While some of the large firms on K Street took a financial beating this past year, the world of lobbying remains strong among the boutique firms thriving here in Washington. Case in point being Meridian Hill Strategies. A firm that’s “greater than the sum of its parts,” according to founder Ernest Baynard, Meridian Hill Strategies offers public relations, advocacy, and business development to it’s host of clients, all of which are rising stars in the tech community.
While Baynard’s demeanor is more that of an excited Silicon Valley magnate than Washington insider, his ties to the Beltway are more than impressive. With a grandfather who worked as a chief of staff on Capitol Hill and a father who worked in the Reagan administration, once could say that politicking is in his blood. Baynard himself got his start working for Vice President Al Gore’s advance team, as well as working as special assistant to the secretary in the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
It was serving as Representative Mike Honda’s communications director on Capitol Hill that really opened up the world of tech entrepreneurship for Baynard. Immediately after 9/11, Honda’s office helped lead the charge to build the TSA and bring security technology into public policy. “I learned that we could do a lot more in synergizing the differences in policy and tech,” Baynard explained over the phone.
That was where the idea for Meridian Hill Strategies was born in 2002. “Technology knows no political party,” Baynard explained of building a lobbying firm catering towards entrepreneurs working in the national security space. “In the post 9/11, post-Benghazi world, it’s important to make lawmakers aware that new technological capabilities are essential.”
And despite the small size of Meridian Hill Strategies, they have had a number of large successes in recent years. From representing K2 Solutions, Inc. to protect the role of working dogs in the U.S. military, to teaching lawmakers about Arlington-based Cross Match Technologies’ products in biometrics, Meridian Hill Strategies is a lobbying firm that lives and breathes the entrepreneurial spirit.
“Because we’re small, we have to be innovative to survive,” Baynard said of his decision to offer business development as part of his companies complete lobbying package. “You have to never be afraid to take risks when working with entrepreneurs.”
And, according to Baynard, there is a growing interest in entrepreneurial solutions on Capitol Hill as well. “D.C. is more and more becoming a tech oriented city,” he said. “There is a hunger in Congress to learn about the new technologies out there, and as a result aversion to the risk of giving contracts to small business is diminishing.”
“The 15-person startup needs a presence in public policy just as much as Google,” Baynard continued. “And for entrepreneurs, working with a boutique shop [like Meridian Hill Strategies] offers a flexible and customizable approach to public relations.”
