EI now has competition. On May 1, London-based military-data giant Jane’s Information Group and Washington think tank Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) are cosponsoring “Companies on the Ground: The Challenges for Business in Rebuilding Iraq.” Registration: $528 to $1,100. The partnership began planning after the war started. “Bush seemed prepared to use the private sector in ways we haven’t seen before,” says Bathsheba Crocker, a CSIS fellow. “There hadn’t been a lot of focus on the role for the private sector, no one place for businesses to go for in-depth information.”
For conferees, information and a possible inside track to a contract are up for grabs. The man who awards Iraqi contracts, U.S. Agency for International Development boss Andrew Natsios, will address the luncheon at EI’s conference about the oil-well repairs, hospital equipment, road construction, water pipelines and the long list of other needs that U.S. companies can profitably fill. Jane’s and CSIS landed his deputy. Between sessions on “funding for Iraqi reconstruction” and “rebuilding Iraq,” EI conferees may get a chance to slip their company brochures to the top contracting official from Halliburton, which already has a lucrative oilfield contract from the Pentagon. How big is the new networking business itself? A lot depends on the size of any warmaking backlog at the Pentagon. “It’s too soon to tell if there is an ongoing need,” says CSIS’s Crocker.
