NEOSA's James Cookinham Elected President-Elect of CRITA, Council of Regional Information Technology Associations; Sets Goals to Increase CRITA Visibility and Promote Public Policy Agenda.

Business Editors, Hi-Tech Writers & News/Assignment Editors

CLEVELAND--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Aug. 20, 2001

James Cookinham, president of NEOSA, the Northeast Ohio non-profit IT industry trade organization, assumed the position of President-Elect of CRITA (Council of Regional Information Technology Associations) on Aug. 1, paving the way for increased visibility of top U.S. high technology communities and the various councils and associations that support and promote them.

"Since its formation 10 years ago, CRITA has quickly grown to the largest IT organization in North America," Cookinham said. "We've achieved national prominence for our unique programs and formal organization of the IT and technology councils in North America. We want to position CRITA as the premier technology business organization in North America."

Under the new CRITA leadership, the organization plans to expand its membership to all IT and Tech Council organizations in North America, expand member services to make CRITA more attractive to potential members, and improve member communications. Additionally, recognizing that the organization can have a major impact on national legislative activities, Cookinham stressed the importance of identifying public policy initiatives and setting a legislative agenda of goals for CRITA in the coming year.

The current challenging economic environment is foremost in Cookinham's mind, as it is in the minds of all business people. In Northeast Ohio, Cookinham has positioned NEOSA as the "go to" organization for a growing membership of high-tech organizations. He wants to promote CRITA's capabilities in the same fashion nationally.

"As we all know, the current economic climate is certainly a challenging one for the IT and other technology sectors around the country," Cookinham said. "Therefore, it is even more imperative that CRITA attract new members and offer them an umbrella of support as we weather the rough economic storm. We must arm CRITA members -- the organizations that offer support to individual high-tech companies across the country -- with the ability to grow memberships and offer whatever their members need to ride out the storm, as well."

The Council of Regional Information Technology Associations represents nearly 50 IT trade organizations who in turn represent more than 22,000 technology-related companies. CRITA's mission is to facilitate information, visibility, networking, and services for information technology-focused, not-for-profit business organizations in the Americas.

CRITA's initiatives are focused on supporting the Information Technology industry through its member organizations through six primary objectives to:

-- Foster growth and development of member organizations

-- Establish CRITA as a valuable representative, resource, and knowledge base
for technology businesses

-- Promote and recognize information technology issues as they apply to member
organizations

-- Support public policy consistent with sustained growth of IT-intensive
industries.

-- Initiate collective, joint programs to facilitate networking, support and
information for members

-- Promote access to financing and resources to support member organizations.

For more information on CRITA, visit http://www.crita.org

For more information on NEOSA, visit http://www.neosa.org