The cluster of companies that brought life to the Highway 40 corridor in St. Charles County seems reborn after last decade's tech crisis, with new firms moving in and others expanding.
By Eric Heisler
Of the Post-Dispatch
In the mid-1990s, Rick Finholt weighed the success of Missouri Research Park by the stellar stock performance of its companies.
"I used to say that if you had a portfolio of just the companies in the park, you'd be doing pretty well," said Finholt, the park's director. The technology park's success extended further, too, as it expanded through most of the 1990s, helping to fuel the growth of the Highway 40 corridor in St. Charles County.
Then, the tech crisis hit. The park's tenants stagnated. Some went out of business. As that happened, the Missouri Research Park's growth came to a halt. Now, for the first time in four years, the business park is again on the rise.
Fast-growing tech companies have moved into buildings that sat vacant for years. Older tenants who survived the tech bust are expanding by constructing new buildings and hiring more workers.
In fact, the park's base of employees, which fell to about 1,300 a few years back, is approaching 2,000 workers.
"There's trends, and there's fads. Fads are short term, and trends are something that last. We really think this is a trend," said Finholt, director since 1989. "The high-tech economy had been in free-fall since 1998. Now, we believe it's trending back upward."
The park's growing companies include a tech firm that helps consumers to copy DVDs, a lab that performs diabetes research and a national mortgage company.
Missouri Research Park, which was developed by the University of Missouri, also is counting victories outside its 700-acre limits, specifically in the Highway 40 corridor of St. Charles County, which has landed several technology and financial-services operations in the past few years. The corridor, which soon will be home to 10,000 workers, traces its roots to the Missouri Research Park's launch.
Established in 1985, the park was supposed to replicate the success of Stanford Research Park and North Carolina Research Triangle Park, which lured technology companies with the promise of amenities and the chance to cluster around similar firms.
But the concept was slow to catch on, Finholt said, in part because of Missouri Research Park's location away from the region's population center. Still, after sputtering early, Missouri Research Park found roots in the mid-1990s as the region forged westward.
Companies leading the park's recent growth include 321 Studios, a software firm established in 2001. It sells technology that allows consumers to copy DVDs. The company moved to Missouri Research Park this year after outgrowing its Chesterfield office.
321 Studios traces its roots to the kitchen table of founder Robert Moore, who 2 1/2 years ago was trying to teach his son a lesson about Internet business. As part of the lesson, Moore, a computer consultant, set up a Web site that sold a how-to manual so customers could burn DVDs.
The response was overwhelming.
Thinking he had a hot idea for a new company, Moore formed 321 Studios out of the basement of his home, at first employing only family members. The company began selling its software in disk and download form.
Today, it has grown to 195 employees. And its profile has been raised further through a legal battle with the motion-picture industry.
In that fight, several Hollywood studios are asking a federal judge to force 321's products off the market, saying the software assists consumers in the illegal piracy of DVDs. In response, 321 Studios says there are legitimate reasons for making copies of DVDs, such as for teaching purposes.
The case is ongoing.
Nationwide trend
Renewed growth in a once-beleaguered tech sector is a theme that's resounding nationwide, said Scott Zajak, a St. Louis-based managing director of Advantage Capital Partners.
"I would say that in general, tech is recovering, but it's sort of a slow, steady climb," said Zajak, whose firm invests in early stage companies. "There's definitely a sense of confidence to invest in companies that have a proven model and want expansion capital."
Zajak said the tech comeback is particularly evident in life sciences, a field that includes Linco Research Inc., another Missouri Research Park company.
Linco, which develops testing equipment for diabetes and obesity research, is building a 50,000-square-foot lab in the park to accommodate the growth of Linco Diagnostics Services, a spinoff. The company will hire 25 new workers.
In the meantime, 321 is setting up shop in buildings that recently sat vacant. Initially, the startup took a 40,000-square-foot spot that had bounced among several tenants.
"One of the things we liked about the park was that it was growing and it had space," said Julia Bishop-Cross, a spokeswoman for 321 Studios. "We thought we could grow along with the park."
Now, because of its rapid expansion, from 50 workers at the start of summer to nearly 200, the company has moved into an 80,000-square-foot building that once housed Mallinckrodt Inc., a company that moved out of Missouri Research Park in 2000.
Gathering place
On the campus of Missouri Research Park, paved jogging trails wind between modern buildings, small lakes and patches of green trees.
To the south of the office buildings and labs, there's the Missouri Bluffs Golf Course. The course and its clubhouse serve as a gathering place for workers who meet for lunch or an afternoon on the links.
Walking trails, wooded areas and golf courses are the kind of amenities that tech companies seek out, Finholt said. What's also important, he said, is the ability to cluster around similar firms as well as to have access to a well-developed electrical grid and fiber optics.
The park was designed to provide companies all that, a stark contrast to the University of Missouri farm that formerly occupied the site.
"I used to show people the park, and they'd say, 'Well, where are my employees going to go to lunch?'" Finholt said. "There just wasn't much out here."
The idea that high-tech companies would move into the Highway 40 corridor in St. Charles County "used to be seen as a kind of a fantasy," said Greg Prestemon, executive director of the St. Charles County Economic Development Center. "I don't think anyone anticipated the arrival of the financial-services industry."
The park is credited for helping to establish job growth in the Highway 40 corridor. One of the most recent examples of that is CitiMortgage, which has opened an $85 million financial center in O'Fallon that will employ 5,000 people. The financial giant joins MasterCard, Enterprise Leasing and others who call the Highway 40 corridor home.
New construction continues inside the park, too.
Natoli Inc., which produces equipment to manufacture drugs, has finished work on a 40,000-square-foot research and technology building. The company plans to add 20 employees.
In another corner of the park, Nexstar Financial Corp. has moved into an 80,000-square-foot building that was vacated when McLeodUSA Inc. downsized a few years ago.
The fast-growing mortgage provider stumbled upon Missouri Research Park this year when it was seeking a building equipped for technology.
"For our business, we needed a high-tech building, and sometimes that's easier to find in a research park," said Jerry Holbrook, the company's chief operating officer. "We felt like moving out here opened us up to a whole new employee base in St. Charles County."
