Tracing GA’s Innovation

The Georgia Entrepreneurship Project aims to trace Georgia’s entrepreneurship and innovation landscape as part of the Smart Community Corps Intern Program for Summer 2022!

Entrepreneurship and innovation are not often quantified or identified geographically, but Dr. Paige Clayton believes that mapping Georgia’s entrepreneurship and innovation landscape can be a great asset to economic development. In this project, Clayton will lead efforts with Smart Community Corps interns to collect data through secondary sources as well as conduct interviews with entrepreneurs and members of incubators, economic development agencies, and maker spaces. This data will enable the project team to geographically characterize innovation and entrepreneurship based on specific industries. The team hopes to identify patterns of movements of entrepreneurs and innovative activities within and out of Georgia to understand why certain areas are more appealing than other areas. With the knowledge attained, the project will create actionable recommendations that can create more equitable access to technology and entrepreneur-based economic development throughout the state of Georgia.