Good news in Rhode Island attracts a crowd these days. Gov. Donald L. Carcieri and Mayor David N. Cicilline were among those who turned out on Feb. 11 to welcome the software development firm InQuest Technologies Inc. when it celebrated its move from Southborough, Mass., to a new headquarters on West Exchange Street in Providence.
Michael R. Colapietro, InQuest’s co-founder and CEO, talked with Providence Business News recently about how state and local officials wooed his company – with personal meetings and incentives including a $750,000 relocation and expansion loan from the R.I. Economic Development Corporation’s Small Business Loan Fund (READ MORE) – and what the outlook is for his business.
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PBN: How did your big grand opening event go? Are you settling in in Providence?
COLAPIETRO: The event was a tremendous success.
The turnout was overwhelming. So many state officials took the time out of their busy schedules to join and welcome us to Rhode Island. The unexpected turnout of so many of our customers, both local and from out of state – such as Gilbane, ADT, the Naval Undersea Warfare Center (NUWC) and ConEdison – was a humbling reminder of how many people and organizations, both currently and historically, have been instrumental through the years in helping us get to where we are today.
Both Gov. Donald L. Carcieri and Mayor David N. Cicilline [who both attended InQuest’s recent grand opening] were very generous with their time, and they continue to send a positive message to the extended business community that they are committed to the transformation of both Providence and the state into a place where innovative companies like ours can call home.
PBN: State officials don’t hide the fact that they campaigned pretty intently to convince you to move your offices here, rather than to Worcester. How did they go about wooing you?
COLAPIETRO: The simple answer is that they made it personal. The folks at EDC took the time to listen and learn about who we were as a company, what we did, and what we needed. They then rolled up their sleeves to work with us on many fronts, to showcase what Rhode Island has to offer and why it was the right place for us.
They realized that a relocation initiative could be a very disruptive event for an organization and they took the time to address not just senior managements concerns but also the employees. They took the time to set up tours of the city of Providence for our employees, they helped us with our site selection, housing requirements, you name it they were there to help us every step of the way.
One last important point is that they understood for this to be a true success, we needed to not just relocate our headquarters to Rhode Island, but we needed to expand. They invested a tremendous amount of time in getting to understand our business model and look at the tools and programs at their disposal that would assist us in effectively expanding our organization here in Rhode Island and thus ultimately translating that into local hires.
PBN: Could you explain a little more about your product, IQ9, and how your customers use it?
COLAPIETRO: IQ9 is a comprehensive Web application platform that allows organizations – especially infrastructure intensive organizations – to quickly configure enterprise-caliber applications with no programming. IQ9 leverages the real-time connectivity of the Internet to allow users of those applications to securely access them with nothing more then a Web browser, making it ideal for a large group of users geographically or organizationally dispersed to have a single secure place where they access their information in real-time.
Once a customer identifies a business process they want to automate, IQ9 allows them to easily configure their data requirements, business workflow rules and security model to quickly create a full-blown enterprise application accessible over the Web. This simple formula, applied in scale, allows an organization to rapidly automate a diverse set of related processes that results in a comprehensive, elegant enterprise deployment.
Our customers find that configuring IQ9 solutions is a better alternative than either of the traditional “build versus buy” decisions facing organizations today. By using IQ9, our customers can deliver rich, workflow-driven solutions with no coding required that meet their exact business needs. Rather than the cost, risks and delays inherent in both Build and Buy choices, InQuest IQ9 allows business users to deliver high [return-on-investment] solutions quickly and easily at a fraction of the cost of the traditional alternatives.
For example:
• ConEdison is using IQ9 to automate the entire project lifecycle for public improvement projects from idea to commencement, from financial appropriations to construction, with users who are in the field or behind a desk.
• Verizon is using IQ9 to automate their communication and operational processes between themselves, their co-owners and their attachees.
• The Naval Under Sea Warfare Center is using IQ9 to automate a multitude of complex processes such as engineering change orders for submarine systems for stakeholders across the country.
• Gilbane will use IQ9 to automate the processes involved from design and construction to turnover of an entire building or facility projects.
PBN: How is your business holding up amid the recession? What is the outlook?
COLAPIETRO: Fortunately, to date, very well. We are very aware that these are difficult times for many companies and a lot of them are looking to control costs. As a result they are being very judicious in their technology investments. However, the reality of today’s recession means that these companies, now more then ever, need to invest in tools and technologies that allow them to do more with less, to maximize efficiency and profitability to preserve their own viability. That is exactly what IQ9 enables them to do.
PBN: When you announced plans to move here, you said you planned to increase InQuest’s staff from 20 to 50. Are you still on track to do that? What sort of jobs are you hiring for?
COLAPIETRO: Yes, we are on track. In fact in the short five months since the relocation of our headquarters to Rhode Island, we have already made 15 hires in this location that range from programmers, business analysts and a graphic designer to an engineering director. With the continuing success of IQ9, we expect to be filling more positions both on the product development, professional services and business development fronts. •
