James November-December 2024 web - Flipbook - Page 11
tinue to build here. I don’t think there’s anywhere else in
the world, certainly nowhere else in the United States, that
has what we have going on.”
EVERY COMPA N Y A TEC H N O LO GY CO M PA N Y
When we think of technology, we probably think of
companies like Cisco or Microsoft or maybe some of the
fintech companies like NCR. Less top of mind regarding the
tech sector, though, are the manufacturing companies that
are increasingly integrating high tech into their production.
“Companies like Hyundai, whether they’re making and
building cars and bringing technology into those processes, or our electric vehicle industry, all the way up to supply
chain, it’s technology,” Williams explains. “Everybody’s a
technology company and tech enabled, but they also drive
innovations that affect the industry globally.”
With every company being a technology company, Atlanta being the home to numerous Fortune 500 and Fortune
1000 companies not only recruit for themselves, but it also
spins off companies that look to serve others and capitalize
on their needs. Coca-Cola, Home Depot, Delta Air Lines and
UPS are all headquartered here but 75 percent of Fortune
1000 companies at least have a presence in Atlanta.
Besides those Fortune companies, the airport and
two coastal ports are extremely important assets. Supply chains and logistics also require high tech solutions.
Estimates show that by 2033 we will have another 100,000
tech jobs, making for more than half a million tech employees. There’s nothing like Atlanta and Georgia south of D.C.
or east of Dallas.
venture capital firms, that are looking to match with companies that offer a good product or niche.
When starting his law practice, Yates recalls that there
were very few technology companies in Atlanta, and
there was a desperate need to retain them. “So rather than
having the funds to move them out to California, which is
what they were doing, we were going out there and saying, don’t move them. Just put money in here; we’ve got a
growing community here.”
It has now evolved where the movers-and-shakers
rarely make an investment in California. Indeed, the southeast is a hot tech area. “We have Venture Atlanta, which
is the largest venture capital conference in the Southeast
and one of the most highly regarded,” Yates notes. “And
one of the things that I’m working on now as a second
potential conference is one focused on Atlanta being, and
we already are fast becoming, the thought leader in generative Artificial Intelligence.”
The Atlanta barrister concludes by underscoring
another factor that helps us boost our tech sector: “We are
by far one of the most diverse cities of all these tech cities.
That is really a major driver for some of these companies
and our homegrown workforce is putting us in an enviable
position going forward.”
Baker Owens is a staff writer for James and James Magazine Online.
WHAT DOE S T HE F U T U R E H O L D FO R T EC H?
John Yates is an attorney and co-chairman of the Atlanta-based law firm Morris, Manning and Martin. Right after law school graduation in 1981, Yates visited California
with a recognition of the burgeoning tech sector. His sister
had started a tech company, and he remembers it was the
beginning of the computer industry with the launch of the
personal computer.
“I visited her, and she started introducing me around
to people in the valley, and I got the bug. My sister and I
had taken programming courses, believe it or not, in high
school in the 1970s,” says Yates. “I learned that being
around programmers is important. I learned I’m a bad
programmer but found that hanging around the good ones
is worthwhile. And that’s pretty much been what I’ve been
doing since then.”
Yates has been going to California every year since
then and has also developed a national circuit of sorts for
his firm that includes Boston, New York, Chicago, Dallas,
Austin and Washington D.C. Yates has practiced exclusively in tech law since he began and, under his leadership,
the firm’s tech practice has represented more than 1,000
clients for legal and corporate services. On these tours,
Yates and his colleagues largely work to meet the funders,
N OV EM B E R /D EC E M BER 2024
11
