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The Cleveland Foundation works to strengthen Greater Cleveland’s economy, with an emphasis on the core city, to ensure equitable economic opportunities for all residents.

Cleveland Innovation Project 

An aligned effort to foster innovation and strengthen technology-based economic growth and prosperity for all Greater Cleveland residents.

Since June 2019, the Cleveland Foundation, Fund For Our Economic Future, Greater Cleveland Partnership, JumpStart Inc. and TeamNEO – together with the Cleveland Innovation Project (CIP) steering committee and more than 150 local business, entrepreneurial, institutional, and nonprofit leaders – have developed a vision, strategies, and plans to help Cleveland become a leading Midwest region for technology-led growth and inclusion by 2030.

CIP seeks to connect innovators, institutions, entrepreneurs, and industry to create new, technology-driven products, services and companies in three key sectors:

  • Smart Manufacturing: Leverage our position as one of the largest and most diverse manufacturing hubs in the country to lead the innovation, application and scaling of industrial digital technologies.
  • Health Innovation: Develop the technologies and service models for delivering excellent remote and community health care, reducing health disparities, and promoting wellness. Become a global center for pathogens and infectious disease research and development as well as the manufacturing of new diagnostics and medicines.
  • Water Technologies: Be a leading center for next-generation solutions – including controls, treatments, data and analytics – for a water-stressed world.

To support these sectors, four initiatives have been developed to strengthen the region’s innovation ecosystem:

  • Boost Digital/STEM Talent: Align and expand education and training programs—post-secondary through post-graduate—to prepare many and diverse individuals for careers in digital/STEM jobs.
  • Catalyze a Capital Continuum: Foster and provide access to a robust and varied range of private capital sources to start and scale businesses.
  • Expedite Digital Equity: Ensure every Greater Cleveland resident has access to in-home high- quality broadband for online learning, working and living by 2022.
  • Enhance Innovation Zones: Develop the region’s primary innovation geographies—the Health-Tech Corridor and the Opportunity Corridor—to accelerate outcomes through proximity, connections and inclusivity.

Learn more about the Cleveland Innovation Project here.

Job Creation: A Vibrant Core City

Helping nurture and support entrepreneurs and small businesses to grow and collaborate, with a focus on technology, innovation and diversity.

  • Leverage existing industries and creating new ones
  • Build neighborhood-based centers of economic activity
  • Nurture minority entrepreneurship and business growth