Editor’s observe: This commentary by Jorge Fernandez, advisor at The Pendleton Group, is printed as a part of the agency’s annual sponsorship of International Atlanta.

Most know that Atlanta has the world’s busiest airport and is a hub for Fortune 500 firms. These are major causes for worldwide firms to find right here. Nevertheless it’s town’s secondary and extra intangible attributes that hold these firms in Atlanta for the long run and provides them the power to make use of this metropolis as a platform to entry the whole world.

Collaboration and congeniality make all of the distinction. In contrast to in different U.S. cities, everybody works collectively right here. Past simply web site choice, there’s a spirit of camaraderie that offers worldwide firms — large or small, in any sector, from any nation — confidence in launching or rising their enterprise, not solely all through the United States, but additionally to far-reaching markets.

This creates a self-sustaining cycle: Overseas-invested firms that succeed listed here are anticipated to contribute to the group in return, turning into ambassadors in their very own proper.

Pendleton Group is a proud a part of this Atlanta ecosystem. We try to be a facilitator for worldwide firms to parlay native help into world attain, utilizing Atlanta’s networks and experience to go additional.

Learn on to find out how a few of our recruits have made the leap to arrange, keep and thrive in Atlanta  — and use our metropolis as a worldwide springboard.

Of their phrases: Case research 

Soar to:

• Tecme Corp., an Argentina-based medical-device firm
• Keeper Options, an Eire-based software program agency centered on fintech
• IDOM Corp., a Spain-based engineering, structure and smart-cities consultancy

Tecme: Tapping the Community 

Tecme Corp. is an Argentina-based medical system producer that chosen Atlanta some seven years in the past for its U.S. workplace. Lengthy earlier than the COVID-19 pandemic, Tecme had specialised in respirators, so when the pandemic hit, the corporate was able to share its life-saving merchandise with broader markets, increasing its attain to greater than 50 nations. Atlanta turned the right base to take action.

“Establishing a enterprise in Atlanta provides distinctive subjective and intangible benefits; the enterprise ecosystem, the standard of providers, the skilled networking and the expansion dynamics are distinctive,” stated Gregorio Nieri, Tecme’s CFO and a global enterprise advisor. “These components enable firms to supply the whole lot they want for his or her enterprise domestically after which undertaking it onto the worldwide stage with fast and environment friendly accessibility.”

Mr. Nieri attributes Tecme’s success to partially to help the corporate acquired from numerous Atlanta organizations. The Metro Atlanta Chamber, Georgia State College’s J. Mack Robinson Faculty of Enterprise, Georgia Division of Financial Growth, the native U.S. Business Service workplace and different teams gave Tecme recommendation, usually working collectively to assist the corporate entry the assets it wanted to broaden internationally, he stated.

“Ease and accessibility: That’s what Atlanta supplies. It’s a group that understands worldwide enterprise and has a enterprise local weather that’s primarily based on networking, with people who find themselves very skilled, pleasant and have a spirit of internationalization,” Mr. Nieri stated.

He famous that the group help didn’t finish as soon as Tecme was established in Norcross. The financial improvement group continues to assist with worldwide market entry and knowledge. And Atlanta’s burgeoning medical system sector has been a strong useful resource for Tecme as properly, with like-minded companions and organizations like Subsequent Technology Manufacturing or Partnership Gwinnett, who supply alternatives for potential collaboration.

Tecme selected Atlanta over Florida and different cities alongside the East Coast partially as a result of the spirit of “give and take” is alive and properly right here.

“Just like the previous saying goes, ‘You should give as a way to obtain.’ That’s what makes Atlanta’s enterprise group particular,” Mr. Nieri stated. “The sum is bigger than its components.”

Keeper Options: Partaking From Afar

Keeper Options, an Irish distant software program improvement and design firm for scaling fintech and medtech companies, additionally sees Atlanta as a necessary a part of its worldwide enterprise improvement technique. Although the corporate has not but established an workplace in Atlanta, it has secured vital shoppers right here with the assistance of our metropolis’s burgeoning fintech, medtech and cleantech communities.

Keeper Options sources software program expertise from Croatia, Serbia, Romania, Poland and Costa Rica to serve a rising consumer base within the U.S. and Europe. The main focus is to broaden in Atlanta, however Emma Wilson, the corporate’s senior advertising and marketing supervisor, stated they’re enthusiastic about alternatives throughout the U.S. and internationally that their new connections in Atlanta would possibly facilitate.

“We undoubtedly see Atlanta as a chief market and wish to immerse ourselves in the neighborhood. We now have to do most of that from a distance proper now, however we’re constructing extra digital collaboration inside the Atlanta market. That helps us always develop relationships all through the world,” Ms. Wilson stated.

She talked about that networking occasions hosted by Know-how Affiliation of Georgia and Fintech Atlanta have helped introduce the corporate to new shoppers. She added that Keeper Options can be contemplating techniques like visitor running a blog by Atlanta fintech firms to succeed in a broader American – and worldwide — viewers.

Ms. Wilson sees Atlanta as a particular place to entry fintech shoppers whose values align with these of Keeper Options, and CTO Nick Holme and Head of Expertise and Operations Mihaela Smadilo had been welcomed warmly when visiting shoppers her after pandemic restrictions had been lifted. Ms. Wilson felt the identical when she attended the Know-how Affiliation of Georgia‘s Fintech South 2022 convention in June.

“The fintech firms in Atlanta are real ‘individuals individuals.’ They worth their workers, are respectful and construct firms that make a distinction. We’re delighted to accomplice with them,” Ms. Wilson stated, including: “The extent of collaboration is basically one thing particular. You may speak about all of it day, however if you end up there and witness it your self, you’re very a lot blown away by it.”

Keeper Options is dedicated to the Atlanta space as a result of it has a number of fintech firms right here, and it has discovered the fintech ecosystem and networks in Atlanta to be a wellspring of help.

The corporate’s aim in Atlanta is to “construct nice relationships with our present shoppers and broaden our consumer base,” she added.

IDOM: Rising the Innovation Ecosystem

Spanish engineering and structure consultancy IDOM Corp. noticed Atlanta as not solely an innovation hub for its North American tasks but additionally as a spot from which to attach with potential shoppers all over the world, stated Marco Busatto, the agency’s director of Trade 4.0 in its Midtown workplace.

The corporate first got here to Atlanta in 2018 to serve its rising consumer listing within the Southeast, together with large-scale tasks for automotive, pulp and paper, metal and chemical crops in Georgia, Alabama, the Carolinas, Tennessee and Louisiana.

IDOM turned considered one of 10 constitution members of Level A, a provide chain innovation middle and assume tank housed in Georgia-Pacific LLC’s headquarters downtown. The group, whose model identify and internet presence had been created by IDOM, concerned some 45 influential firms in Atlanta, corresponding to Georgia-Pacific, W.W. Grainger Inc., Amazon Internet Companies, Microsoft Corp., Delta Air Traces Inc., United Parcel Service and extra, in collaborative workshops to innovate on provide chain finest practices.

The trouble ended, nonetheless, with the worldwide pandemic. However Mr. Busatto is hopeful the undertaking will resume sooner or later, as provide chain points are central to his firm and people of its companions and shoppers, with Atlanta as an vital transportation hub.

And, he stated, Atlanta is the very best location to convey collectively progressive firms. “That may be a principal purpose we now have stayed in Atlanta,” Mr. Busatto stated. “The relationships we made by way of Level A are key. The presence of main innovators, high-tech startups and universities like Georgia Tech, plus the progressive and business-friendly atmosphere of Atlanta was a most important motive for us.”

Despite the fact that Level A closed and IDOM needed to relocate its workplace from the Georgia-Pacific constructing to Colony Sq., the corporate will proceed to have a presence right here due to the networking alternatives and cultural match, along with town being a “pure bridge” between Mexico and Canada, Mr. Busatto added.

He famous that Atlanta’s enterprise group is “very worldwide,” with many Spanish-speaking and Latino professionals, and it is rather supportive. The chamber, GDEcD and others proceed to be useful, Mr. Busatto stated.

IDOM is a daily sponsor of Subsequent Technology Manufacturing’s networking occasions, and the group, in addition to Georgia Tech, has helped IDOM develop relationships with an ecosystem of tech startups in Atlanta, together with Verusen, Sagepath Reply, Cogniac and extra, he added.

IDOM additionally makes use of its Atlanta relationships to entry worldwide tasks. By way of Georgia-Pacific and Koch Industries, IDOM met Guardian Glass, who they help with development tasks within the Center East and India.

Recommendation to Newcomers

These success tales present that investing in Atlanta  — or anyplace — is about greater than quantitative evaluation. As Pendleton has present in working with many world companies, quite a lot of components will decide whether or not an organization thrives in a brand new enterprise.

“Don’t solely calculate the numbers concerned in your location choice, but additionally think about the subjective questions that make the distinction. These intangible advantages – the enterprise local weather, the entrepreneurial mindset, the networking – these include time and are components that differentiate Atlanta from different locations,” Mr. Nieri of Tecme stated.

Mr. Busatto of IDOM stated newcomers ought to rent a mixture of native and worldwide workers.

“Have a mix of individuals, locals and those that know your organization tradition, so that you don’t lose your organization identification,” he urged. “It’s not really easy, however growing good relationships is essential.”

Ms. Wilson inspired different worldwide firms to get entangled.

“Being as current as you may within the Atlanta group is basically vital. However even from a distance, you may nonetheless be part of that ecosystem,” Ms. Wilson stated. She famous that even earlier than Keeper Options visited Atlanta, the Pendleton Group labored with Enterprise Eire to arrange conferences and introduce them to companions.

“They couldn’t have been higher. They had been actually informative and always guiding our means,” Ms. Wilson stated of Pendleton Group. “We would have liked extra help from a enterprise improvement perspective and a networking perspective, and we undoubtedly bought that.”

Firms who’re able to make the most of Atlanta’s collaborative financial improvement group as a springboard to worldwide markets can contact us at information@pendletonatlanta.com or discover out extra at www.pendletonatlanta.com.