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Nascar's Ward Burton had the job of driving home the benefits of downstate localities toexecutives like DynCorp's Dan Bannister.

photo by Mark Rhodes

"The whole idea was to create an impression," says Beverly Lucas, vice president of The Software Factory in South Boston. "Secretary [of Technology Don] Upson has said to me on several occasions, 'It's not that Northern Virginia thinks of you in a negative way, it's just that they don't think of you.'" The visit, sponsored by the Governor's Commission on Information Technology, was designed to introduce downstate localities to executives who might consider putting a satellite operation there. The visits are part of Gov. Jim Gilmore's effort to spread the high-tech wealth.

A parade of local business leaders spent the day putting the best face on their region, with some success. "I was very impressed," says Dan Bannister, chairman of Reston-based DynCorp. He asked if they could assemble 100 qualified workers for a tech company, and they said yes. "It isn't as if they have the tech workers sitting down there. They have people with excellent work skills who could be trained."

The region already has a few high-tech companies, like The Software Factory, a 2-year-old South Boston firm that specializes in year 2000 programming and software development. And Sudhaker Shenoy, chief information officer of McLean-based Information Management Consultants, says the area has incredible potential. Manufacturing companies there share a "kind of technology environment" and require similar skills, he says. "I have no doubt these skills are transferable."

Shenoy believes the region has promise, but its chances of landing some high-tech firms are hamstrung by its distance from a major airport. Shenoy says it took the group several hours in a small propeller-driven plane to get to and from South Boston. While Raleigh-Durham International Airport is just 74 miles away, Shenoy says that's not close enough for companies like his that need to get to clients quickly.

Shenoy also says it's critical for the region to collect better data about the skills of its work force -- such as programming and HTML training. Companies have different needs and want those details before they'll consider a move. "It's not enough to say you have a high-tech work force. That's too broad an answer," he says.

But he agrees the area needs to do a better job of publicizing its advantages, such as low-cost commercial sites. "Space is so inexpensive out there," Shenoy says. "It's like one-third of what we pay. Nobody knows this."

A critical part of the effort to lure technology companies is the Halifax County/South Boston Continuing Education Center. Last fall, voters in Halifax County approved a $1.75 million bond referendum to cover half the cost of renovating an old, 70,000-square-foot tobacco warehouse in South Boston into the new home for the center. Locals are raising funds to come up with the balance, says Bill Confroy, chairman of the Lake Country Marketing Council and executive director of the Halifax County Industrial Development Authority. The center, which opened in 1986, is currently housed in a 7,000-square-foot building in South Boston. It offers undergraduate and graduate courses from nine of the state's colleges and universities through on-site instruction and a two-way videoconferencing system.

Education, says Confroy, is the region's ticket to joining the technology expansion in the state. "We have a golden opportunity," he says.

Bannister says the region's marketing pitch will be passed along to the 1,100 member companies of the Northern Virginia Technology Council. It's not beyond reason, he says, "that there's a couple of companies that might want to have a satellite operation down there. Not all the people that work up here have to be here."

© JULY 1999, Media General Business Publications Inc.,
publisher of Virginia Business Magazine