Hasta La Creative!

Hip Techies Dig Scene In West L.A.; Houses Google, Yahoo, MTV; The beachside enclave of Santa Monica is sort of the Silicon Valley of the south

BRIAN DEAGON — Investor’s Business Daily , February 25, 2008 Monday NATIONAL EDITION

Silicon Valley might have never come to be the technology capital of the world were it not for Frederick Terman getting tuberculosis.

Terman, considered the father of Silicon Valley, was intending to return to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology sometime around 1930 when a bout of tuberculosis caused him to stay at Stanford University, where he would later continue teaching.

He cajoled two of his students, William Hewlett and David Packard, to form a company, which they did in a place near the Palo Alto, Calif., campus, between San Jose and San Francisco and often considered the heart of Silicon Valley.

Terman also pioneered the creation of Stanford Research Park, where engineers would congregate. Such acorns became the foundation of Silicon Valley.

Building a tech community requires a concentration of companies, watering holes and organizations where people get to know the movers and shakers.

Something like that is occurring in west Los Angeles, anchored in the beachside city of Santa Monica. Among the largest employers in the 85,000 population city are Activision, MTV Networks, Symantec, Edmunds.com, Yahoo and Google.

Roots have also been planted by Time Warner’s AOL, Microsoft, HBO, Sony, Lionsgate Entertainment and News Corp.’s 20 th Century Fox.

According to the Santa Monica Business Directory, more than 140 tech companies have a business license from the city, an area of just eight square miles.

This does not include a bushel of tech firms just outside the city limits, many along Wilshire Boulevard, which runs into a shoreline overlooking the popular Santa Monica Pier. Electronic Arts occupies a two-story building six miles up the coast, with room for 600 people. Yahoo leased 256,000 square feet of space in a business complex that was renamed Yahoo Center.

The Santa Monica and west Los Angeles area appeals to 20- and 30-something creative types. The Mediterranean weather and beach scene aren’t the only draws. Santa Monica’s Main Street has lots of stores and restaurants. It has the open air Third Street Promenade and the upscale Montana Avenue.

“It’s a lifestyle choice,” said Michael Jones, a vice president of AOL and CEO of its Userplane.com unit. “While there are pockets of tech firms in Burbank, mid-Hollywood and parts of the San Fernando Valley, it’s really all about west Los Angeles and Santa Monica.”

According to Santa Monica’s Economic Development Division, technology firms are some of the area’s top employers. The city’s Web site says: “No discussion of the area would be complete without mentioning the tremendous influx in recent years of entertainment, high-tech and software companies.”

Evidence of the influx is shown in commercial rental properties. Nondescript industrial buildings fetch monthly leases of $5 a square foot per month, on par with high-rise office building rents.

“We see a lot of digital activity on the west side,” said Jack Kyser, chief economist of the Los Angeles Council Economic Development Corporation.

As with all successful tech centers, the area is burbling with professional networking groups.

When Dealmaker Media, a well-known networking group in Silicon Valley, held its premier event in the area, it chose Santa Monica as its location, across the street from the Yahoo Center and next to MTV.

TwiistUp, also new to L.A., has held three events in nearby Venice.

“It’s happening because there is a critical mass of tech people on the west side,” said Benjamin Kuo, founder of SoCalTech.com, which chronicles L.A. tech activity. “A lot more events are going on, with more people getting involved.”