The Silicon Prairie, a take on the Silicon Valley, can refer to one of several places in the United States: an area in Texas, one in a multi-state region comprised loosely of parts of Nebraska, Iowa, South Dakota, Kansas, Minnesota, North Dakota, Southwestern Ohio, and Missouri, one in Wyoming, and one in Illinois.
North Texas's Silicon Prairie refers to north Dallas and Dallas and Fort Worth's northern suburbs, all part of the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex. It is named for the high concentration of semiconductor manufacturing, telecommunications, and other information technology related companies in the area.
Dallas area business in these industry sectors include:
Alcatel-Lucent (Richardson) AT&T (Dallas) Cisco (Richardson) CommScope (Richardson) CompuCom (Dallas) CSC (Fort Worth) Dell Services (Plano) Entrust (Addison) Ericsson (Richardson) Fujitsu Network Communications (Richardson) Hotels.com (Dallas) HP Enterprise Services (Plano) i2 Technologies (Irving) Match.com (Dallas) Microsoft (Irving) Motorola (Dallas) Nokia (Irving) Nortel (Richardson) NQ Mobile (Dallas) Okmetic (Allen) PivotPoint Solutions (Plano) RadioShack (Fort Worth) Raytheon (Plano) Research In Motion (Irving) Rockwell Collins (Richardson) StreamVenue, LLC (McKinney, Texas) Texas Instruments (Richardson) Thursby Software (Arlington) Travelocity (Southlake) Verizon Communications (Irving)The Telecom Corridor in Richardson is usually considered an area within the Silicon Prairie. There are also a large amount of recognized video and computer game developers in the area, known as the Dallas Gaming Mafia, including Gearbox Software, id Software, 3D Realms, and Ensemble Studios.
The Illinois Silicon Prairie typically refers to the Chicago and Champaign/Urbana areas. Much of the high technology industry base in the Champaign-Urbana Metropolitan Area consists of research and small start-up companies working with the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Seven Fortune 500 companies have research entities at the university's research park, which is located in Champaign. The National Center for Supercomputing Applications is in Urbana.
The Chicago Metropolitan Area is home to several companies in the industrial automation, consumer electronics, telecommunications and online services industries. The Illinois Technology and Research Corridor along Interstate 88 and the Golden Corridor along Interstate 90 have particularly high concentrations of such businesses.
Among the Chicago area companies that comprise the Illinois Silicon Prairie are:
Alcatel-Lucent (Naperville) Amada America (Schaumburg) Anixter (Glenview) CDW (Vernon Hills) Classified Ventures (Chicago) CommScope (Joliet, Illinois) Continental Automotive Systems (Deer Park) FANUC Robotics America Corporation (Hoffman Estates) Groupon (Chicago) Guaranteed Rate (Chicago) Hostway (Chicago) LiveText (LaGrange) Molex (Lisle) Mori Seiki USA/DMG (Hoffman Estates) Motorola Mobility (Libertyville) Motorola Solutions (Schaumburg) Northrop Grumman Electronic Systems (Rolling Meadows) Omron (Schaumburg) Orbitz (Chicago) Panasonic Corporation (Buffalo Grove) Schneider Electric (Palatine) Shure (Niles) Tellabs (Naperville) Underwriters Laboratories (Northbrook) USRobotics (Schaumburg) Westell (Aurora) WMS Gaming (Waukegan) Zebra Technologies (Lincolnshire)An area of the Midwestern United States is often referred to as the Silicon Prairie. This region can loosely be defined as the states bordering along Interstate 29 in the Upper Midwest; specifically Nebraska, Iowa, South Dakota, Kansas, Minnesota, North Dakota, and Missouri.
Gateway
The moniker was first claimed by the Gateway 2000 computer company in advertisements in the mid-1990s as its location in advertisements and promotional materials. The firm was originally founded in Sioux City, Iowa but later relocated across the border to North Sioux City, South Dakota.
Silicon Prairie News
In 2008, the online technology and entrepreneurial news publication Silicon Prairie News was founded to highlight achievements of companies in the region's principal cities, namely: Omaha, Des Moines, Lincoln, Sioux Falls and Kansas City.
Iowa Governor Culver
in 2009, Governor Chet Culver (D-Iowa) used the term to describe his desired future reputation for his state after their investment in wind and other renewable energy industries.
Wyoming's Silicon Prairie refers to the region of Wyoming south and east of Jackson Hole, also called the Silicon Range, where a growing number of Web 2.0 startups are setting up shop.
