In the Dot-Com Wasteland, A Few Patches of Green

Silicon Valley symbolized dot-com fever and the outrageous excess that went along with it. When the fever turned fatal, the same small stretch of Northern California came to represent the economic downfall of a high-flying category. Soon it may serve as a symbol once again—of tentative recovery. The region shed 127,000 jobs between first-quarter 2001 and second-quarter 2002, according to regional economic oversight group Joint Ventures, and no one expects it to fully return to its go-go self anytime soon. But marketing communications executives say they see signs of life—and business—returning. Edelman Public Relations, for example, was tapped this month by Princeton Softech, a Princeton, N.J.-based data storage company, for national PR chores, based on the agency's Silicon Valley presence. Edelman also recently won U.S. PR duties from Altium, an Australian software design outfit that was also looking for a Silicon Valley agency. "Technology companies are still looking at Silicon Valley as the driving force within the technology industry," said Luca Penati, deputy general manager of Edelman's technology practice in Mountain View, Calif. "The fact remains that in order to succeed, you need to tap into key influencers that are based in Silicon Valley: media, analysts, academia, [venture capitalists], competitors, other companies and all the entourage that makes Silicon Valley such a unique place." "Silicon Valley is made up of a lot of well-entrenched technology companies, and also is a hotbed of innovation," said Tom Hoog, chair of the counselor's academy at the Public Relations Society of America. "Some of that innovation took a hit, but the basics are still there." Fees for PR services, however, have dropped dramatically, noted Patrick De Chiro, president of PR shop Thunder Factory in San Mateo, Calif. "The days of Silicon Valley tech companies paying PR firms $30,000, $40,000 and $50,000 a month are gone," he said, adding that monthly retainers are now closer to $10,000-15,000, with the exception of the very largest clients. Some ad executives also feel a change for the better is in the air. Witness Godfrey Q & Partners, a new ad agency that veterans of Hill, Holliday, Connors, Cosmopulos, San Francisco, founded to handle tech accounts only. Patrick Godfrey and Brian Quennell, tech specialists on the account and creative sides, respectively, have lured Fred Goldberg, head of the former Goldberg Moser O'Neill (which later became Hill, Holliday San Francisco), out of retirement to head their advisory board and act as a consultant. The partners, who have worked on Cisco, Dell, IBM and Microsoft, said they have received several projects from tech firms."There are still big budgets within [tech-company] marketing organizations, and they are not indicating more cutbacks," said Donovan Neale-May, executive director of Palo Alto, Calif.-based CMO Council, a trade group representing some of the largest technology companies. "It's a gradual recovery," echoed Ryan Donovan, associate director of global technology at Ketchum Public Relations in San Francisco. "There's no question we're on the road to recovery, but it won't be rapid."

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In the Dot-Com Wasteland, A Few Patches of Green

Kristen Rountree

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Kristen Rountree