Tech Firms Find Strength (and Benefits) in Numbers
Local Group Joins Statewide Association

by Heidi Thomas

 

About three years ago, a small group got together in Bellingham to discuss the issues and needs of high-tech businesses. Participants were surprised by the number of companies in the area that offered high-tech products or services or supported such businesses.

They created the Bellingham/Whatcom County Technology Alliance Group (TAG) in January 2000 to “promote, educate and advocate,” according to its founding and past president, Robin Halliday. She is chief executive officer of Rivetek, a subsidiary of Bellingham-based Distribution Information Systems.

“We wanted to create a highly effective organization to build total solutions together, so people wouldn’t need to go beyond Whatcom County,” she states.

The group includes anyone in the software, hardware or telecommunications industry and anyone who serves that industry, such as educators, lawyers, bankers, builders and property owners.

In April, TAG took a step farther in promoting the technical industry by becoming the fifth chapter of WSA (formerly Washington Software Alliance), a statewide technology trade association based in Seattle.

Officially the Northwest Washington Chapter of WSA, the group will retain the name TAG for consistency and recognition, and will encompass Whatcom, Skagit, Island and San Juan counties, states Yvonne Cartwright, advertising director of Cartwright Zeiler Group in Bellingham and a member of TAG. Its board of directors will serve as a steering committee on the WSA board.

“As the state’s largest technology association, WSA was a logical extension,” says Halliday. “We were recognizing that there would be limits to the benefits and service we could provide locally.”

 

Membership benefits

WSA was formed in 1984 and has 1,300 members with chapters in Spokane, the Tri-Cities, Olympic Peninsula and South Puget Sound. It offers affordable business resources such as insurance programs, educational and networking opportunities and advocacy efforts on behalf of the industry.

The organization is dropping the “software” association with its name, since “it’s not just software anymore,” explains Lew McMurran, WSA director of public and governmental affairs. “We don’t want to turn anyone away.”

In addition to networking, members have the opportunity to attend educational seminars on topics including investments, human resources and business development. WSA also offers a wide range of insurance for business, error and omissions, health, autos and homes. “We are close to offering a 401(k) product,” says McMurran.

WSA members also reap the benefits of the organization’s size through telecommunications service, payroll services, discounts on office supplies and an employee assistance program.

“These are all made available to companies too small to obtain on their own,” McMurran notes.

“We’ll be continuing the programs we started (with TAG), but will be able to offer a higher level of services and access to the power structure that lives and works in technology in the state through WSA,” points out Cartwright.

For example, TAG is continuing to build its scholarship program with Bellingham Technical College, Western Washington University and the School to Work Technology Preparation Consortium for high school students. The program soon will include Skagit Valley College.

“We have 200 tech-related companies in Whatcom County alone,” Cartwright says, “and we want to provide information on all kinds of issues: software and hardware, funding start-ups, smart buildings (structures wired with fiber-optic lines for high-speed Internet access), how to insure intellectual property and taxation.”

“We’re continually growing. I don’t see it stopping,” she adds. “(Technology) is a clean industry that doesn’t hurt the environment and it is improving the local economy. The dot-com bomb may have slowed things a bit, but overall it’s going to be just a blip on the radar screen. It’ll come back, if not stronger, certainly smarter.”

While TAG is not actively pursuing technical businesses to come into Whatcom County, “We just provide an additional reason to come because of the support,” Cartwright comments.

“We couldn’t have asked for a better partner,” says John Gargett of Fairhaven International and the current TAG president. “We’ve spent the last three years growing and marketing our group in the Whatcom County area but needed an organization like the WSA to take us to the next level.”

The new chapter’s board includes Gargett as chair; Halliday as past chair and chair of TAG’s education subcommittee; Cartwright, marketing; Paul Gray of Gray Consulting, community partnerships; Bill Hurd of NetManage, membership; Ann Bowen of Key Bank, finances, and Amy Drury Esary of Moss Adams, programs.

TAG has 45 members and annual dues are $300. For information on TAG, visit www.bwtag.net; for WSA information, go to www.wsa.org.