Virginia tech firm
targeting isle workers

The computer software company
is hiring locally and increasing
its presence in Hawaii

By Peter Wagner
Star-Bulletin

A Virginia computer software company has come to Hawaii looking not for a new market but for highly trained employees.

"We feel there are underutilized knowledge workers here," said Ray Brisbane, Jr., president of Total Resource Management Inc.

TRM, which designs and installs computer software to help manage large government and private facilities, today announced the opening of an office in Kapolei. The Hawaii location is TRM's second, to be followed by new locations in San Diego and Norfolk, Va. by the end of this year, Brisbane said.

The company has hired four employees for its Hawaii operation, a number it expects to increase to 25 within the next year. Two of the new hires are recent graduates of the University of Hawaii and Hawaii Pacific University computer sciences programs.

Brisbane said TRM will be targeting Hawaii's tourist industry, military, government and large companies that could benefit from operational fine-tuning.

But the larger market for TRM, he said, is on the mainland.

"There is a shortage of technical information workers on the mainland," he said. "That means we can come to places like Hawaii and find people who want to live and work here who can support clients in other states."

The explosive growth of the Internet, he said, makes it possible for TRM to offer its services anywhere.

"There's no reason why you can't be located in Hawaii and servicing folks in Texas," Brisbane said.

TRM this year will record about $3 million in revenues, a 70 percent annual growth since the company was founded in 1993, Brisbane said.

The company calls itself the only U.S. company solely dedicated to high-technology solutions to management problems. The company has contracts at Marine Corps Base Hawaii in Kaneohe and at the Public Works Center at Naval Base Pearl Harbor.

According to Don Omura, vice president of Pacific Operations, TRM chose its location at Campbell Estate's Kapolei Building because of its proximity to broad-band telecommunications facilities and because of favorable terms offered by landlord Campbell Estate.

Omura said the company plans to expand services to "application hosting" which will allow clients to tap TRM's services without having to invest in computer hardware or employee training.

TRM's clients also include Intergraph Corp., the Pentagon Renovation Project, U.S. Marine Corps facilities management departments, and U.S. Army public works departments.