Michael Pena wouldn’t say the Startup America Partnership saved his business in the past year. But it sure helped—especially with the private contributions of time, knowledge, and services from the companies and people that are part of the initiative that turns a year old today.

“I like to believe that we’re a tenacious bunch, but they certainly have made our lives a whole bunch easier,” said Pena, the 28-year-old cofounder and chief executive of Autoref, a website that helps people make car-purchase decisions. “If we just look at the amount of exposure we have received…it’s like hiring a $4,000 PR person.”

Pena, who is a two-time cancer survivor based in Los Angeles, and the team of students based largely at Pittsburgh’s Carnegie-Mellon University who work with him, can point to some very specific benefits they’ve received from the partnership of the Obama administration and the private sector to boost entrepreneurship.

Todd Medema, Autoref's 19-year-old chief operating officer, said Startup America had helped the company—which allows shoppers to get bids online on car deals prior to test-driving one and helps auto dealers with marketing—get $4,000 worth of Google advertising free, and it helped arrange a booth for the company at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.

Further, Medema said, the company is now looking for financing, and the Startup America crew had helped with drawing up business plans and networking with angel and venture capital investors.

“The help that we’ve gotten from them has really helped accelerate our company,” he said.

That’s the kind of story entrepreneurs who have involved themselves in the partnership, chaired by AOL cofounder Steve Case, tell often. From the private sector, entrepreneurs have gotten help with networking, paperwork, and marketing from businesspeople who have been in the same shoes. On the public side, exposure has been key as the Startup America Partnership held its first meeting at the White House last year, and today it put forward a series of pro-entrepreneur legislative proposals.

Kavita Shukla of Fenugreen, a Boston startup that makes a material that keeps food fresh, said the help her company has received from Startup America has come in the form of contacts.

As a small startup with that began with national ambitions, Shukla said her company’s biggest challenge upon joining Startup America was growth beyond Boston. The experienced entrepreneurs at Startup America, like CEO Scott Case (no relation to Steve Case), theoretically can tap into networks of national companies that could be customers or partners of Fenugreen or other startups.

“Startup America really helps small businesses get to the national level,” she said. “Startup America has been very good about asking who could partner with us.”