A Riverside, California-based company that does business around the globe was featured on the Discovery Science Channel this month for its fire helmets, marking yet another success story for a client of the Riverside County Office of Foreign Trade.
Phenix Technology, Inc. has worked closely with the Riverside County Office of Foreign Trade for several years, evolving from novice exporter to savvy international entrepreneur. In fact, the company's overseas business has grown by 100 percent in the four years that the Office of Foreign Trade has been assisting Phenix.
Now the company is on the program “How It’s Made” for a close-up look at the helmets Phenix has been producing for 45 years. The program and a related article in The Press-Enterprise newspaper of Inland Southern California can be found here:
http://www.pe.com/2017/07/25/see-a-riverside-business-make-fire-helmets-on-discovery-channel/
https://www.sciencechannel.com/tv-shows/how-its-made/
The relationship between Phenix and the Office of Foreign Trade, which is part of the County’s Economic Development Agency, goes back several years and exemplifies the ways in which the Office of Foreign Trade assists businesses in Riverside County. The Office has two goals: to attract foreign direct investment and to assist businesses such as Phenix with exporting.
The Office of Foreign Trade trained Phenix staff in exports back in 2013, helped introduce and promote the business to fire departments across the country and internationally, and introduced the company to resources provided by the U.S. Department of Commerce, the Small Business Administration and the Center for International Trade Development. Phenix also has been included in foreign trade missions locally with countries like Germany, Turkey and Vietnam. Some of that assistance was covered in a Press-Enterprise article four years ago:
http://www.pe.com/2014/07/26/riverside-county-trade-office-taps-international-markets-for-local-companies/
The company now does business with countries from Mexico to Thailand and continues to look for new opportunities to grow.
As recently as two months ago, Angel Sanchez Jr., director of global operations for Phenix, joined Office of Foreign Trade staff at a meeting with a trade delegation from Can Tho, Vietnam. He made yet another connection at that meeting with a Vietnamese business looking to import fire protection equipment to Can Tho, which is the latest city to sign a bilateral trade agreement with the Office of Foreign Trade.
Sanchez is hopeful that new connection will lead to even more international business for the thriving company.
The Office of Foreign Trade, which was created in 2009, connects businesses in the nation’s 10th-largest county to markets around the globe and provides export and import assistance. The Office has executed bilateral trade agreements with multiple cities, provinces, states and countries. For more information, please visit www.rivcoeda.org or contact Michelle DeArmond, Manager Office of Foreign Trade, (951) 955-1308, MDeArmond@rivco.org.