CONNECT, San Diego’s original high-technology incubator, celebrated its 30th anniversary Thursday with an open house and party at its new offices near Westfield UTC.
Greg McKee, president and CEO, said the nonprofit organization has revamped its programming as CONNECT 3.0 and remains “committed to creating and scaling great companies.”
At the open house, over 500 people from San Diego’s growing entrepreneurial community heard presentations from promising new ventures and sampled food and craft beer from vendors that were themselves startups.
A number of companies that had graduated from CONNECT’ were in the audience, including Employee Loan Solutions, a spinoff from Intuit. CEO Scott Davis said CONNECT’s introductions and thoughtful guidance were crucial in building his company. He described CONNECT as “the family we wish we had as innovators.”
Former Mayor Jerry Sanders, now president of the San Diego Regional Chamber of Commerce, said CONNECT helped San Diego change from a “sleepy military town” to a city that is “now in the spotlight worldwide.
“I see only great things for CONNECT into the future,” he told the crowd.
CONNECT was founded by UC San Diego as an internal department then spun out in 2005 in an effort to better serve the growing tech community.
