Innovation is not just for the USA

Readers of this blog have undoubtedly been following the ongoing controversy between Jim and Steve about whether Boston or the Bay Area is the most important center for technology innovation.

Jim and Steve, what about all the innovation taking place outside of the US?

Grenoble, France, where I happen to live, is located just under three hours from Paris and, much like Boston and the Bay Area, is home to some of the nation's leading universities, medical schools, research institutions and technology companies.

According to the magazine l'Usine Nouvelle, The Grenoble Institute of Technology is the second largest engineering school in France and is second in terms of research contracts awarded. The Grenoble Graduate School of Business was the seventh best MBA program in Europe, according a 2009 Financial Times report.

Research institutions include Minalogic and Minatec for nanotechnology, NanoBio and Nano2Life for biotech and Tenerrdis and the PV Alliance for solar and other forms of renewable energy.

Technology companies in the region range from established multi-nationals such as Capgemini, HP, Radiall, Soitec, STMicroelectronics, Sun and Xerox to dynamic start-ups like H3C-energies and UShareSoft.

The great thing about innovation is that anybody anywhere can have a great idea. And, given the right environment -- world class higher education, research institutions and an dynamic economy -- great ideas become great companies creating great products.

We Built It and They Came

Silicon Valley

My esteemed colleague Jim wrote on this blog just a couple of days ago that he is tired of hearing about how Bay Area is the end-all, be-all of technology innovation and that for his money Boston is every bit as tech savvy as the nerds in Silicon Valley.

Ironically, that very day, Apple – a Silicon Valley based company – surpassed Microsoft as the most valuable technology in the world! That’s right, a company from Cupertino, CA #1 in the tech industry.

But as strong as Apple has become over the past few years, it is far from being the only formidable technology company here in Silicon Valley. You may have heard of some of them -- Google, Facebook, eBay and Intel. And literally tens of thousands of other companies too. But we’re not just about the Internet and semiconductors any more. No siree!

Just this past week President Obama was in Fremont, another Silicon Valley city, touring Solyndra, a maker of solar panels, where he touted the new factory as an example his administration's efforts to encourage job growth in innovative technologies. Green tech comes to Silicon Valley.

And Solyndra is not alone. There are dozens of new companies developing green technologies here in Silicon Valley, and a number entrenched semiconductor companies, such as Intel and National Semiconductor, are spending big amounts of R&D money on new photovoltaic and solar projects.

Biotech is another area of growth for Silicon Valley. In fact, hundreds of Valley-based biotech firms are expected to vie for $1 billion in new federal tax credits and grants aimed at boosting medical research and generating jobs.

Boston is certainly a vibrant and important market for a number of diverse technologies. But Silicon Valley, like Apple, isn’t going to give up its #1 tech ranking easily. That’s why 3Point Communications is located in both Boston and the Bay Area. We know that if you’re going to provide world-class communications counsel to technology companies, you have to be in both places at once.