Tech forum director to step down
By ROBERT TRIGAUX
Published December 1, 2004
In four short years, the Tampa Bay Technology Forum has morphed from a networking group for business geeks to a rising star in regional economic development.
Much of the credit must go to the passion of the TBTF's founders and to the boundless energy these past three years of its first executive director, Michelle Bauer.
The group quickly raised its profile by helping start-up companies with its boot camp for entrepreneurs. This year, it introduced the ideas of Florida university researchers to commercial entrepreneurs in a statewide technology transfer conference.
The group also successfully spread the tech gospel - that technology businesses and knowledge workers are critical to a region's healthy future - to the area's more tradition-bound economic development groups. Now these groups are TBTF allies, not competitors.
That's a lot done in little time. So it comes as a surprise that Bauer said Tuesday she will step down as executive director early next year. She will continue to work part time for the TBTF, running the boot camps and the next tech transfer conference in Orlando in May. She also will produce a study that better defines what kinds of tech companies are operating in the area.
But in an interview, Bauer - always a whirlwind of activity - made it clear she has more than TBTF on her mind these days. She is a co-founder of CreativeTampaBay, the grass roots group inspired by regional economist Richard Florida and his focus on the "creative class." The idea is that communities that make themselves appealing to talented people - through arts, tolerance and diversity - will, in turn, attract more talented people and the companies that want to hire them.
That goal, Bauer says, is something TBTF and CreativeTampaBay have in common.
"Fresh perspectives and new blood are always necessary for organizations like TBTF to thrive as they mature," Bauer said. "It's time to pass the torch on to someone who can take the organization on to an even higher level."
As for the TBTF, the group expects to choose a new executive director this month.
The timing just might work. After all, TBTF president George Gordon, the CEO in Tampa of an online business called Enporion, suggests the regional tech group is getting close to flexing its young muscle in a new way: lobbying.
It's time to try and influence policymakers in Tallahassee to grasp the longer view of Florida's future, he said.
The pitch? Tourism and agriculture are proven but fading foundations for the Sunshine State. Making Florida into one of the country's technology leaders is crucial in the coming decade.
"The Tampa Bay area should aim to be among the top 10 regions for technology," Gordon said. That top 10 includes Silicon Valley, Route 128 near Boston, Chicago and Austin, among others.
At best, the Tampa Bay market probably ranks in the top 25, Gordon said. But it has the potential to soar higher.
TBTF has miles to go, Bauer and Gordon acknowledge. Trying to communicate to the larger world that the Tampa Bay area is more than a tourist destination is a tall order.
"That's a perception shaped over 50 years," Bauer said. "It takes time to change it."
Gordon, who is starting his second year as TBTF president, says four factors must be addressed to help the region's technology base grow and prosper.
First, a region's economic developers must "get the message" that technology is important. Done.
Second, a region's research and university expertise must be tapped. Under way.
Third, technology entrepreneurs must be encouraged. Work in progress.
And fourth, sources of capital to help finance tech start-ups must be found and expanded. The weakest link.
Area entrepreneur and TBTF director Kurt Long sees this region at a bit of a crossroads.
The Tampa Bay area has never been stronger for tech entrepreneurs, he said. But the region has yet to produce a big tech winner whose international prominence draws attention to this market.
The Tampa Bay market's message on technology is compelling, Long argues. But the area needs to speak with one big voice in order to be heard by venture capitalists.
And Florida's university system is excellent, Long said. But the state needs to develop a "Top 10" university by 2015.
Long is the founder and former CEO of Clearwater's OpenNetwork Technologies. He is now at work on a start-up called EpicTide Software, a security software firm.
As Long envisions the new world economy, there will be importers of technologies of all kinds and there will be exporters.
"Regions with thought leaders will be exporters and will reap the benefits of better education, better jobs and healthier lifestyles," Long said.
That's where TBTF comes in. It will keep shooting to put this region on the exporters' team.
Robert Trigaux can be reached at 727 893-8405 or trigaux@sptimes.com