DREAM LIFE: How The Tropical Island Of St. Croix Is Paradise For Remote Tech Workers
The island is in the midst of a high-tech makeover with goals to become a hotspot for remote tech workers.
Of all the islands in the world, St. Croix is in a unique position to do this, says Alexis George, project manager for ConnectSpace.vi, an organization helping to lead the charge.
At 28 miles long and 7 miles wide, St. Croix is the largest of the three U.S. Virgin Islands. It's also the unlikely guardian of a huge portion of the Internet.
Three of the Internet's biggest cables connect here: the Pan America Cross Cable, the South American Crossing cable, and the MAC or Mid-Atlantic Crossing cable. (Here's a cool map of all the world's underground cables if you feel like geeking out.)
That means this tiny island is sitting on top of more Internet bandwidth than, say, the city of New York, says George. But until recently, residents of the island couldn't tap into all that power. Most homes and small businesses didn't have high-speed Internet.
That began to change at the start of 2012, when the island's largest employer of high-paid jobs, oil company Hovensa, announced it was closing its St. Croix refinery, putting 2,000 employees out of work.
That's when part-time St. Croix resident Matt Bauer stepped in with the idea of converting these workers into high-tech remote workers, as well as attracting more tech to the area. Bauer is best known as a cofounder and president of BetterWorld Telecom, a San Francisco-based telecom and Internet service provider in over 35 states, bent on serving non-profits and socially progressive businesses.
Bauer joined with telecom management consultant Jim Kenefick to found ConnectSpace VI. They helped the Virgin Islands get a grant from the U.S. stimulus program to roll out broadband, a project called Virgin Islands Next Generation Network (viNGN).
"By the end of this year, $300 million will be invested in the U.S. Virgin Islands by a number of entities, in terms of upgrading the infrastructure," says Bauer.
ConnectSpace VI then focused on partnering with employers who would hire remote workers living on the island. Bauer partnered with Salesforce.com to turn people into certified Salesforce administrators. It also works with Support.com, a Redwood City-based company that sells remote tech support worldwide.
The next step is to convince more startups to move to St. Croix.
"For entrepreneurs, the tax benefits of the U.S. Virgin Islands are insane," Bauer says. For those that register a company there, even without moving all operations to the island, "they'll pay no state tax and get up to a 90% discount on federal tax," he says.