Bay Area Council Economic Institute and Joint Venture Silicon Valley Network Choose Halpern Info Services for Economic and Employment Research Findings

Franklin, MA - May 11, 2009 - In the midst of the country's worst economic slowdown since the Great Depression, it's not easy to grow, attract and retain businesses especially in the face of increasingly competitive conditions, both locally and internationally.  While small and medium businesses drive new net job growth, they often need help ferreting out the types of policies, development and practices that work for their regions.

One way for a region to set a course for industrial and economic development is to study how leading economic private-public partnerships, alliances and bilateral trade organizations function.

The famed Silicon Valley and Bay Area in California are no exception.  These are world centers of information technology, and each produce authoritative analyses on major economic policy issues, including infrastructure, globalization, energy, science and technology and governance.  Here, two of the nation's leading economic and business development agencies - Bay Area Council Economic Institute and Joint Venture Silicon Valley Network - have undertaken a strategic plan that includes exhaustive examination of their own region, and comparisons with other regions of the state and country.

For this, they have relied on a number of management and market research resources including Franklin, MA-based Halpern Info Services, to provide missing data assets.

As evidence, Halpern Info Services was chosen as the source for economic, foreign direct investment (FDI) and global employment data used in the forthcoming report from Bay Area Council Economic Institute, The Bay Area Index of Global Economic Links: Tools for Understanding the Region's Global Engagement (2009), and previously, The Silicon Valley Index (2007).  The former is planned for release in June 2009 and will be available at http://www.bayeconfor.org/baefresourcees.html.  The later is still available at http://www.jointventure.org.

The reason why the Halpern firm was chosen is explained by President & CEO Sean Randolph of the BACEI as follows: "Richard Halpern's company delivered high quality, authoritative data that we were simply unable to find on our own.  He put in time up front to make sure he understood what we needed, then provided us with data, charts and statistics on foreign direct investment (FDI), and information on corporate linkages that we used with good effect in a major regional report.  His data filled important gaps and contributed to the breadth and quality of our product."

As Halpern Info Services Principal Richard Halpern puts it "Regional economic development in a global economy has no silver bullet.  Success comes from analysis of individual attributes - private equity investments, intellectual property, tax incentives, an educated workforce, and insights gleaned from employment data and the global economy.  We realize firms like ours have an important role providing key elements for a solid strategic plan, and we take this role very seriously."

Halpern Info Services, a collaboration of independent information researchers, provides business and healthcare research on a project and retainer basis for business, non profit agencies, professional services firms, entrepreneurs and individuals throughout North America.

For more information, contact Richard Halpern, Principal, Halpern Info Services: richard@halperninfoservices.com, 508.346.3225. 

Halpern Info Services - www.halperninfoservices.com -- Franklin, MA 02038