from the editor
Technology Trends & Regional Potential	Joe Sweeney, Editor-In-Chief & Publisher jsweeney@ingramsonline.com
The Corporate Report 100 fast-growth competition is probably my favorite annual tradition here at Ingram's. We've worked hard to devise a fair and equitable playing field for the contest of companies headquartered in the KC area. In the 16 years of this competition, we've observed countless new business trends and analyzed many organizational business models that enable companies to rank high and often on this volatile list. The analysis in this year's Corporate Report 100 competition is perhaps among the most interesting we've observed yet. For starters, 80 percent of the top quartile of KC's fastest-growing corporations are technology-oriented companies. Of them, 16 have placed on this list for the first time this year, and none of them has been on our list more than four times. Of the top 10, no company has been in existence more than eight years. Generally, younger, smaller businesses are the ones that rank on the CR100. But among our honorees each year are established big businesses that continue to grow at an alarming rate. Companies like UtiliCorp, with 2000 revenues of $29 billion, or Dunn Industries, now in their 78th year, with revenues of $1.4 billion - each with projections of aggressive future growth. To compare the Corporate Report 100 in 1997 to the report today reveals a couple of tendencies. In '97, the average revenue for the top 10 companies was $4.86 million; this year it's $17.27 million (excluding the multibillion-dollar Sprint PCS). The average number of employees working for our top 10 in '97 was 41.5, whereas today it's 35 (excluding the uncommonly personnel-rich Sprint PCS and Euronet). This analysis represents a 15-percent reduction in work force and a 350% increase in revenue. Kansas City's fastest-growing companies today versus those of four years ago clearly produce significantly more with fewer people. Couple this with the growth in the area's percentage of tech companies, a low unemployment rate, and the partnership of educators and businesses to produce and retain a skilled work force, and it appears that the KC area is yielding a better ROI business climate than we ever have before. This does not however, necessarily mean that we're maintaining pace with other markets or regions. Venture capitalists remain gun-shy about investing in Kansas City, but then they remain gun-shy about investing anywhere. Technology companies continue to perform and thrive in KC. While the high-tech industry has been humbled by a recent slump, and we've seen some casualties along the way, we have to tip our hat to the pioneers for paving the way in forming what likely could represent the strongest segment of our regional economy. Kansas City still offers a low cost of living and operations, a growing support for technology, availability of well-trained, affordable labor, centrality…the list goes on. Why do you think the KC region has become one of the more popular call centers in the nation? For those reasons listed above and many more. The logical evolution, of course, is for the information technology community in Kansas City to work closely with the burgeoning life-sciences movement to drive the development of bio-informatics. This could become Kansas City's most important growth industry yet. As pointed out in this month's Industry Outlook, Kansas City must leverage its technology capabilities to take its place in the global knowledge economy.
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