Entrepreneurship Center changes name, looks to hit major milestone

The Randall W. Lewis Center for Entrepreneurship at Cal State San Bernardino is closing in on a major achievement: generating $1 billion in economic impact in the Inland Empire.

Since it was founded in 1999, the center – recently renamed for the executive vice president of the Lewis Group of Cos. in Upland – has created an estimated $846 million in economic growth in Riverside and San Bernardino counties, according to Mike Stull, the center’s director.

The effort to reach $1 billion in economic impact has no formal name. It’s essentially an extension of what the center has always tried to do, which is to grow the local economy by helping small businesses get started or expand.

To reach that goal, the center will look to get maximum use of the resource centers it operates in Palm Desert, Temecula, and downtown San Bernardino. All three of those facilities opened within the past 24 months.

In the next two years, the resource centers plan to add more affiliate businesses, more programs about business strategies and skills will be put in place, and the center will step up its efforts to connect small business owners in the Inland Empire with capital.

Despite some concerns about the economy, particularly regarding the Trump Administration’s proposed tariffs, the entrepreneurship center still expects to reach its $1 billion goal by the end of 2027, according to Stull.

“It’s an ambitious goal, but it’s not just about numbers,” Stull said in a statement released earlier this month. “We’re committed to supporting our entrepreneurs. By reaching $1 billion in economic impact, we will solidify the Inland region as a hub for business development and a model for the future of entrepreneurship.

Stull spoke with IE Business Daily about the significance of reaching $1 billion in economic impact, how that number is determined and the reasons for renaming the entrepreneurship center after one of the Inland region’s most renowned commercial developers.

The following report has been edited for clarity and length.

Q: The Inland Empire’s gross domestic product in 2023 was approximately $260 billion, according to several estimates. That’s enough to make it one of the wealthiest major metropolitan areas in the United States, and a major factor in California’s economy, which had a GDP of a little more than $4 trillion two years ago. So is $1 billon over the course of 26 years that much?

A: One billion dollars might not seem like a lot when you consider the entire Inland economy, but it is a lot, especially when you consider the multiplier affect. One billion dollars creates a lot of jobs. Also, we’re a small entity at a large university. I don’t know anyone else our size in the Inland Empire that could create that much impact.

Q: Given the current economic conditions, are you concerned about meeting your goal in a little less than two and half years? 

A: There’s a lot of uncertainty about the economy, but that means a lot of small businesses will be trying to navigate that uncertainty. Our job is to help them do that as much as we can. Maybe that’s helping them get capital, or finding ways for them to expand. You see this over and over. No matter what state the economy is in, whether it’s up or down, there are always people who want to expand their business or start a new one.

Q: It appears that some of the budget cuts that President Trump signed into law this month might hurt small businesses. 

A: Yes, and we’re absolutely opposed to that. We’re against anything that hurts the country’s primary economic driver, which is small businesses. To cite one example, the administration is recommending that the Veterans Entrepreneurship Support Program be dismantled. We believe that is very shortsighted. That program has done a lot of good things. That’s not to say that government agencies shouldn’t look at their programs and make sure they’re efficient, but the wholesale dismantling of programs that have proven themselves to be effective is not a good strategy.

Q: You’ve said that reaching your goal of $1 billion in economic impact isn’t only about numbers, it’s about transformation. What do you mean by that?

A: I’ll use an example that’s not from the center, but I think it illustrates the point. I had a student last fall, and we were doing some breakout work in small groups in three different locations. I was working with each of them. One of the students, a young woman, told me that her brother was a student of mine. She said my class convinced him that he could be an entrepreneur, and that he’d started a logistics business and it was doing really well.

1. Did you remember him?

A: After she showed me a picture of him, yes. She said her brother – who was the first person in her family to go to college – was the reason she was at Cal State San Bernardino, studying so she could get a degree and start her own business like her brother did. That’s the kind of transformation I’m talking about. We help people start their own business, or grow their own business, and that has a positive impact on people’s lives.

Q: Is your main goal job creation? Helping people line up financing?

A:  Both of those are major goals. Our main job is to help people start their own business, which is not easy to do. Job creation is important, but so is job retention, and so is getting access to capital. Ultimately, our job is to produce results. The people who come here for assistance expect results, and the people who fund us expect results.

Q: How do you measure success? How will you know when you’ve reached $1 billion in economic impact?

A: Because we track everything we do on an annual basis. If we help someone get a Small Business Administration loan for $250,000, then we know we put that much into the local economy. Same thing with jobs. Let’s say that loan made it possible for the business to hire five people. The business owner will confirm that.

Q: Can you talk about renaming the center after Randall Lewis?

A: Randall donated $6 million to the entrepreneurship center earlier this year. That’s a strong validation of the work we’ve done. It’s Randall’s seal of approval, and that sends a strong message to the business community. He’s saying “I approve of this, and I’m putting my name on it.” 

Q: Did Randall attach any conditions to the donation?

A: No. He told me that he would not tell us how to run the center or the school. He said he wanted to help us get where we want to go. He wanted the gift to be a catalyst to bring more people to the table and to get them to support what we’re doing, and that’s how we’re approaching it.

Q: How will the money be spent?

A: It’s a phased endowment, so it will create interest that will be available for the program to use, but that will happen over time. The [university] and the entrepreneurship center will both come up with plans that will determine how the money is split every year. Whatever it is, and it will probably vary from year to year, it will help drive our operations. And Randall has said he won’t tell either of us how to spend it.

For more information about the RLCE and its initiatives, please visit www.entre.csusb.edu.