CEO: Arizona has potential to be next Seattle when it comes to tech

Seattle is world-renowned for its technological industry, but one Valley CEO said Arizona is not far from following in its footsteps.

Jeff Pruit, the CEO of Tallwave, a company that looks to turn ideas into commercialized products, said Arizona is loaded with quality employees.

“The talent pool in Arizona is amazing,” he told News/Talk 92.3 KTAR’s Rob & Karie on Wednesday, adding that graduates of in-state schools are among some of the best in the nation that want to stay in Arizona.

“They’re excited to work in a place where they can see their vision reached,” he said.

Pruit’s company focuses on developing ideas that are considered “lighter tech,” like software, digital marketing and e-commerce companies. He said these ideas are perfect to pair with Arizona’s healthcare, education and construction fields, among others.

However, Pruit said that Arizona is just a few steps away from being on-par with tech-savvy cities like Seattle.

“You’ve got a lot of great companies here and if we can form more initiatives around those clusters, but early on, when innovation starts, which is with entrepreneurs, and start to crawl, walk then run into that, we’ll do a lot better.”

And Pruit said Arizona would be selling itself short by trying to compete on a city level.

“We should, in Arizona in general, we ought to be looking at companies that don’t just do well in the Valley,” he said, adding that entrepreneurs should be looking to compete on a national level.

Pruit said Arizona has an innovator-friendly environment that is conducive to turning ideas into profit.