Program has helped eight firms settle or expand in Charleston this year

The Charleston Digital Corridor, a 3-year-old economic development initiative, is building traction in its bid to lure high-wage jobs to the area, officials said Thursday.

The program helped eight new companies either settle or expand their operations in Charleston so far this year, bringing the corridor tally to 35, according to a report presented to City Council members this week. A ninth is in the bag and two more are in advanced stages of the negotiating process, according to Ernest Andrade, the mastermind and sole paid employee behind the initiative.

Most corridor members joined the program as existing businesses, and it's arguable how "digital" some of the companies are, but this year's crop represents an improvement over the two startups the initiative enrolled in its first year and the five last year. "I think it's definitely gaining momentum and I feel very encouraged about the future," said Mayor Joe Riley Jr., a big supporter of the initiative.

Andrade said the corridor was originally designed to boost the economy over the long term, with the first big successes coming five to 10 years out. He says the results so far are "encouraging." One of the new companies in its roster is Modulant, which makes software that helps companies and governments share data. Modulant announced plans to move its headquarters from San Francisco to Daniel Island earlier this year, adding 30 or so jobs to the 150 workers it already employed in the area.

Universal Solutions LLC, a business communications company, also announced plans to move its headquarters here this spring, bringing 40 jobs to the area. Andrade helped both deals happen.

The rest of the corridor's 2003 roster is filled with one- to five-employee companies, but Andrade is just as happy talking about them as he is larger corporate relocations. "I have a tendency of celebrating the smaller success," Andrade said. "Philosophically, every company, including the one-man shop, is important, because you never know where that one-man company is going to end up."

The Charleston Digital Corridor is a "lean" organization, which is to say it consists of Andrade, an intern and a relatively small amount of the $500,000 or so that the city earmarks for economic development in a given year.

Alex Rosen, who started Rosen Litigation Technology Consulting this summer, has gotten some help from Andrade's initiative. Rosen grew up in Charleston and, after traveling the country designing multimedia courtroom presentations, he wanted to come back home to ply his trade. He didn't need a big break on property taxes or utilities, and he would have set up shop here with or without the corridor, but Andrade did hook Rosen up with his first few clients and helped edit one of his first press releases. "He was a huge help to me," Rosen said. "He's so about networking people and this cooperative approach to technology, it's a great resource for a business like mine."

Andrade was also instrumental in helping launch Sans Locus early last year, the brainchild of local Web site developers Jamie Posnanski and Joe Bryan. Andrade lined up some small business grants and affordable parking space for the two entrepreneurs. More importantly, he let them work out of his own office while they were looking for real estate. "If something's a great idea and should be pursued, he's not going to let anything get in the way, and that's one of the major benefits of the way he works," Posnanski said.

Andrade said that next year, he will focus on developing a resume database for prospective companies and current corridor members. He is also committed to getting state funding for a center to incubate medical-science startups at MUSC and pushing a city plan to create a technology park on a 19-acre plot in Berkeley County. "There's plenty of groundwork to be laid, so to speak," Andrade said. "We're more focused on building a framework – a solid foundation – than we are on attracting businesses right now. ... I still think of us as a very, very young organization."