“I found entrepreneurship to be particularly enjoyable to work within, because there’s people taking huge risks to build their dreams. And if I can empower them and enable them to succeed, it’s only going to make our region and country better.”
Cameron Law, Carlsen Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship
Cameron Law heads up the Carlsen Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship at Sacramento State in Northern California. The center serves students, staff and faculty alike but expands their area of service to the surrounding six counties, also known as the Greater Sacramento region.
Cameron’s work as a champion for entrepreneurship and ecosystem builder falls across three areas:
- Student success: Nurturing students’ innovation and entrepreneurial mindsets, hands-on learning and creating pathways for students to adopt entrepreneurial skills
- Community programs: Servicing founders directly through technical assistance and cohort-based programming (idea to seed stage)
- Ecosystem building: Serving as a hub for the Sacramento Entrepreneurial Growth Alliance, a coalition focused on entrepreneurship as a key economic development driver
An Evolutionary Leap: Building the Foundations
The ecosystem in the greater Sacramento region is not new: Monique Brown had laid a foundation with the iHub network, and now with the Growth Factory; so did Jeff Bennett and Laura Good, the founders of StartupSac who led the charge in mapping the ecosystem in the early days.
“When I first joined the Carlsen Center in 2019, it was mostly known as a physical space but in my mind’s eye, I knew it could and be so much more: a network of people who had great ideas were passionate about innovation and entrepreneurship, and programs that would allow them to turn those ideas into reality – or at least experiment with them in a structured and supportive environment.”, Cameron says about his vision for the Center.
Shortly after Cameron took over the Carlsen Center, the pandemic threw a wrench in his original plan. But, as it turns out, there was a silver lining to it:
“The Center itself as a physical asset had no real utility during a time where people couldn’t leave their homes. It forced us to lean into the non-physical assets of the ecosystem and develop them intentionally: We activated our mentor networks, recruited guest speakers and launched virtual programming to support founders.”
Once the Carlsen Center had re-positioned itself as a hub for founders, it wasn’t a stretch to play a similar role within the ecosystem. “Being a part of an institution that was already convening and building connections among the many resources helped us lean into the role as a central hub for the ecosystem. We were able to invest time and resources to bring the ecosystem together to look at how to truly support innovation and entrepreneurship across our region. Over these last five years, we launched various initiatives to tackle gaps in our ecosystem. A pervasive one has been early-stage investment. Through our efforts in 2024 we activated over 15 new angel investors that make investments into startups through our pitch competition called AngelCon (that originated in San Luis Obispo). We’ve seen some of the angels become LPs in venture funds and invest in other vehicles in our area growing the pie for everyone.”
It was also during the pandemic that a small group of ecosystem builders – Cameron, Laura Good and Monique Brown among them – met virtually to discuss how they might better support local entrepreneurs in such times of crisis. What emerged was the Sacramento Entrepreneurial Growth Alliance whose 40-50 partners now meet quarterly to drive innovation in the greater Sacramento area.
The Backyard Advantage: The Strength of Collective Vision
Central to the Sacramento ecosystem is the ethos of their “backyard advantage,” a term that emphasizes the collaborative, community-centered nature of Sacramento’s ecosystem. This firm belief in and appreciation of collaboration is not limited to entrepreneurs but has seeded the culture in the Sacramento ecosystem.
“The term of our Backyard Advantage was coined by Mark Haney and Monique Brown, co-founders of the Growth Factory. Their goal was always to invest in and support entrepreneurs in our own backyard. And the ethos caught on as the ecosystem began to grow and mature. The idea of supporting innovation and entrepreneurship in our own backyard where it benefits our local community was something that everyone could get behind.”, Cameron explains.
It’s really collaborative in nature. And I think a lot of that stems from a value of truly actually loving and
supporting one another and wanting Sacramento to be the best place that it can be.
The Power of Technology in Ecosystem Building
The Carlsen Center and Sierra College provided the seed funding for Sacramento’s initial EcoMap. Over the years, the platform turned out to be more than just a map of resources. Cameron explains, “Back in 2019 we wanted to launch a resource navigator so entrepreneurs would know what assets and opportunities were available to them. We tried to build one ourselves but it was ultimately too cumbersome to try to keep all the information up-to-date. We wanted a one-stop-shop that was accessible and that would be the front door for entrepreneurs in our region. What’s more, it became a tangible representation of our ecosystem coming together. Oftentimes you don’t really see all the assets and conversations you have, and it’s hard to tell a story about the outcomes of our quarterly convenings.”
The Sacramento ecosystem had leveraged Forward Cities’ E3 Scorecard and identified some gaps that then informed their strategy:
- A Lack of visibility of available resources,
- Incomplete data to demonstrate the activity in the ecosystem, and
- Not being able to tell a full story about the ecosystem.
Having EcoMap in place allowed Cameron and his partners to tell a more coherent and comprehensive story about the current maturity of their ecosystem. Equipped with these insights, they were able to prove that their previous years of conversation and collaboration had led to an actual, tangible output. What’s more, it helped them inform their ecosystem strategy going forward.
“EcoMap helped us answer the question ‘What do we want to build towards?’”
Cameron shares, “Being able to see the assets, their foundations and relationships to one another greatly informed our ecosystem strategy. We wanted to grow around innovation clusters and with our next EcoMap renewal we were able to develop different guides that are specific to these industry clusters. For example, if someone wanted to start a company in the food and ag space, they had the relevant resources at their fingertips.
At the next stage we were then able to add another layer: Ecobot is a chat feature specific to our ecosystem and it enhances accessibility by translating our EcoMap into the main languages spoken in the greater Sacramento region.”
Increasing accessibility and efficiency
Leveraging technology has made Cameron more efficient in his ecosystem building efforts. Instead of scheduling early conversations one-on-one, entrepreneurs can easily orient themselves on the NorCal Entrepreneur Hub and then approach ecosystem builders like Cameron with specific questions. As Cameron explains, he doesn’t want to be the bottleneck. Leveraging their Entrepreneur Hub makes all information accessible to anyone without having to wait for a slot on his calendar to open up.
Secondly, he explains, “We have been able to turn a lot of our content into on-demand training material. Instead of spending an hour teaching someone the lean startup canvas, an entrepreneur can access these materials on their own time, work through them and then schedule some time to discuss their ideas. As a consequence, this conversation will be a lot more informed and I can be much more specific in the guidance I provide. They’re simply further along than they would have been otherwise and we can use our time together to accelerate their trajectory.”
Looking Forward: A Vision for the Future
Cameron’s vision is clear: a Sacramento that fully embraces entrepreneurship as the key to its economic and cultural evolution. He elaborates, “We’re all in on entrepreneurs driving the future of the greater Sacramento region. We want to attract the right companies – and not just large corporations – that are building around our innovation clusters. In order to do that work, I hope people recognize that we need more ecosystem builders to solely do that work: build the innovation and entrepreneurship ecosystem.”
As we anticipate the future of ecosystem building, Cameron’s insights reinforce the idea that growth stems not just from financial investment, but from fostering a culture of connectivity and collaboration – a Backyard Advantage. His work is not just about bridging gaps within Sacramento’s innovation landscape, but about laying down a sustainable blueprint for others to follow.