Urban View
November 1999
Page 5

WHAT? MORE HIGH-TECH?
Mayor Brown continued his crusade to seduce big business-to put down roots in Oakland at his Oakland 2000 Tech Summit on November 12. Lulled by networking opportunities and placated by the high-end bag of marketing goods given out, about 300 business men and women settled into seats at the Kaiser Permanente Building for a day of promises and Brown's somehow provocative rhetorical questions: "How can we get just a little bit of brains that made all of you so successful to fix our schools around here?"
   Three panel discussions, interspersed with comments by the mayor and a lunch at the Lakeview Club, filled the day. The time, money and thought put into the event was obvious everywhere, most of all where panelists sat behind a postmodern brushed metal table, getting up to speak in from of a geometric mesh screen with soft colored lights reflecting more metal. The decor alone should have been enough to convince businesses that Oakland is serious its prospects. Outside the building, unheard by the people sequestered inside, protesters chanted to the tune of "Mary Had a Little Lamb": "Jerry has a housing plan, housing plan, housing plan, Jerry has a housing plan for people white as snow." The mayor's press assistant, Jim Memechek, noted that "the protesters were allowed to have their say, and then we continued on with the rest of the summit without any further ado."
   Panelists offered a measured view, discussing local and global opportunities for the future. Peter Schwartz, chairman of the Boards of Global Business Networks and author of The Long Boom, put the day's events into a global-historical context with the help of an impressive multimedia presentation, looking at the events of the past and speculating somewhat wildly into the future (claiming that "our children will live for centuries"). Others touted the numbers: One-third of all Internet traffic comes from California, and one-half of that is from the Bay Area, according to Fred Hoar, CEO of Miller/Schankwick Technologies West in Palo Alto. The overwhelming sentiment from the morning's panel was that the boom is happening all around us, and Oakland is eager to jump onboard, helpless to resist, but handicapped by two factors: the state of the schools and the perception of a high crime rate. Mayor Brow made no attempt to gloss over problems, bringing up issues such as the school system in what seems to be an alert to potential newcomers: Settling in Oakland means being involved in Oakland.
   Ann Winblad, a partner of Winbald Venture Partners, a venture capital firm specializing in hi-tech, noted that while technology can revolutionize education, it is the government's responsibility to change the compensation structure of teachers, and make sure that they are trained in technology that they are charged with teaching.
   In the afternoon, the suit-and-tie audience heard from the likes of Nat Goldhaber, CEO of Oakland's first IPO, Cybergold, who painted the picture of Oakland as an "open field" ready to be cultivated and venture capitalist Garret Gruener from Alto Partners in Oakland, who talked about wanting to invest in Oakland based companies.
  According to Nemechek, "we've already received a few calls from the people interested in moving to Oakland since [the conference]. I believe it's creating a good buzz as far as getting the word out that Oakland is rally wired for the future." Mayor Brown summed up Oakland's position on bringing hi-tech business to Oakland in a few words: "Let us know what you need. If it doesn't cost anything, you got it."