20 Years in Folsom

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Suffering Incongruities
     That situation irks Folsom’s vice mayor Morin, who, understandably, would like to see the Intel Folsom campus continue to grow.     
     “California’s business climate is frustrating,” he says. “Cities like us are at the mercy of state policies that have all of these incongruities, and we suffer for it.”     
     Business challenges are not the only ones facing the company as it begins its third decade in Folsom. Many within Intel, all the way to CEO Craig Barrett, also decry what they see as America’s floundering K-12 education system. Barrett and others say the U.S. is rapidly falling behind other industrialized nations in turning out skilled workers.     
     “The bottom line is that China, Japan, India and Russia are all putting out more science, math and engineering students than we are,” says Intel spokesperson Francisco.     
     “Schools in this country are competing with other states,” adds CIO Johnson. “But that isn’t their real competition any more. Their competition is other countries.”     
     In spite of those challenges, or maybe because of them, Jacobson says the campus has truly evolved since Intel came to Folsom in 1984.     
     “We had to grow within Intel itself,” he says. “We’ve matured now. We’re not growing as fast, but we have become a campus with real gravity within the company. We’re also using our stature to positively impact regional public policy.”     
     Francisco says that role in public policy is the most telling sign of Intel’s maturation. “We were really an enigma when we got here in 1984,” he says. “These days, it’s amazing the number of tables we have a seat at. We’re not an enigma anymore.”

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