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Show Computer software company finds a home in Park City r by Teri Gomes The name Unibase may not ring any bells. But if its growth continues at the present rate, this Park City software company will not be anonymous for long. Lynn Blodgeli and his brother Jim began theu- own computer company in 19G8 in Salt Lake City. By 1980 they were selling computers and software from Nixdorf along with their own line of soft ware. They also had a series of "Managerships" all across the country, service bureaus which used their software and helped to educate users as to how the software worked. The foresighted brothers were aware of AT&T's impending im-pending deregulation and entrance into the computer world with the creation of a piece of software known as the Unix which would ex pand the capacity of a computer. com-puter. The Blodgetts went to M I T. and gathered some of the brightest minds to help create a product which would work with the Unix and adapt its language to run on any number of computers. com-puters. In the meantime, the Blodgetts relationship with Nixdorf computers had reached a stalemate. Lynn Blodgett claims Nixdorf was afraid the Blodgetts' soft- projected their first year sales would reach $6.1 million and represent some 68 different accounts nationwide. Blodgett says they are adjusting those figures upward. "We will have 50 accounts by the end of May and it looks now like we will have some in accounts by the year's end. That will increase in-crease our figures from $6 million to $n million for this year." The Blodgetts have also devised a better means of servicing their clients. They have continued with the idea of managerships using people who have experience running comDuter infor- ware was outselling the company's own. In 1981 Nixdorf Nix-dorf stopped shipments to the brothers. They in turn filed an antitrust action. The following April the case was settled out of court. By now, the brothers were operating largely as a computer com-puter service bureau without being able to sell the computers com-puters their own software worked on. They agreed to be acquired by a Philadelphia-based company, Computer Input Services Inc., to get working capital for their project at M.I.T. which was still in the works. Computer Input filed for bankruptcy three months later. mation and service centers. "We go to a computer service ser-vice company, say in San Francisco and explain our program and our equipment and invite them to Park City for training and sales," Lynn said. "Currently, we run three workshops that are continuously full. The sue-cess sue-cess rate has been terrific many of the companies buy more than one unit for their existing systems." The Blodgetts' main product, the editor translator, trans-lator, helps the businessman whose sales are between $1 million and $5 million be a part of the changing world of computers. It helps them to no longer be locked into what Lynn Blodgett calls "the tyranny of the current monopoly mon-opoly on computer software and hardware." UniBase is currently bringing business to Park City at the rate of some 25 clients a month, representing represent-ing four and five different companies. Lynn Blodgett estimates that adds around $68,000 a year to the local economy. "People like coming to Park City to do business. They come here for a business trip but they can't ignore the resort atmosphere. at-mosphere. It's far easier for us to promote Park City than Salt Lake. I think the area is just overall better suited for technical development." Executive offices for UniBase are located in Prospector Square. This could have been the end of the story. But at the suggestion of their banker the brothers approached Park City entrepreneur en-trepreneur Randy Fields and his venture capital company, com-pany, Fields Financial, for start-up money to finance their own product fresh from the minds at M.I.T. an editor translator, or E.T. for short under their own company name, UniBase. "The venture capital company com-pany is approached by 15 to 20 businesses and potential businesses a month," said Field. "To date we have invested in-vested in just four. We invested in-vested in UniBase quite simply sim-ply because I think UniBase is one of the most exciting business opportunities I've ever seen. They have both a technological and marketing edge over the rest of the market and their growth track is currently faster than Apple Computers, Inc." The Blodgetts easily agreed to the one stipulation 3 of the venture capital in- vestment: They must x relocate in Park City, f "Randy Fields is a great supporter of the town and he had some solid reasons for wanting the company here. a He said employees would be more productive here than in Salt Lake the atmosphere was conducive to creative thinking and doing your best work. He was right," Lynn Blodgett said. UniBase moved to town in November. The Blodgetts |