Terms and Definitions
General Definitions
Permitted content, information, services, events, contacts and/or resources must be:
- Directly related to supporting businesses to start and grow.
- Provided at no cost or very low cost.
- Available to entrepreneurs or businesses in Fairfax County, City of Fairfax, City of Falls Church, or towns of Vienna, Clifton or Herndon.
- Must be non-profit, government, educational organization, or partner of a government entity.
- For-profit business accelerators and incubators may be considered, if a primary component of their services is to provide comprehensive business building services and resources.
- Provides services to entrepreneurs or businesses located in Fairfax County, the City of Fairfax, City of Falls Church, or the towns of Clifton, Vienna and Herndon.
- Fairfax CORE will not include for profit resources such as bankers, accountants, lawyers, insurance agents, management consultants and other for-profit organizations.
Resource Navigator Definitions
Growth / Expansion
Companies that want to expand and typically seek growth through debt financing and capital equipment acquisition. Second stage can be in any industry and have enough employees to benefit from adding professional managers.
Innovation-led
Tech or high-growth company. These companies form around a new technology or breakthrough process that sometimes needs assistance with proof of concept, pitching for equity investments and building leadership teams.
Main Street
Typically brick-and-mortar store: restaurants, coffee shops, dry cleaners, retailers, etc. These companies have employees, need operations support and are typically focused on sales, cashflow and funding.
Microenterprise
Companies in this category require little capital to launch. Most are focused around the owner’s personal expertise—consulting, design, lawn care—and they may not require a physical location.
All Resource Partners serve all populations. Resource Partners may also identify themselves as “specialists” in serving subsets of the entrepreneurship population. To identify as a “specialist” a Resource Provider must have designated programming and/or a stated mission to support that segment of the population, and/or staff particularly educated or trained to meet the needs of that subset of the community.