After spending nearly 20 years living on the coast, splitting time between Vancouver and Victoria, James Bjarnason has returned to Golden to start his own business, Huginn Technology.
The business will be looking to provide a service that has been lacking in the valley since East Kootenay Electronics closed, providing repairs for house hold electronics such as computers, phones, and TVs.
“Basically, it’s an IT consulting business, which also does PC repair and AMC repair – pretty much any electronics repair,” said Bjarnason. “These kinds of electronics usually end up recycled or in a land fill. That’s something that I’m trying to avoid happening.”
Originally born and raised in Golden, Bjarnason initially left for the coast and pursued multiple careers, including working in IT and security.
“I left for the city in my mid-twenties, and found out the city isn’t all it’s cracked up to be,” said Bjarnason. “I decided to start a business, and I said, listen, I know how to do this, so let’s just do it, and it was off.”
While the business is still incredibly new, with Bjarnason just getting his license to officially begin operations on Monday, January 6, Bjarnason is already looking ahead for Huginn Technology.
He would like to help bring Free Geek to the valley, a non-profit based in Portland which has made it’s way to B.C. with the mandate to help provide refurbished laptops at discount prices. Instead of putting old electronics in landfills, which can have a negative environmental impact, Free Geek takes apart old electronics to recycle what can’t be salvaged, and refurbish what can be saved.
“I thought it would be great for the valley, because as far as I know there isn’t anything in the valley that does this,” said Bjarnason. “It takes so much out of the landfill and puts it towards recycling and reusing.”
Bjarnason is very focused on making electronics last in order to keep them out of the landfills. According to him, people tend to replace their computers every 3-5 years, when normally their processing capabilities are just fine and a quick tune up can restore them to their former power.
For those who are maybe in need of more than a quick tune up and are in need of more processing capabilities, Bjarnason recommends biting the bullet early, and making sure you purchase a computer that will be able to do all that’s required of it, not one that is just going to scrape by.
“Get as much computer as you can, and that computer will last you a lot longer than getting a computer that can just barely do what you want it to,” said Bjarnason. “There’s a lot of cost involved in replacing computers and to upgrade machines, re-purposing and reusing not only saves money, but also saves the environment.”
Huginn Technologies is looking to hit the ground running, and Bjarnason is hoping to get in service as soon as possible. Those looking to use Huginn Technologies services can contact them through their Facebook page.
