.
Colorado
Technology Summit Considers High-Tech
Future
by
Judah Ken Freed
Military
and biotech highlighted in state summit
meeting. Oracle CEO Larry Ellison offered
keynote pitch.
.
Governor
Bill Owens' third annual Colorado
Technology Summit on July 19, 2003, looked
at the future of the technology sector in
the state.
Convened at the
Colorado Convention Center, the day
featured a luncheon focused on military
technology and an afternoon session
divided between introducing key players in
the states' technology initiatives, a
panel of finance experts, and the standard
commercial stump speech by Oracle
Corporation chairman and CEO Larry
Ellison.
The consensus
emerging from the day is that although the
economy is down, Colorado has a bright
future though development of aerospace,
telecommunications and biomedical
technologies.
"We have developed a
strong partnership between business,
education and government to ensure that
the development of the technology industry
in Colorado is in good hands," Owens told
the Summit in his opening statement. "I'd
prefer to bet the future of Colorado on
technology than bring back the old economy
with its boom and bust cycles from
agriculture and natural
resources."
Missing from the
conversation at the Summit, however, was
any consideration of such "appropriate
technology" developments in Colorado as
hybrid vehicles and alternative energy
sources, including solar and wind
electricity generation to replace the
state's 90 percent reliance on coal-fired
power plants.
The Summit agenda
mirrored the priorities of Gov. Owens, who
personally selected the luncheon and
keynote speakers.
Governor Owens began
the Technology Summit three years ago to
focus press attention on Colorado's
technology sector while creating a forum
of technology business leaders to
interact. Initially held in Colorado
Springs, the event moved to Denver this
year.
The event was
organized by Colorado Secretary of
Technology Marc Holtzman, based in the
Governor's office and working without
salary as one of Republican Owens'
"dollar-a-year" men (a term coined in the
administration of Democrat Franklin D.
Roosevelt). Holtzman earned millions
selling his eastern European financial
services business to a Dutch bank in 1998,
permitting him now to volunteer for public
service. Colorado is one of only two
states in the nation with a cabinet-level
position devoted to technology.
In an interview,
Holtzman emphasized that no tax dollars
were used in producing the event. The
event directly cost about $170,000 plus
the production costs picked up directly by
Oracle, such as the main stage with the
Oracle logo in the convention center
ballroom.
"Everything was
underwritten by sponsors," he said,
referring to technology companies that put
in $20-25,000 each. These included such
"household names" in Colorado as AT&T,
Hewlett Packard, Motorola, Qwest, and
StorageTek, along with lesser-known
ventures like CH2MHill, Ciber, Deloitte
& Touche, EDS, EMC, First Data,
McData, Korn/Ferry Recruting and W3W3 Talk
Radio.
Another 25 companies
contributed smaller amounts for the
privilege to present their wares in booths
outside the ballroom. Some of these
included major players like Eastman Kodak,
Hitachi, Intel, Quantum, and Verio along
with smaller ventures like Front Range
Tech Biz newspaper, Metzger &
Associates, and OutSourceIT.
Holtzman said that
about 550 business and technology leaders
attended the luncheon and another 3200
were registered for the afternoon summit.
The gathering was by invitation only, he
said, but almost anybody could request an
invitation.
Speaking at the
luncheon for the Department of Defense was
former astronaut Edward C. "Pete"
Aldridge, now Under Secretary of Defense
for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics.
Originally, Owens and Holtzman invited
Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul
Wolfowitz.
While people were
finishing their meal, Aldridge ran through
a range of space-based technology programs
that may involve Colorado defense
contractors like Martin Marietta. There
are 110,000 defense-related jobs in
Colorado now, and President Bush recently
proposed making Colorado a central hub for
Homeland Security, which could translate
into more jobs and a larger income tax
base.
As the luncheon
ended, a biotech researcher privately
quipped, "Too bad so much federal and
state money seems to be going into killing
people instead of healing
them."
When the Summit
itself convened, the first order of
business was introducing Colorado's
technology development team. After a
welcome by Colorado Technology Alliance
president Terry Huffine, short remarks
were delivered by Holtzman, Colorado
Aerospace Advocate Trip Carter, Colorado
Institute of Technology CEO John Hansen,
and management consultant Lewis Wilks,
co-chair of the Governor's Commission on
Science and Technology. Their remarks
conveyed all the enthusiastic optimism of
a high school pep rally.
Next came the
capital markets panel, moderated by Qwest
president and COO Afshin Mohebbi, who had
been promised that he would not have to
answer any questions about the financial
affairs of his company, including
allegations of improper or even fraudulent
accounting and customer billing
practices.
Seated on the
financial panel were Alberto Vilar,
founder and president of Amerindo
Investment Advisors; Norman Benedict,
deputy executive director of the Public
Employees Retirement Association of
Colorado; Chad Brownstein, managing
partner of ITU Ventures; Charlie Fote;
president and CEO of First Data; L.C.
"Mitch" Mitchel, a VP within EDS (founded
by Ross Perot); Rick Patch, founding
partner of Sequel Ventures; Gary Rohr,
cofounder and managing partner of iSherpa
Capital; and Matt Warta, managing director
of Village Ventures.
Warta summed up the
financial outlook by saying simply, "It
sucks." Other panelists concurred, but
said Colorado is on its way to a more
sustainable economy because the state has
such a diversified technology sector. This
is a marked contrast to past decades when
the state economy was dependent of either
agriculture or natural resources like
mining or oil shale.
The high point of
the panel might have been when Charlie
Fote responded to a common problem of low
volume with the convention center's
wireless microphones. Standing up, he
walked forward a few steps like the
character in the cellphone TV commercial
and said, "Can you hear me now?" The
laughter was sustained.
The day was capped
by Gov. Owens introducing Oracle chair and
CEO Larry Ellison, Like all the speakers
during the day, he was not paid any fee
for his presentation. Ellison gave
essentially the same three-part keynote
peech he gives everywhere.
First, our personal
computers should not be burdened with
expensive chipsets and hard disks but
instead should be networked over the
Internet into centralized servers (running
Oracle software, of course). Second,
Microsoft and Bill Gates are the evil
empire out to rule the world. Third, make
Oracle the king of the world instead. His
language is more tactful, of course, but
that's been the consistent heart of
Ellison's message for more than a
decade.
The new variation of
his sales pitch this year is a call for
all prescription medicine records to be
centralized (on secure Oracle servers) to
prevent accidental deaths from pharmacists
at one store not knowing what conflicting
drugs had been dispensed by another
retailer. He also called for a national
database of criminal warrants.
Owens then joined
Ellison on stage for a closing question
and answer session with audience members
lining up at microphones in the isles. The
governor soon became visibly frustrated by
a series of people who stood at the mic
making rambling comments that never seemed
to make a point or ask an actual question.
Patting his crossed
knee with his hand flat, fingers
outstretched and taunt, the look on Owens'
face said he was exerting all of his self
control to stay polite and diplomatic.
When the session ended and the summit was
adjourned, the governor actually seemed
relieved.
Whether there will
be another Colorado Technology Summit in
2003 may depend on the outcome of the 2002
elections.
Democratic
gubernatorial candidate Rollie Heath, who
did not attend the event, questioned
Governor Owens progress on the technology
front. "The governor made a big deal about
getting high-speed Internet connections
into rural and mountain communities
throughout Colorado, but we've not seen
these 'last mile' connections happening
because only a fraction of the promised
funds have been allocated."
Heath lauded the
efforts of the Colorado Institute of
Technology to get colleges and
universities to graduate more qualified
engineers and high-end technologists, but
said the state needs to do a better job
training Coloradoans for the middle-level
technicians jobs that comprise most of the
workforce. These jobs are now being filled
by importing people from other states and
other countries, he said.
More telling of
Owens' political priorities, he said, was
the absence from the published Summit
program of any speakers from the National
Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) here in
Colorado, which is a world leader in
developing solar, wind, geothermal and
agricultural alternatives to coal and
petroleum for both industry and
transportation.
Some experts
attribute Colorado's current draught to
global warming, which even federal
government scientists now agree is being
caused by air pollution generated from
human activities.
A spokesman at NREL
said facility director Richard Truly did
attend the Summit as a member of the
Science and Technology commission, but
Truly was not invited to speak.
Heath did not object
to the emphasis on military technology
during the Summit. "If the federal
government wants to spend millions or
billions in Colorado," said the veteran of
22 years in the Army, "we'd be foolish not
to take advantage of their
offer."
Orginally
published in The Colorado
Statesman
July 2002
(c) 2002-03 by Judah Ken Freed
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