The Research and Technology Park of the University of the Virgin Islands is leading the territory toward economic growth, technological advancement and innovation, and on Monday Cane Bay Partners VI LLLP congratulated them on their efforts while pledging its support.
The RTPark’s ACCELERATE VI program, for instance, is supporting entrepreneurs and freelancers in the Virgin Islands with trainings, co-working infrastructure and other resources. This exciting 12-week business acceleration program will soon be housed on the first floor of the Cane Bay Partners’ Church Street office building, and CBP will be a sponsor of the program. The 2,300-square-foot space is slated to open in January and will house up to 30 people representing various early-stage businesses. It will feature high-speed Internet, office equipment, two conference rooms, four private meeting rooms and a shared co-working space.
“We’re so proud to be a sponsor of their programs and to provide the space to house their ACCELERATE VI program,” said Kirk Chewning, co-founder of Cane Bay Partners. “We’re thankful to Peter Chapman and his staff, the government and UVI, who have been so supportive of creating an environment ready for new industry, new business and new opportunities for the Virgin Islands.”
The RTPark’s recent Business Attraction Summit highlighted for prospective businesses how to leverage the advantages as well as overcome the challenges around doing business in the Virgin Islands. Chewning participated in a panel discussing resiliency following the 2017 hurricanes. He discussed how he and business partner David Johnson led a large-scale recovery effort that turned into a long-term charitable giving effort, Cane Bay Cares. The damage to their Church Street office led to CBP purchasing their downtown Christiansted office building, which facilitated the availability of the space that will now be used for ACCELERATE VI.
“We’re working hard to promote economic diversity in the Virgin Islands while supporting innovation and technological advancements, and we appreciate the support from established local businesses like Cane Bay Partners. The RTPark doesn’t live in a vacuum, so collaborating with our local business community is essential to promoting the strong economic ecosystem that we have in the territory” said Peter H. Chapman, UVI RTPark executive director. “Chewning’s talk during our Summit on resiliency was important for us to illustrate the best example of how to be a great corporate citizen, as well as maintaining business continuity and thriving in the wake of a hurricane.”
About UVI RTPark: The University of the Virgin Islands Research and Technology Park (RTPark) is a rapidly growing economic development program specializing in technology and knowledge-based business attraction, retention and expansion in the United States Virgin Islands (USVI). It is a partnership between the private sector, the government of the US Virgin Islands and the University of the Virgin Islands (UVI). Benefits include, but are not limited to attractive tax incentives, a research university partnership, special programs including our comprehensive entrepreneurship program, and living and working in the America’s island paradise in the Caribbean – the United States Virgin Islands. Our Mission is to establish the USVI as the premier business destination of choice for firms in knowledge and technology-intensive sectors. The RTPark is proud to be an instrumental part of diversifying the regional economy and growing the tech ecosystem in an area advantageously located between the mainland U.S. and Latin America.
Photo cutlines:
Cohort – Entrepreneurs and freelancers participating in the ACCELERATE VI program by the UVI RTPark have a training session in the Cane Bay Partners Church Street conference room.
Accelerator – The 2,300-square-foot, co-working space under the UVI RTPark’s ACCELERATE VI program will be housed on the first floor of the Cane Bay Partners VI, LLLP’s Christiansted office building and will support early stage businesses.
RTPark – Peter Chapman, executive director of the UVI RTPark, speaks during their recent Business Attraction Summit.
About Cane Bay Partners VI, LLLP
Cane Bay Partners VI, LLLP was formed in June 2009 and founded by internationally experienced business executives with many years of experience in the financial services industry. Focusing our efforts primarily in the financial services industry, our management consulting practice specializes in providing services to clients in need of sophisticated risk management models, debt collections organizations which require liquidation models and analytics, and portfolio management companies desiring a variety of services. More specifically, our practice has elected to specialize in three areas where we believe our core competencies reside: (1) management consulting (2) risk management/scorecard development and (3) service provider analysis.