Branding Middle Tennessee as “an entrepreneurial ecosystem” is the goal of a consortium of business, education, government and economic-development leaders in a 40-county region that includes Rutherford County.

The initiative, dubbed Mind2Marketplace, is chaired by Andrea J. Loughry, a retired Murfreesboro business executive.

The consortium was founded in 2006 at the urging of U.S. Rep. Bart Gordon to nurture technology-based ideas, move them toward commercialization and create jobs.

Mind2Marketplace includes more than 60 individuals representing entities as diverse as chambers of commerce, universities and entrepreneurial business ventures.

Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville are also represented.

“With these two innovation generators framing our region, we are positioned to take ideas and shepherd them into the Middle Tennessee marketplace,” Loughry says.

The consortium focuses primarily on three areas of the economy – biotechnologies, aviation and aerospace, and distribution.

The federal Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer programs ensure that innovative small businesses get their share of the government’s research-and-development funding pie.