News

State firms seek global markets

CardioPak has already taken its first steps onto the global business dance floor.
The Billings-based company has found better prices for raw materials from India and has already exported
some of its prepackaged surgical supply kits to Saudi Arabia.

BY JAMES HAGENGRUBER
Of The Gazette Staff

With 96 percent of the planet’s consumers living outside the United States, the future is international, said
the company’s director of operations, Troy Bergquist. But before venturing too far, CardioPak must first
overcome barriers to operating a business in Montana, he said.
CardioPak spent a year trying to set up a computer network between buildings one block apart, Bergquist
said. Digital capabilities only arrived a few months ago.

Technology and high-speed Internet is vital for
modern commerce, yet "Montana is 10 years behind,"
Bergquist said.
Bergquist’s frustrations were shared by others at
an international business conference held by the
MSU-Billings College of Business Tuesday. About 250
students, entrepreneurs and government officials
attended.
Although trade has great potential to boost the
state’s economy, a lot more than mountains and
prairie separate Montana businesses from the global
marketplace, said Arnie Sherman, executive director of
the Montana World Trade Center in Missoula.
"It’s a challenge to be here," said Sherman, who
has worked and traveled in 70 countries. "It’s much
more daunting to do business from Billings or
Missoula, Mont., than it is from Moscow, Russia."
Billings "is probably the most sophisticated town
in the state," Sherman said, but there’s few
professionals in the city with expertise in international
finance, law or business.
"We are very inwardly focused," he said, during
the conference’s keynote speech. "We’re so far from being ready."
Montana must develop an action plan that focuses on improving information technology, transportation,
access to capital and education, Sherman said.
"This sounds like an economic development speech – well, it is," he said. "Economic development is the
background for globalization, trade."
Montana exported $488 million in goods in 2001, a 6 percent decline from the previous year, according to
U.S. Census data compiled by the Massachusetts Institute for Social and Economic Research, at the University
of Massachusetts. Only Hawaii is behind Montana in terms of exports. Wyoming exported $503 million in 2001;
Idaho exported $2.1 billion.
Jim Stevenson and his Billings-based Unifield Engineering firm began working with clients in Latin
America about a decade ago. The business has 60 employees in three offices in the Northwest.
International clients now represent about 10 percent of Unifield’s business, Stevenson said.
Unifield’s products are ideas. Apart from the high cost of travel, the traditional language and shipping
barriers to international business weren’t so much a problem. "English is the language of technology and
science," Stevenson said.
But expanding the business depends on the development of new ideas. The state could help by investing
in education and fostering research partnerships between universities and businesses, Stevenson said.
"Montana’s most valuable resource is its people," he said. "Our best value-added industry is education."
In fact, the state would do well by promoting its higher education to foreign students, said David Aronofsky,
general counsel and law professor for the University of Montana. "Teacher education and business education
are in very high demand right now," he said.
The informal connections built between students produce strong business relationships in the future, said
conference attendee Alexander Yeremenko, a native of Kiev, Ukraine, who is studying finance and accounting at
MSU-Bozeman.
Yeremenko said he plans to return to Kiev soon with his knowledge and network of Montana business
contacts. "The exchanges are wonderful experiences for foreign students and those here," he said.
Brenda Burkhartsmeier’s business, Mountain Mudd Espresso, of Billings, has 200 sales kiosks in 16
states. She’s now looking at foreign markets – particularly Canada – but is daunted by the tangle of laws and
regulations. North of the border, her coffee cups would also need to be printed in French, for example.
"I don’t know anything about all the policies," she said after attending a session on trade policy and legal
issues. "It’s much more complicated than I thought."
Burkhartsmeier is working with a marketing company to explore options. Even with the challenges, she
continues to field calls about expanding her business. The prospect is too good to turn down.
"The interest is there," Burkhartsmeier said. "We have inquiries coming in internationally too numerable to
mention."

Copyright © The Billings Gazette, a division of Lee Enterprises

http://www.billingsgazette.com/index.php?id=1&display=rednews/2002/04/03/build/local/66-mt-trade.inc

Posted in:

Sorry, we couldn't find any posts. Please try a different search.

Leave a Comment

You must be logged in to post a comment.