The nonprofit lender DreamSpring has introduced a new loan product to help contractors move projects ahead despite rising costs. The Fast Forward loan, which provides short-term financing for 1-3 months at 0% interest, is specifically for contractors, service providers, project-based businesses, and construction industry businesses. Funds can be used for working capital to complete projects or get new initiatives off the ground.
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Grants Available to Businesses Impacted by Wildfire
The Wildfire Business Assistance Grant Program provides emergency assistance to business owners and self-employed individuals whose businesses were physically damaged or saw reduced revenue due to recent wildfires. The $1.5 million temporary grant program offers support when federal assistance falls short.
Continue readingLow-Interest Recovery Loans Still Available
Businesses that were impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic still have access to a few recovery loan programs designed to propel companies toward growth by offering low interest rates and deferred payments. These loans are even more attractive as interest rates on traditional loans increase.
Continue readingTech Startup Gets Help From New Mexico MEP
Microscopic examination of metals can help airplane manufacturers know that the planes they build can withstand the forces involved in flight and could assure airlines that jet engine maintenance would detect problems before takeoff.
A small woman-owned business based in Albuquerque is commercializing a laser optical technology that has the potential to revolutionize this “failure analysis” procedure — not just for airplane parts but also for prosthetics, wind turbine blades and any product or component made of non-cubic metals such as titanium, magnesium, and zirconium. The technology is also effective on fiber composites and plastics.
Advanced Optical Technologies’ CrystalView crystallographic polarization-classification imaging (CPCI) technology can characterize the strength of metals in a fraction of the time that’s currently required—and can do it in a nondestructive way, without cutting small samples and inserting them in a stationary scanning electron microscope.
Continue readingLab Assistance Program Extended
The Technology Readiness Gross Receipts (TRGR) initiative, launched in 2020, has been extended from a three-year pilot to a full five-year program by the New Mexico Legislature, giving businesses another opportunity to tap into the expertise of New Mexico’s national laboratories.
Continue readingNew Program Offers Loans to Cannabis Businesses
Until cannabis is legalized by the U.S. federal government, cannabis businesses have limited banking and loan options. But access to capital in New Mexico has improved since legislators authorized the New Mexico Finance Authority to offer microloans of up to $250,000 to small businesses engaged in the sale or production of cannabis.
Continue readingAccelerator Pays You to Learn
Eligible participants accepted into NMSU Arrowhead Center’s Native American Sprint will get $500 to invest in their business when they complete the program.
Continue readingGrants for Tribal Businesses
The Regional Development Corporation is offering grants of up to $8,000 to businesses that are 51 percent or more owned by a Northern New Mexico tribal member to grow, diversify revenue, leverage other investments, create new jobs, and put systems in place that lead to growth.
Continue readingState Lowers GRT Rate
The gross receipts tax rate was decreased by .125 percent by the State of New Mexico effective July 1, 2022. The decrease affects every business and purchaser in the state. Often thought of as a sales tax, GRT is slightly different because it applies to the sale of services, as well as tangible items.
Continue readingWhat is an Entrepreneur?
According to Lorena Schott, entrepreneurs pop up in all types of industries and can have widely different backgrounds. “Really anyone can be an entrepreneur, given the idea and the right tools to develop it into a functional business,” she said.
Schott should know. The director of marketing communications at WESST has met thousands of entrepreneurs since joining the business development organization in 2009. WESST is a nonprofit organization that offers business consulting, workshops, financial resources, business incubation, and support to help entrepreneurs start and grow a business.
“An entrepreneur is someone who sees a need and takes on the financial risk to start a business to fill that need,” she said in a WESST blog post. “It may sound vague, but that’s the point; there is no cookie-cutter entrepreneur…”
Schott contrasts the ‘classic’ entrepreneur — someone who creates a business like a new restaurant or a tech start-up — with today’s entrepreneurs. “There has been a shift in the global job market that has opened the door for entrepreneurship to become more mainstream,” she said.
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