Sen. Mark R. Warner said Friday that the Charlottesville region would be one of the biggest beneficiaries in the state if his legislative efforts to boost startup companies are successful.

“Charlottesville is going to gain more from this kind of legislative activity than almost anywhere in Virginia,” Warner said in an interview. “Blacksburg will as well. You’ve got the talent, you’ve got the ideas. We’re trying to … help get ideas out of the university into commercialization.”

Warner, D-Va., was in Albemarle County on Friday morning for an economic roundtable with business leaders from local companies and the University of Virginia. Mikro Systems Inc., a tech company that manufactures equipment used in turbine blades and medical imaging, hosted the event at its facility off Seminole Trail.

A group of 15 businesspeople, representing companies working in medicine, software, robotics and more, packed a conference room to hear Warner speak and to offer their ideas.

Warner has introduced legislation with Sen. Jerry Moran, R-Kan., intended to spur job creation at startup companies by fast-tracking commercialization of university-based research, reducing regulations, providing tax relief and making it easier for skilled immigrants to stay in the United States. The bill, S.1965, is called The Startup Act.

The former Virginia governor said he’s spent much of his time in Washington focused on dealing with debt and deficits, but spending cuts and/or tax increases alone are not going to do the trick.

“You’ve also got to have a growth agenda,” Warner said.

Over the last 20 years, Warner said, net job creation hasn’t been driven by the largest companies or the traditional small business, such as drugstores, barber shops or auto mechanics.

“Close to 90 percent of all the new jobs that have come in the last 20 years have been from startup firms,” Warner said. “So in an area where we actually might get something done this year, because I didn’t get the memo that you’re supposed to take presidential years off, there are a group of us, Democrats and Republicans, that said could we put a series of bills together under the aegis of a startup America.”

The full package of legislation was introduced in the Senate in December, but Warner said some pieces may have a better chance of passing than others, and he hopes to launch a new push for startup-friendly legislation next week.

After Warner concluded his pitch, he gave attendees an opportunity to respond.

Gary Henry, a local entrepreneur and founder of the Charlottesville Technology Incubator, said the business community is experiencing “uncertainty” due to pending decisions related to debt reduction and tax reform.

“We’re dancing around the periphery with all this until the main event is settled,” Henry said.

Warner, a member of the bipartisan “Gang of Six” working to pass a long-term deficit reduction package, agreed.

“The thing that’s so wacky is that a serious deficit-reduction plan, that included tax reform and entitlement reform, would do more to create jobs than any of these other items we’re talking about,” Warner said. “… The thing that makes me so frustrated is, this is not defeating communism. It’s not putting a man on the moon. We’re going to get forced to do this. The only question is whether we’re going to do it on our terms.”

Warner urged “rational people,” including those in the business community, to get involved in demanding a bipartisan solution to the national deficit.

“It’s not going to happen by just taxing the millionaires or cutting waste, fraud and abuse,” Warner said. “… This stuff is around the edges. I agree. But at least it’s incremental.”

Before the roundtable, Warner toured the Mikro facility. The 11-year-old company employs about 40 people in Central Virginia.

CEO and co-founder Mike Appleby said the company has partnered with Siemens Energy to license its technology at a facility being built across town.

Warner said Siemens, a German engineering conglomerate, sought Mikro’s expertise in two divisions, one for health care technology and one for turbines.

“In both cases, Siemens wanted to move production facilities either to North Carolina or Germany, and as a good Virginia, Charlottesville company, they said, ‘No way,’” Warner said. “To be able to say no way to a big partner like that means you’ve got good stuff.”