Maria Thompson
Arsenal Growth
303 Detroit Street, Suite 100
Ann Arbor, MI 48104
734-218-1380
maria@arsenalgrowth.com
August 4, 2017
It is with great pleasure that I strongly recommend Jo Bourjaily. I started working with Jo when I was CEO of T/J Technologies. My company was one of the first chosen for the Michigan Economic Corporation’s Upper Hand Campaign, that was lead by Jo. I was impressed with her from the first meeting. She was innovative, professional and consistently exceeded her deliverables.
A commercial featuring T/J Technologies was part of the Upper Hand Campaign. As a small company with aggressive deliverables to my customers, I could not afford for my scientists to stop working for the day. Jo and her team found creative ways to get the filming done while my team stayed on schedule. I heard from people all over the world who saw the commercial. As I went to conferences and travelled on business, other CEOs remarked on the campaign, saying that they had been unaware of how much entrepreneurial success was happening in Michigan and how they wished their states would invest more in high tech enterprises. After T/J Technologies was acquired by A123 Systems and we were scouting locations for our new plants, several economic development executives from other states flew in to try to convince me to put the plants in their states. They remarked on the success of the Upper Hand campaign and said that they could not come close to competing with the incentives Michigan was offering at the time.
Jo and her team can stretch under intense time constraints. When former U.S. Vice President Joe Biden came to Detroit and announced that A123 would be received over $200M from the Department of Energy to build plants in Michigan, former Governor Jennifer Granholm asked me to host a press event at our plant location the next day. I had been at the plant earlier that morning. The site we had selected was a plant that had sat empty for 6 or 7 years. The grass was over a foot high. Our team has started renovations, tearing up old carpeting and tearing down walls. It was a mess and I knew the one team I needed to help me pull it off. I asked the governor and the MEDC for Jo’s help. In less than 20 hours, Jo’s team and mine got the site photo ready for a first class press conference with several key politicians, electric vehicle and battery demonstrations, television coverage, food, flowers, etc. Jo and her team thought of everything, including coaching me on my message and handling air time for each politician. Jo had even placed a receptionist at the front desk to direct people. It was a wonderful success that required the expertise, dedication and precise execution of a stellar organization such as Duffy Petrosky.
Jo Bourjaily has earned my strongest recommendation and she is a joy to work with. Please contact me if you need any additional information. I can be reached at maria@arsenalgrowth.com or by cell at 734-218-1380.
Best regards,
Maria Thompson
Entrepreneur-In-Residence, Arsenal Venture Partners
Chairwoman, NextEnergy
Former President and General Manager, A123Systems Government Solutions Group
Former CEO and Co-Founder, T/J Technologies, Inc.