NPower NY, a nonprofit organization that provides technology assistance to small nonprofits, won a grand-prize in the third National Business Plan Competition for Nonprofit Organizations. NPower is the only New York-based organization of the four top-tier winners selected from 464 applicants. It will receive a $100,000 cash prize as well as free consultants to help develop its plan. The competition was launched three years ago at the inception of the Partnership on Nonprofit Ventures, a Yale University-based nonprofit education institute that is sponsored by the Goldman Sachs Foundation and the Pew Charitable Trusts as a way to promote social entrepreneurship. NPower plans to provide remote web site maintenance to nonprofits through a center staffed by trained youths from low-income communities. The organization, which has an annual budget of $3 million, expects the new business line, when fully developed, to push up its earned revenue. “Nonprofits are increasingly having to think about more creative ways to keep their organizations sustainable in an environment where foundation and government funding is drying up,” said Barbara Chang, executive director of NPower NY. “That’s what drove our entry into this competition.” [06/20/05]