Fertile Environment Makes New Castle IT Hotspot
Published Apr 16, 2006
At Delaware Technology Park, J. Michael Bowman (right) and Karl Steiner hold 3-D glasses used to view computer animations of CT scans.
Gone are the days when the term “information technology” was associated almost entirely with companies in the computer business. Today, IT has spilled over into nearly every industry, from health care to education. And New Castle County’s varied economy has provided ideal conditions for IT to flourish.
At the Delaware Biotechnology Institute – a partnership between federal and state government, academia and industry – researchers are working on computer animations that transform CT scans into three-dimensional images that can be projected on 15-foot-wide screens.
“They become a preoperative tool for surgeons,” explains J. Michael Bowman, chairman and president of the Delaware Technology Park, where the institute resides.
The field is called bioinformatics, Bowman says. “It’s where biotechnology meets IT.”
The tool also can be used for drug discovery. Instead of picturing interactions on paper, Bowman says, scientists can view an animated drug entering the body in a 3-D environment that is built to scale.
The Delaware Technology Park, a collaboration among the state, private industry and the University of Delaware, covers 40 acres adjacent to the UD campus in Newark. Besides the Delaware Biotechnology Institute, it houses more than 50 high-tech companies, many of them involved with IT.
Among them is Animedix, which offers high-quality, scientifically accurate animation. Clients include biotechnology firms and hospitals. Founded in Michigan in 2000, the company moved the next year to New Castle County.
“Delaware is within driving distance of 80 percent of the major pharmaceutical industry in the country,” says Chief Executive Officer Ashok K. Subramanian, a Delaware native who founded the company with Jeremy Dawson. “Here we have geographic proximity to our clients.”
Subramanian is glad he made the move for other reasons. The Delaware Technology Park supports small businesses, he says, and Bowman is a “fabulous mentor and networker.”
Also located at the park is Quantum Leap Innovations. The company, founded in 1999, creates problem-solving technology for business and government. “It’s one of the fastest-growing, coolest stories we have in IT,” Bowman says.
The new generation of IT businesses has a wide geographical reach. HostMySite.com in Newark, for instance, has clients worldwide.
Lou Honick and Neil Heuer founded the Web-hosting business in 1997, when Honick was a University of Delaware student. “We started as a two-man operation,” he says.
Today, HostMySite.com has 120 employees and two datacenters with a combined 2,000 servers. The company also offers Web-site creation tools, but it is not a design firm, says Honick, the company’s CEO.
HostMySite.com owes much of its success to customer focus. “What it comes down to is how we serve the customer,” he says. “A lot of times our industry is too technically focused.”
The University of Delaware offers a ready talent pool for companies as they expand. Yet New Castle County’s IT businesses can fish in many streams. “They are attracting talent from all over the country – some of the best of the best,” Bowman says. “They’re a magnet.”
Story by Pam George
Photo by Antony Boshier
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