[luau] Re: our economy

[maddog]

I have lived here for nine years now and have to agree with Scott and partly
with Vikram.  Part of it is our payment in "sunshine dollars"  but the
biggest part is a good ole boy mentality with a small group of businessmen
controlling most of what goes on in this economy.  Why would they want
things to change?  They have been in control since 1900 so why rock the
boat.   It is going to take a dedicated bunch of new entrepreneur with a
vision of the future and maybe backing from the mainland to break open
treasure chest that is here for us.  I was a high school teacher here for a
couple of years an have seen first hand what we need to do to bring up the
standard of tech learning in public schools here.  That's why I am so
dedicated to HOSEF.  We have half the equation to bring good tech jobs here.
We have a great location (geographically and for recruitment), we have a
good understanding of growing Asian markets, we have people ready to work,
but are lacking a skilled workforce  (top complaint I have heard from tech
companies wanting to come here) we haven't built up the tech infrastructure
(though that is changing) and most of all we make it difficult for new
companies to do business here, leading back to my first point.  That why it
so important we break down as many of those barriers as is humanly possible.
I don't know about the rest of you but I married into a Hawaiian family and
will probably be buried in Kaneohe cemetery when I go.  The mainland is
really not an option.  For those of you who are in the same boat as me lets
make this tech industry become a reality here.  Just my 2 cents   Jeff Zidek


Great comments Jeff. I also married into a family that is rooted here and I
too am here for the long haul. Thinktech Hawaii is a passion for me because
I think that tech, in certain forms can thrive here. We have perhaps the
biggest open laboratory in the world right here. Dr. Yanagamachi at UH said
it best, he illuded to the fact that he could be making 3 to 4 times more
than he makes here but he like living here and he is the guy that invented
invitro fertilization, and the genetic transfer that made green mice
possible.

Astronomy is another area of tech well suited to here. We have a world class
observatory system and the volcanoes too.

SOftware development is another area we think has a lot of potential. Konami
has a big presence here and they bring a lot of programmers from Japan and
they love it here.

The key to building an industry is to look at what works and emulate it but
Hawaii has a problem there because there is this bogus idea that "we do
things different" ingrained in peoples heads. We are no different from
anywhere else and the faster we realize it the better off we will be.

Want to fix the education system? look at a place of relative size that has
a good system and emulate it from top to bottom. Want to fix government? do
the same thing. I came from San Diego and we had a HUGE defense contracting
industry until Jimmy Carter slashed the defense budget. We were doomed. Then
Mayor Pete Wilson decided that San Diego was gonna be a tech town and he
lured Qualcom in and bang! instant tech community. Well not exactly, they
poured a lot of money into UCSD and SDSU to establish world class
engineering schools. SO there is a workforce, and a ton of spinoffs and SDSU
is recognized as a great business college. He also got a big influx of
VENTURE CAPITAL. Act 221 is attempting and I think is somewhat successful at
this. WHat we have gleaned from the VC's we have talked to is that there is
no local venture fund and without it there will be no mainland venture funds
interested. KSBE and the Employee pesion funds could easily fix this problem

These are just some of the things we have come across in our study of the
tech industry in Hawaii. We also need to realize that "tech" is a very broad
subject and that as far as computer tech is concerned the type of businesses
that will work here are service oriented and those service products can be
exported.

That's my $0.0000002

Don


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