To find out what would make Connecticut a compelling place for fast‐growing technology companies, starting in June 2010 the Connecticut Technology Council interviewed a cross‐section of Connecticut’s fastest growing and strongest enterprises in most technology clusters, from start‐ups to established titans. We also assembled a team of business leaders and graduate students, predominately from Yale and University of Connecticut, to research issues brought up by the CEOs and to review past reports and analyses of states’ competiveness. What we found surprised us.
Today’s most successful entrepreneurs and managers have a common and surprisingly consistent view—the state is not on their innovation and growth wave length. One after another the CEOs told us they like the quality of life here, but that it is a suboptimal location for their business. They expressed concern that the state’s leaders “don’t get it” when it comes to making Connecticut’s institutions flexible and innovation‐oriented. And given the high costs of running a business in Connecticut, the CEOs we spoke with expect our leaders to “get it.”
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