Emerging Prairie, A Critical Partner in Economic Development
Emerging Prairie, A Critical Partner in Economic Development
Good economic development strategy supports existing industry growth while capitalizing on new opportunities driven by technology innovations.
Partnering with Emerging Prairie and Grand Farm
An important part of building a diverse, vibrant economy is supporting the entrepreneurial ecosystem. Each startup holds the potential to become a profitable business that contributes to the region’s economy.
At the EDC, we engage the community and look for ways to foster engagement. We support and connect, leading each entrepreneur to the next phase in their company’s development.
A critical partner in that effort is Emerging Prairie. We have partnered with and supported Emerging Prairie since its beginning.
Emerging Prairie
The EDC partners with Emerging Prairie in two primary ways.
Our organization sponsors and supports Emerging Prairie events that gather people around innovation and entrepreneurship. Those events include 1 Million Cups Fargo and TEDxFargo. We’ve also been a long-time supporter of the Prairie Den co-working space. EP’s work supports a diverse and vibrant economy and makes this community a better place to live.
Second, we partner with Emerging Prairie and Grand Farm to support business development. Events like Drone Focus, Cultivate and the Grand Farm initiative support business attraction.
Grand Farm
Our region sits in a unique position at the convergence of significant emerging industries including agriculture technology, unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) and autonomous systems.
Taking advantage of the region’s leadership in production agriculture, ag technology and equipment development and as a global leader in enabling UAS deployment gives us tremendous opportunity.
That’s why the EDC works with partner organizations like Emerging Prairie and Grand Farm to invite and host prospective companies, organize events and attend industry conferences promoting the advantages of doing business in Fargo Moorhead.
Grand Farm is an initiative that started from a discussion at a 1 Million Cups Event. What is the region’s “moonshot”? Emerging Prairie took the question as a call to action and in a collaboration that involved non-profits, businesses and higher education, Grand Farm evolved to contain all the avenues to research products and applications in the space that converges agriculture, technology and UAS.
The collaboration started Emerging Digital Academy, a 20-week, immersive coding bootcamp, to quickly educate and upscale the talent to align with the emerging industries.
Finally, the Plug-and-Play ag-tech accelerator places promising startups right here in our backyard.
Our organization meets regularly with Emerging Prairie and Grand Farm staff to collaborate on business development strategies. This includes meeting with prospective businesses in Ag Tech, including Plug-and-Play cohorts, looking to integrate the innovative startups into our ecosystem and guide them to the region.