Teo Tijerina is a soft-spoken executive driven by deep purposes. His non-profit organization, EDCO Ventures, provides services to entrepreneurs in economically distressed areas of Texas. Tijerina founded EDCO with a childhood friend and Stanford classmate in 2006.
After graduating from Stanford in 1997 with a degree in chemical engineering, Tijerina held executive and senior engineering positions with Dell, Dow Chemical, and Rockwell Semiconductor Systems. He also co-founded Innovei, an after-market electronics repair firm.
In 2009, Tijerina was finally able to go full-time with EDCO. His company helps start-ups raise capital, develop a business plan, and recruit talent. EDCO focuses on green technology, biotechnology, nanotechnology, and Web 2.0. They look for companies with a high value-added potential.
The green technology companies EDCO is currently working with include a kenaf producer in the Lower Rio Grande Valley, an electronics repair company in El Paso, a waste-to-energy developer in McAllen with patented microwave plasma gasification technology, and a biochar developer from San Antonio.
For Tijerina, it's not just business, it's personal. Born in Reynosa, Mexico, he was raised in McAllen, Texas, one of the poorest regions in the nation. Though EDCO began with a grant from the Commerce Department's Economic Development Administration, Tijerina does not want to depend on public funds. EDCO is working to bring private investment to economically distressed regions in central and south Texas, and along with it job creation, community development, and investment in young talent.
EDCO currently consists of four full-time employees and one summer intern. Laura Bosworth-Bucher is a Venture Executive for EDCO. She spent ten years each at IBM and Dell, specializing in marketing, customer support, and strategic planning. An engineer by training, she also has extensive volunteer and mentoring experience.
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