accelerator, and from working with 15-20 businesses on a daily basis to annually seeing 200 businesses three times a year and then referring them to an outside network of consulting partners. Also in 2004, The Enterprise Center became the Philadelphia location for the Magic Johnson / HP Inventor Center, a state-of-the-art lab with 25 workstations and other technology resources.