400 Show High-Tech Unity at Zone Club

In their biggest show of force to date, 400 members of Los Angeles’ high-tech community turned out for the inaugural meeting of Zone Club, a group that aims to help Southern California become another Silicon Valley.

But some of the sentiments expressed at the event, held Wednesday night at Ciudad restaurant in downtown L.A. and co-sponsored by the Los Angeles Times, underscored the amount of work it will take to achieve that goal.

Executives and entrepreneurs alike bemoaned the dearth of venture capital available to Southland start-ups. And many said that despite the efforts of several groups--including one led by Mayor Richard Riordan--to unite the region’s technology pockets, the area still lacks a cohesive atmosphere.

“L.A. has not developed an identity yet,” said Thomas Evans, president and chief executive of Marina del Rey-based GeoCities.

That’s why Tim Draper, a Silicon Valley venture capitalist who last year launched an L.A.-based investment firm called Zone Ventures, is spearheading Zone Club. Without a venue for regular gatherings, Draper said, the region’s engineers, entrepreneurs, investors, lawyers and other business professionals won’t coalesce and live up to their collective potential as a technology powerhouse.

That was a persuasive argument to attendees such as James Crumpton, senior vice president of Silicon Valley Bank’s California technology division in Los Angeles.

“We act as a referral service to one another,” Crumpton said. “As young companies begin to emerge, they need resources. Like a plant needs water, sunlight and nutrients, companies need lawyers, CPAs and investment bankers. If we’re all networking, we can form a more nurturing environment.”

Zone Club participants, who paid between $25 and $50 to attend the event, were looking for investors, business partners and customers.

Indeed, the buzz of networking could barely be quieted when it came time for the evening’s panel discussion on Southern California’s high-tech future.

Panelists Draper and Jack Kyser, chief economist of the Los Angeles Economic Development Corp., talked up the region’s potential. Kyser noted that the Southland is home to more software development firms than the Silicon Valley. But Evans, who was also on the panel, dismissed the notion that high tech would ever overtake Hollywood as L.A.’s signature industry.

That debate seemed of secondary concern, however, to people in the audience. Their main interest was venture capital--and why there is so much more available in the Silicon Valley than in Southern California.

“If L.A. really wants to be a place where entrepreneurs can flourish, they’ve got to change the venture capital environment,” said Mark Skiba, chief executive of Storactive, a Marina del Rey software firm.