Startups move to Colorado amid concerns state losing its luster for tech companies

Charlie Childs, the CEO of a biotechnology startup, moved the company to Colorado for the lifestyle and because she believes the state is an up-and-coming hub for the industry.

Ditto for Blake Herren, head of the startup Raven Space Systems, on Colorado’s quality of life. And outreach by the state and the business community made an impression as he was considering moving from Kansas City.

Their moves to Colorado come as a business coalition has raised concerns that the state’s status as a draw for tech and innovation companies is in danger. More than 230 business, technology and civic leaders sent a letter in April to elected leaders, saying that Colorado is losing companies and jobs to other states.

Palantir Technologies’ relocation of its headquarters early this year from Denver to Miami was a warning sign for those who believe Colorado’s reputation as a national leader in innovation and high tech is eroding. In a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, the data-analytics and artificial-intelligence powerhouse said the effects of climate change in Colorado and the state’s regulation of AI were risks to the company.

But beyond the splashy headlines about Palantir’s exit, the coalition’s letter warned that other states are luring away companies and beating out Colorado for investment and entrepreneurs “by offering clearer policy signals, faster regulatory pathways, and stronger alignment between government and growth.”

The letter has been signed by more than 430 business and tech leaders and investors, the coalition said on its website.

Gov. Jared Polis was a tech and internet entrepreneur before entering politics. After Ensuring Colorado’s Innovation Future released its letter, Polis said he was committed to making the state “an even better place” for companies to grow and innovate.

“We always want to double down on our successes and we want to change whatever isn’t working,” Polis told The Denver Post.

He said his administration has been working on one of the coalition’s recommendations: improving the supply and affordability of housing.

“We’ve removed a lot of barriers to housing. We did condo liability reform,” Polis said. “You make it easier to build, reduce regulation and red tape, speed up the approval process.”

But a bill limiting local governments’ ability to set minimum lot sizes for single-family homes to make more room for housing failed in this year’s legislative session.

Making it through the legislature was a bill requiring state departments to establish a schedule to review rules and determine whether they’re still needed. The bill was signed into law.

Polis and Eve Lieberman, executive director of the Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade, or OEDIT, met with about 70 business leaders last month. The session was the first in a series planned across the state to focus on the business community, innovation, supporting good paying jobs and Colorado’s economy, according to OEDIT.

“That acknowledgement that we want to do better is an important part of showing the business community that Colorado is the place to be and the place to invest, because we’re always excited to learn how we can be more competitive,” Polis said.

One of the tools the state uses is the Opportunity Now Colorado program, which aims to grow existing companies, attract new ones and “train up” workers for new positions.

The program focuses on the state’s strategic priorities, such as promoting advanced industries, and helps fill training gaps where there are workforce shortages, Lieberman said.

The Opportunity Now program is in its second year and the tax credits that companies can apply for will build on the $90 million in grants that have been awarded, Lieberman said. The grants are projected to serve 20,000 Coloradans across almost every county in the state.

“We have already placed almost over 8,000  workers into those advanced industries, healthcare and education, where there are workforce shortages,” Lieberman said.

The biotech company that Childs co-founded with Madeline Eiken received a $250,000 advanced industries grant from OEDIT. They moved the company, Intero Biosystems, to Colorado from Michigan over Christmas.

Childs and Eiken trained with Jason Spence at the University of Michigan. Childs said Spence was the original inventor of  the process that develops miniature human intestines, or “organoids,” from stem cells that she and Eiken then commercialized.

“If you have a drug that you want to take into clinical trials, you can test it on our organ instead of a mouse or a dog or a monkey and hopefully get a better data point on how it’s going to react in humans and ethically not use animals,” Childs said.

Intero hopes to work on other organ systems as well. The company chose to move to Colorado because people didn’t want to be in the industry hubs on the two coasts.

“We feel like we can live a much better life here. Our employees can live a much better life here,” Childs said. “From the business side, there are so many resources here, like the OEDIT grant.”

Up-and-coming biotech hub?

Childs said the Colorado Bioscience Association was welcoming, helping Intero employees plug into networks. The company has set up shop in a building for startups on the University of Colorado Anschutz medical campus.

“One thing about Colorado is it’s not one of the big biotech hubs, but it is like the up-and-coming biotech hub. We’re just really excited to be here at the early stages of it really coming into fruition,” Childs said.

Herren, CEO of Raven Space Systems, had a personal connection to Colorado. He grew up in Oklahoma and has visited Colorado since he was a child to go mountain climbing.

There’s also the fact that Colorado has a robust aerospace and defense ecosystem and didn’t seem to be as expensive as other areas where a lot of other aerospace startups are located, Herren said. “It seemed like a good balance of access to talent and access to investors that would be interested in what we’re building.”

The company developed a 3D printing technology that specializes in aerospace-grade composites. The applications include hypersonics, propulsion systems, reentry vehicles, satellites, aircraft, missiles and rockets.

Raven moved from Kansas City to Colorado last year and decided on Broomfield as the site for its pilot facility. Herren said the company just started shipping its first parts for rocket motors.

When the company was looking at relocating to Colorado, Herren said state officials and the people in the industry reached out. He said OEDIT briefed him on available grants.

The company landed a $250,000 advanced industries grant from OEDIT. Last year, the Colorado Economic Development Commission approved up to $5.8 million in job growth tax incentives over eight years for the company. The tax credits are contingent on meeting job creation and salary requirements.

“There have been a lot of examples of successful startups before us to kind of give us that level of confidence,” Herren said.

But it’s also good to have the kind of major aerospace companies found in Colorado because they draw investors, other companies and government interests, he said.

Polis and Lieberman stressed the benefits that Colorado’s research universities, federal laboratories and the density of tech and aerospace companies offer businesses looking to relocate or expand. Denver International Airport is an important asset, Polis said.

“It’s one of the top North American airports with easy access to both coasts the same day, to Europe,” Polis said. “It’s a good selling point for companies to do international business or business across the United States.”

Colorado is a federally designated technology and innovation hub for the quantum computing industry.

The Colorado Chamber of Commerce Foundation has blamed regulations in the state, the cost of doing business and other problems for what it says are lost opportunities and declining competitiveness. A tracker the foundation released in 2025 said 98 companies represented “lost opportunities” since 2019,  including relocations, expansions outside of Colorado and lost site selection opportunities.

According to OEDIT, just two of the state’s expansion programs led 143 businesses to choose to expand in or relocate to Colorado over other locations from 2019 through 2025. The agency said the businesses are poised to create 42,145 new jobs and generate $4.8 billion in wages.

Lieberman said in 2025, $7.46 billion in venture capital flowed into the state, the second-highest amount seen in Colorado.

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