Edward Dutton

American Chief Executive Thomas O’Rourke used to work for Microsoft developing Media Player. He met Bill Gates on several occasions and even remembers discussing Nokia, amongst other things, with him at a party for about twenty minutes. But something brought Mr. O’Rourke back to Oulu – where he’d studied as an exchange student in 1987 and where he had worked in the early 1990s. He is now the head of Eneris Solutions.

An English-Language Company

‘I took over Eneris in 2002,’ said the forty-one year-old from Minneapolis, Minnesota. ‘The aim was to turn it around. The first few years were difficult but I think this is where the future is.’
Eneris Solutions, which is positioned opposite Oulu’s musical academy, develops custom-made software for various companies including Flowman – providing media solutions – and also healthcare companies.
‘If these companies need a new product they call on us,’ said Mr. O’Rourke. ‘We’re small but we have a lot of expertise.’
Mr O’Rourke, who is married to a Finn, has managed to master Finnish but his office is an English-language zone.
‘I always say that if you don’t speak English then you will learn it if you come and work here . . . and we won’t charge you!’ he laughed.
The software manager’s Finnish has often been useful in negotiating with Finns – especially if they haven’t been aware of just how well he speaks it. However he emphasised that being an English-speaking company – even if based in Oulu - is a huge advantage in negotiating with international companies.
He also pointed out that, ‘We’re looking to hire . . . so if you can write software and especially Java . . .’ – referring to the increasingly important computer programming language.

Oulu in the 1980s . . .

Thomas O’Rourke has had a long time to adjust to the differences between Oulu and his native Minneapolis, which has a population of 3 million.
‘I first came to Oulu as an exchange student in 1987,’ he recalled. ‘I love skiing and I’d met some Finns skiing in the US and they’d kind of invited me over.’
So Mr. O’Rourke, who was studying at the University of Minnesota, went to Oulu University as an exchange student. He chose Oulu because, ‘someone told that in Helsinki I’d just hang around with other Americans and learn nothing about the culture!’
And Oulu University in 1987 certainly allowed him to do that. ‘There were hardly any foreign students here then!’ he remembered. ‘And all the lectures were in Finnish!’
He got through it by learning Finnish as much as he could and asking other students what was going on. He eventually became Vice-President of the newly formed ‘Foreigner Students Association.’ At the time it was – because it was a foreign association – it was questionable whether the group could legally distribute its own publications. ‘Things have changed so much!’ O’Rourke laughed.
Mr. O’Rourke met his future wife at Oulu University, wrote an article about Oulu for his faculty magazine, finished his degree in Minnesota and then came back to Oulu to do his Masters degree and work for the engineering company Elektrobit.
‘There were seventeen people working there at the time and I was the first foreigner they’d ever hired!’ O’Rourke quipped.
He returned to the US in 1992 to work for Microsoft but returned to Oulu in 1997 where he launched a spin-off of Elektrobit. Soft-bit eventually employed forty people and in 2002 Mr. O’Rourke took over Eneris Solutions.

Oulu’s ‘Fairness’

His reasons for wanting to return to Oulu were many. One important issue he mentioned again and again was ‘reasonableness.’
‘Finnish people are a little stoic. It’s often harder to make new friends than in the US . . . but maybe their relationships are deeper. There’s this reasonableness . . . this capacity for fairness.’
He claimed that, ‘It’s a big cultural difference between Oulu and the US . . . people in Finland would say “Of course we must help the homeless guy!” People in the US might say the opposite!’
Mr. O’Rourke couldn’t think of that much that he missed about ‘the big city’ though he’d enjoyed the sense of ‘activity’ in Minneapolis.
From O’Rourke’s perspective, Finland has many quirks. ‘One thing that drives me nuts about Finland is having to find a coin to put in the shopping cart in this modern, wireless country!’ he said.
But Oulu offered something different which he believed to be very conducive to business.
‘In the US, there are the longest working hours and that doesn’t include all the time spent in traffic jams getting to and from work,’ he remarked. ‘In Oulu I can get to work in five minutes . . . It’s not Silicon Valley,’ he smiled, ‘but there is a big supply of highly skilled people here.’
He also stressed that there are ‘complications that you don’t have to worry about here such as paying for health insurance . . . you have more time and you can get more done.’

‘Skilled People’

Mr. O’Rourke had a number of recommendations on how to make Oulu an even better place to run a business for a foreigner.
‘The foreign population is not that big and this can make it more difficult to access international markets’ though he emphasised that English helped greatly with this. Although there were some exceptions he felt that there needed to be more centralised help in starting up new product lines.
He also felt it would be better if there was more integration between institutions – such as Oulu Polytechnic – which trained people for software companies like his and Oulu companies and this could also be centrally organised. ‘Software is an area where there could be more co-operation,’ he remarked.
Mr. O’Rourke has gradually got used to the very different way which Finns communicate when compared to people from the USA. He now sees the funny side when recalling business conferences where key-note speakers have been greeted with the stereotypical Finnish silence or straight-forward honesty.
But there’s something about doing business in Oulu that has brought him here three times and moved him away from Microsoft to do business in Oulu.
As he said, ‘It’s not Silicon Valley but there’s a big supply of skilled people here.’