MUNCIE, Ind. - James W. Robinson believes any business that produces something with future potential is a good bet.

The retired chairman and treasurer of Robinson Nugent in New Albany was referring to small start-ups like his family’s company, which started as a machine shop in a garage and grew into one of the country’s 100 fastest growing companies.

But he could have been talking about Ball State University.

The businessman, who was only nine when he helped his father and brother start their business, recently invested $37,700 in the future potential of Ball State students. Robinson hopes to add to the fund until it reaches $100,000.

The James D. and Sarah T. Robinson Scholarship is named for Robinson’s parents, owners of a southern Indiana variety store and an appliance store in the 1930s.

Robinson’s father was an entrepreneur who started the evenings-and-weekends Robinson Machine Works to deal with the scrap parts produced by the company he worked for during the day.

The company became Robinson Nugent in 1965 and went public in 1978. It is now an international manufacturer of electronic connectors, sockets and custom cable assemblies for the electronics industry with sales exceeding $75 million.

James W. Robinson has served on the boards of many for-profit and not-for-profit corporations and organizations. He is involved with Junior Achievement and the Southern Indiana Chamber of Commerce and is an occasional guest lecturer at Ball State.

The Robinson scholarship will be awarded to incoming freshmen and is renewable up to four years. Once the program is fully functioning, there will be four recipients at the university each year.

Preference will be given to students from Floyd, Harrison, Orange, Washington and Clark counties in southern Indiana. Preference will also be given to students of the College of Business.

(Note to Editors: For more information about this story contact Lori Rader at 765-285-1560 or lrader@bsu.edu.)