Startup Spotlight: Customer-focused telecom software company Audian boasts big growth

Monica Nickelsburg | GeekWire | 22 August 2017

“Early in his career as an IT executive, Brandon Bazemore encountered a problem many business leaders face. He wasn’t satisfied with the telecommunications options available to him. But unlike many business owners, he decided to build his own solution.

The system he started building was a seed that would eventually grow into Audian, a Seattle startup that makes software-based telecom tools for businesses.

“I realized I needed a phone system,” Bazemore said. “After getting pitched these huge complicated systems by a number of local vendors, I could clearly see there was opportunity in the space. With the advent of software-based telephone switching and management, I could see a path where specialized proprietary hardware was obsolete, and where the customer could manage the entire telecommunications stack.”

Bazemore and his co-founder and COO Janae Smith officially launched Audian in 2013. The company has since grown to 14 employees and says client growth has increased by 393 percent year-over-year, due to an obsessive focus on customer support. Audian’s services included hosted voice, phones and hardware, and other telecom tools.”

Read more here.

View job openings at Audian here.

 

 

Resources help women find a variety of paths to tech careers

WGU Washington | The Seattle Times | 17 August 2017

“To keep Washington among the global leaders in technology and innovation, more skilled professionals are needed to meet current demand. Despite unprecedented opportunity, too few women are choosing careers in tech fields. A recent study from Accenture and Girls Who Code revealed fewer than one in four computing jobs is filled by a woman – and that number is getting smaller.

That decline is happening despite a tech industry willing to pay for well-trained workers. Research by the American Community Survey showed the median yearly earnings for computer and mathematical jobs is about $30,000 higher than the median earnings for all female professionals. In the Puget Sound area, tech salaries are among the nation’s highest.

The lack of women in that industry has been likened to keeping half the team on the sidelines at a critical point in the game. To encourage more women to pursue careers in tech, there are dozens of resources available – no matter where a person is in their life and career.”

Read more here.

 

Where the tech jobs are: Seattle, S.F., D.C.

Jon Swartz | USA Today | 7 August 2017

SAN FRANCISCO — Tech job seekers take note: Go west, or head to our nation’s capital.

CapRelo, an international relocation company, looked at the 25-largest metropolitan areas and cross-referenced job listings on LinkedIn during the first week of June to come up with a snapshot of the American workforce.

What CapRelo found is a booming market for tech jobs in Seattle (more than 50,000 open jobs), the San Francisco Bay Area (more than 40,000) and Washington, D.C. (nearly 40,000). Canada is another hotbed of tech hiring, according to CapRelo.

Tech is strong in multiple markets, CapRelo concluded, though not the most crucial in some of America’s biggest cities. Financial services (New York, Philadelphia), construction (Los Angeles, Dallas, Houston), retail (Chicago and Miami), and hospital and health care (Phoenix-Mesa, San Diego and Tampa-St. Petersburg) are booming as well.”

Read more here.

 

Amazon brings the boom to Bellevue: Here are the teams expanding into the tech giant’s big new office

Nat Levy | GeekWire | 7 August 2017

“Amazon is staffing up its big new Bellevue, Wash. office building, which looks ready for the coming deluge of badge-wearing, coffee-toting techies.

Amazon’s jobs site shows 85 open positions in Bellevue, most of them in the new 354,000-square-foot building called Centre 425. Amazon confirmed in April that it leased the entire building, a major expansion across Lake Washington from its Seattle headquarters. Teams that have posted open jobs in the new location include Amazon Devices, Amazon Web Services, Amazon Alexa, and the Lab126 hardware engineering unit.”

Read more here.