Georgia is Great for Technology so Why Leave?

Georgia based CheckFree announced yesterday that they are being purchased by Wisconsin based Fiserve. This marks another sad day in technology business in Georgia.

With the announcement, CheckFree joins BellSouth, ISS, Secure Computing, Invirtus, and Cubed Technologies in the move away from being Atlanta owned companies. While some are moving out of the area others have said they have no intentions of leaving.

It is usually a PR game. After you get bought by a company outside of your home town you tell the locals you are staying then quietly move out of town closer to your parent company or be absorbed altogether. Last year Secure Computing said they not only were staying but they planned to add jobs in their Alpharetta based offices. I don’t find it surprising then that the HQ address on their Web site has recently been changed to California. A scheduled interview for a job that a friend of mine had in their Alpharetta offices was suddenly cancelled this spring. They told him they were moving the job to California.

It is indeed a sad day for technology in Georgia. I am not sure who should get the blame. Are the politicians doing enough to keep our tech based companies happy here? Are they doing anything to really foster a great atmosphere for incubating start-ups? Several years ago GCATT was at the forefront of heading up such efforts but lately I, for one, have not heard much out of them. Is our congested Atlanta traffic to blame like usual?

Sure, there are still dozens of brand name Tech companies based here such as ScriptStart, Equifax, and ADP but my perception is that the list has been getting shorter lately, not longer.

Georgia has a lot to offer with top schools such as UGA, Ga. Tech and Emory and a good weather climate. West coast tech firms work hard to recruit technical people yet we seem to have a few to spare right now. Real estate costs less here and you can get away with paying 10-20 percent less in salaries. It seems like a no-brainer to me to keep your technology company based here or even relocate it to this area. What do you think?

Back to the Land of Landline and Loving it

Ding dong. The door bell rang at 8:30am this morning. It was the AT&T service technician just letting me know that my line was on. They said the order would be filled today and lo and behold it happened.

I felt whole again -- two landlines and all the stability that goes with it. There is a lot to be said for a warm body and a white van standing in front of you. It sure beats the response you get if you are one of the 200,000 SunRocket customers in limbo after they abruptly pulled the plug two weeks ago.

That white van with a new logo and the intelligent technician that uses it to solve issues is front line PR and customer service. He was courteous and represented his company well. He has been with the company five years....not five days.

The new AT&T does seem drastically different than the BellSouth that I left. Please don't make me eat my words AT&T. With the new organization and ability to finally rapidly evolve with technology, you may have your one chance to get it right. So far so good.

SunRocket, a case study in bad PR

Ouch! It is hard to admit but I too got burned by SunRocket, the internet phone service. I had signed up and ported over my primary number just two months to the date that SunRocket burnt out. American Express has refunded my payment in full (kudos) but I am in limbo with my number. I took the safe way out and am porting it back to a landline.

My SunRocket service was great and far superior to my prior experience with Broadvoice and Vonage. The problems literally started overnight when it leaked out that the doors were locked at SunRocket HQ and that there was a piece of cardboard taped to the door of their offices in Virginia that read "Out of Business."

My personal experience with SunRocket tells me two things about the company that once was. The technology was great, management was abysmal.

There are good VCs (Venture Capitalist money backers) and bad VCs. VCs can really screw things up sometimes. I have helped launch numerous technology start-ups and I have seen it time and again. VCs pour money into a company (or give baseless pledges) then they call the shots. Most VCs know money; they don't know how to run a start-up. What did the SunRocket VCs do in the end? They put a big name corporate CEO in place that by most accounts had no start-up experience. Better yet, the CEO came from the much misaligned and mismanaged AOL. What kind of track record is that?

In the end SunRocket really misled the public by not having an emergency exit plan. This is poor management and very poor PR. Where are the execs now? If I were one of the first to go I'd be making lemons out of lemonade. Here is my advice to them... Get on the radio talk show circuit and start pointing fingers elsewhere while you write your book about how not to operate a technology company.

What are your thoughts?