Dr. Tim R. Holcomb is CEO of Embarc Collective, a world-class hub for early-stage tech startups and growth companies and Florida’s fastest-growing startup hub. Founded to address a critical gap in Florida’s innovation infrastructure, Embarc Collective’s globally-recognized startup platform offers founders access to curated programming and a repository of startup resources and frameworks; on-demand coaching and mentorship; access to talent; connectivity to corporates, universities, and investors; open collab workspace, assigned offices, conference rooms and event space in downtown Tampa; access to best-in-class service providers in banking, accounting, tax, legal, insurance and employee benefits; cybersecurity, GTM strategy and marketing, software development and AI architecture, etc.; and engagement with a community of 300+ founders that lead 150+ Florida-based early-stage tech startups and growth-stage companies in healthcare and life sciences, cybersecurity, data analytics and frontier tech, fin tech and legal tech, ed tech, renewable energy and climate tech, and defense and national security, among sixty sectors.

Embarc Collective member-companies have created 1,400+ Florida-based tech and tech-enabled jobs, driving more than $100M annually in economic returns to the state, and have closed $800M in funding, accounting for more than $130M in capital invested into Florida’s startup and innovation economy in 2025. As the leading platform for tech startups and growth companies in Florida, Embarc Collective helps activate, promote, and accelerate Florida’s startup and innovation economy, hosting 350+ events that draw more than 30,000 registered event participants and visitors annually to our facility to engage in entrepreneurship, technology, and innovation conversations.

Dr. Holcomb is Co-Founder, Partner, and Investment Committee member at 1809 Capital, a national growth equity investment platform, and a limited partner at QCA Ventures, the longest-established organized angel group in the Midwest with more than 130 investments. He has advised hundreds of high growth companies that have raised almost $2 billion in funding, including Tampa-based ReliaQuest, Portland-based SOLARCORE®, Cincinnati-based Gravity Diagnostics, and Charleston-based Gotcha, among others. Previously, Dr. Holcomb served as Executive Director of the John W. Altman Institute for Entrepreneurship and Founding Chair of the Department of Entrepreneurship in the Farmer School of Business at Miami University (OH). Prior to joining Miami, Tim held the Jim Moran Professor of Entrepreneurship at Florida State University and served as Executive Director of The Jim Moran Institute for Global Entrepreneurship.

Dr. Holcomb has 35+ years of strategy, international business, and startup experience, including work in twenty-five countries abroad. Tim began his career at Accenture, where he consulted with Fortune 500 companies like PepsiCo, Nike, and American Airlines, among others, for thirteen years. He later cofounded and served as president and COO of Telcom Global Solutions (TGS), raising more than $20 million in combined funding, before exiting in a sale of the company to Flex. Tim later served as senior vice president at Flex, where he helped build and run the company’s $800 million network service division.  

Earlier this year, the Tampa Bay Business Journal named Dr. Holcomb to its Power 100 list in 2026. Tim earned his Ph.D. in strategic management and entrepreneurship from the Mays Business School at Texas A&M University in 2007 and his bachelor’s degree in Accounting and Computer Information Systems in 1984 and his MBA in Management in 1986 from the College of Business and Social Sciences at the University of Louisiana at Monroe.