Hard numbers show software is solid.

• Position: Computer software industry in North Carolina - Industry Overview

Robert Capon has lived a software developer's dream. From an initial $5,000 investment in 1988, he shepherded Durham-based HJC Software through early growth and sold it in 1989 to Microcom Software Division. When he left Microcom last year, the company employed 30, and its Virex anti-virus product had annual sales of $5 million.

"These were highly skilled, well-paid jobs," says Capon, who's in the process of starting another company. "Software is an important area of growth for the Triangle."

Tom Droege, publisher of North Carolina Software Developers Directory and a Durham software consultant, estimates that more than 400 software companies operate in Wake, Durham and Orange counties.

According to the state Employment Security Commission, software-development employment in the Triangle has increased 27% from 1988 to 1991, to 5,571. About 1,600 are at SAS Institute in Cary, the largest of the Triangle's software companies, but the numbers also include such growing operations as Da Vinci Systems, Virtus, Sapiens USA and Medic Computer Systems. A survey by Raleigh advertising executive Cliff Allen, a specialist in marketing computer products and electronics, found 137 Triangle companies selling packaged, off-the-shelf software.

Though the scope of its software business remains much smaller than in Silicon Valley and Boston, the Triangle is part of a second tier of regions -- including Austin, Tex...