To most readers on this site, the fact that Washington is a major hub for innovation and mega-corporations is hardly a little known one. We all know the Puget Sound as the home of Microsoft, Amazon, Starbucks, and so on. However, our region is not so closely linked to these companies in the minds of many foreign investors and political officials. Governor Jay Inslee's trade mission to South Korea is finding that while Washington's companies capture the attention of those they meet with, many simply don’t know that those companies are in Washington State.

“There’s an assumption that Microsoft and Amazon are from Silicon Valley, and Starbucks is in Chicago,” said Secretary of Commerce Brian Bonlender “They don’t have a sense of the innovative and dynamic nature of our economy.”

The mission is currently visiting South Korea and have experienced that officials and potential investors alike are eager to learn more about the region once they associate it with the businesses that operate here and understand how rapidly Washington is growing.

“Add the fact that Seattle is one of the fastest-growing cities, and Sea-Tac the fastest-growing airport in North America and has been for a couple of years, [then] you can see the level of interest rise dramatically and things start moving quickly.” Bonlender said of the reactions of those the trade mission have met with.

With the recently fragile Chine economy, interest from Asian investors in the U.S. market may soon be on the rise.

The governor’s nine-day trade mission moves on to Japan later this week.