The Technical Assistance for Capital Readiness Program will connect small businesses to lenders, spur 40,000 new loans in the next five years
 

On Monday, the California Office of the Small Business Advocate (CalOSBA), part of the Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development, announced participants in their new Technical Assistance for Capital Readiness Program.

Funding for this $25.3 million program comes from the U.S. Treasury’s State Small Business Credit Initiative (SSBCI), which was created by the U.S. Congress in 2010 and reauthorized through the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021. The SSBCI is designed to spur investment in businesses with 1-9 employees, small manufacturing companies, and businesses operated by owners from underserved communities.

This program will help underserved small business owners by:

• Guiding them through the loan application process, spurring the the approval of an estimated 40,000 new business loans over the next five years
• Building legal, accounting, and financial management skills to access the capital needed to get started and scale
• Increasing awareness of state-backed capital support programs

Additionally, it will support the deployment of $1.1 billion in federal funding separately approved for capital support programs from the California Infrastructure and Economic Development Bank (IBank) and the California Pollution Control Financing Authority. Lenders across the state are expected to leverage the $1.1 billion in funding for existing capital support programs into $18 billion in new loans for small businesses over the next five years.

Learn more about the launch of this new program here.