Launch New York Inc
Nonprofit profile at a glance
- EIN
- 453980649
- IRS 990 coverage
- 2013–2025
- Forms available
- Form 990 2025, Form 990-EZ 2012
- Location
- Buffalo, NY, USA
- Phone
- 7162000961
- Rating
- 78
- Verdict
- SUPPORTED
- Rating confidence
- Standard
- Sector
- Small Business Development
Reported finances
- Revenue
- $3,836,515
- Expenses
- $2,492,056
- Assets
- $13,278,536
- Liabilities
- $1,004,094
Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2025. Amounts in USD.
Leadership & pay
12 people listed
Executive titles in this filing
- Marion LaVigne (CEO/President/Secretary)
Highest reported compensation
- Marion LaVigne (CEO/President/Secretary): $286,000 total reported compensation
- SCOTT TERHAAR (FINANCE DIRECTOR): $78,000 total reported compensation
Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2025. Names and roles reflect this filing, not necessarily current officeholders.
Overview
Mission
The organization's objective is to identify, support and invest in high-growth, high-impact companies that can transform the local economy and catalyze the entrepreneurial culture across upstate New York by providing pro-bono mentorship and capital access programs & services to entrepreneurs with a particular goal of helping scalable startups position themselves to receive professional equity investments from launch ny and angel, seed-stage, and venture capital investors.
What it reported doing in 2025
The regional entrepreneurship action plan implementation program: become investable and successful. Launch ny connects entrepreneurs to resources and funding both within the upstate ny ecosystem and beyond. Since the beginning of 2012, launch ny has served 1,913 companies and in 2025, launch ny served 397 clients. By the end of fiscal year 2025, launch ny completed 20 transactions for a total of $1,195,000.
Operating model
- Revenue model
- Mixed. Its operating money came from several sources; no one source provided a clear majority.
- Distribution model
- Direct operator. The filing allocates 100% of reported program-service expenses outside its grant, affiliate-payment, and member-benefit lines. This expense classification does not rule out separately announced grant awards.
The verdict
SUPPORTED - A large share of available resources goes toward mission work and the filed numbers largely add up. Fundraising costs are high for each dollar raised and some filing-based governance responses are negative or unanswered.
Rating breakdown
- Financial Efficiency: 69
- Transparency & Controls: 79
- Accountability: 91
- Sustainability: 73
- Growth: 100
Detailed rating inputs
Financial Efficiency
- Mission deployment rate: 61.2%; rating input score 61
- Program expense ratio: 87.3%; rating input score 87
- Fundraising efficiency: $17.52 raised per $1 spent on fundraising; rating input score 55; 55th percentile among comparable filings
Transparency & Controls
- Consistency checks: 100%; rating input score 100; 63rd percentile among comparable filings
- Pay-setting controls: 2 of 6 controls in place; rating input score 33
- Compensation committee: Missing
- Independent consultant: Missing
- Other Form 990s reviewed: Missing
- Written employment contract: Pass
- Compensation survey or study: Missing
- Board or committee approval: Pass
- Foreign activity oversight: Limited
- Grant itemization coverage: Limited
- Major donor itemization: Yes; rating input score 100
- Related-party transparency: Limited
Accountability
- Independent voting board: 100%; rating input score 100; 63rd percentile among comparable filings
- Governance controls: 7 of 9 controls in place; rating input score 78
- Conflict-of-interest policy: Pass
- Whistleblower policy: Pass
- Document-retention policy: Pass
- CEO compensation review process: Pass
- Other executive compensation review process: Fail
- Form 990 shared with the board: Pass
- Board meeting minutes documented: Pass
- Audit committee oversight: Fail
- Independent financial-statement audit: Pass
Sustainability
- Operating margin: 35%; rating input score 84; 84th percentile among comparable filings
- Total-asset coverage ratio: 5.33; rating input score 82; 82nd percentile among comparable filings
- Liabilities to assets ratio: 0.08; rating input score 53; 53rd percentile among comparable filings
- Officer compensation ratio: 14.6%; rating input score 23; 23rd percentile among comparable filings
Growth
- Program expense growth: 5.1% per year; rating input score 100; 37th percentile among comparable filings
- Revenue growth: 9.8% per year; rating input score 100; 65th percentile among comparable filings
- Asset growth: 19.5% per year; rating input score 100; 83rd percentile among comparable filings
Details
- Where the money goes: 61.2% of revenue deployed · 87.3% of spending went to programs
- Governance: 9 of 9 board members independent · 7 of 9 filing controls reported
- Programs: 1 filed program accomplishment · $2.2M in reported program spending
- Leadership: top reported pay $286K · 12 people listed · 2 of 6 pay-setting controls reported
- Highest-paid contractors: 1 contractor listed · $109K reported
- Consistency: 27 of 27 current checks pass
- Schedules: 6 filed schedules · includes major donors and executive pay
- Filing history: 13 filing years from 2013 to 2025
- Contacts: How to reach this organization
- Money network: 4 filed money-flow records
- Related organizations: 11 filed related-organization links
- Grant readiness: Federal tax and exclusion status, award history, and grant-maker relationships.
- People: Everyone the filings name, and which of them the filings identify by more than a name.
Key Signals
Signals prioritize questions for review. They are not findings of misconduct.
- Review — Financial Efficiency: Fundraising efficiency scored 55/100.
- Review — Accountability: Governance controls: 2 of 9 not reported.
- High — Sustainability: Officer compensation ratio scored 23/100.
- Review — Sustainability: Liabilities to assets ratio scored 53/100.