South Florida Tech HubSouth Florida Tech Hub
06
Apr, 2020

By Nancy Dahlberg

Member Spotlight | Jim Walker & CloudHesive

Read Time 3 Minutes

Business: Founded by cloud executives, CloudHesive provides cloud solutions that help companies improve security, reduce operating costs and increase productivity.

HQ: Fort Lauderdale

CEO: James Walker

No. of employees: 50-55

Website: CloudHesive.com

 

 

 

In 2014, Jim Walker debated moving to Boston to continue his cloud technology career or starting a company in South Florida. Lucky for the tri-county region, he chose the latter.

The venture he co-founded was CloudHesive, a Fort Lauderdale-based technology company that provides cloud solutions through consulting and managed services with a focus on security, reliability, availability and scalability.

“We are a Managed Service Provider helping customers consume cloud services,” said Walker, CloudHesive’s CEO.

The company’s services include everything from migrating large data centers into Amazon Web Services to DevOps work building out infrastructure as code deployments all the way through to migrating contact centers out of old legacy equipment onto cloud-centric solutions and services, said Walker. He is a 25-year tech veteran who was previously Global Head of Operations of Operations and Security at Pegasystems.

AWS PREMIER PARTNER

CloudHesive is also the largest AWS Premier Partner in Florida. “We are niche player for Amazon Connect, Amazon Workspaces, and Amazon Elemental,” he said.

Today, CloudHesive has 50 to 55 employees split between its offices in Fort Lauderdale, Buenos Aires, Argentina and Santiago, Chile. Last year, the multi-million-dollar company was named to the Inc. 5000 list of fastest-growing companies, with a 424% 2-year growth rate.

“We’ve grown 80% year over year, and we won South Florida’s Fastest Growing Companies. This year we are projecting another 60-80% growth,” Walker said. “From a headcount perspective, we are anticipating adding another 10 heads.”

CloudHesive moved into new offices off Commercial Boulevard at the end of 2019. It also opened its Santiago office last year, Walker said. “We’ve had some incredible growth and we’ve been blessed with great customers.” Overall, he attributes the growth to being obsessed with customer success. “We go above and beyond to make sure all of our customers are successful.”


The company began expanding to Latin America in 2017, where it has set up full service offices to serve the region, Walker said. “We saw a need in the market for cloud services. It is a green-field geography — there are not a lot of cloud partners down there right now. We thought it would be advantageous sooner rather than later.”

Still, hiring and retaining high quality tech talent has been a challenge in the South Florida market, he said. “One of the biggest skills you can have down here is a Cloud or Amazon certification and we focus on that. So every time we bring someone in, it is hard to keep them retained.”

HIRING FROM ALL 3 COUNTIES

CloudHesive hires from Palm Beach to Miami, and looks for great engineers, not necessarily cloud engineers, Walker said. The company brings in people with skills in everything from VMware to networking to security. While leveraging those skills, the company can train them to be cloud engineers.

CloudHesive became a member of  Palm Beach Tech about a year ago. The company hosts community meetups for AWS and at universities. On campuses, Walker has also judged startup pitch competitions and done proof of concepts for next-generation technology for student labs.

One of the areas where South Florida is still lacking, Walker says, is with formal training on cloud based solutions. That would be a smart area for universities to add to curricula, he said. Miami Dade College is already starting to do that.

Culture is an important recruiting tool. CloudHesive has a flexible work environment with work-at-home days, Flip Flop Fridays and a java-rater in the office. “We have corporate events and happy hours,” Walker said. “We try to have some fun while we make our customers successful.”

26
Feb, 2020

By Nancy Dahlberg

SMArtX Advisory Solutions Raises $4 Million

Read Time 2 Minutes

SMArtX Advisory Solutions, a West Palm Beach-based leader in managed accounts technology and turnkey asset management platforms, known as TAMPS, announced it has closed a $4 million equity financing round.  The financing was led by ManchesterStory Group, a venture firm focused on fintech, and included existing investors including IA Capital Group.

With this round of funding, SMArtX will expand upon its tools for Registered Investment Advisors and Independent Broker/Dealers to develop solutions for enterprise customers looking to provide their own proprietary managed accounts programs to financial advisors.

 

“We believe our technology can have a far-reaching impact on global wealth management practices, and we’re excited to have earned the support of ManchesterStory Group and our existing partners to help finance these initiatives,” said CEO Evan Rapoport in making the announcement.

SMArtX has continued to expand its in-house built technology stack by expanding the features of its platform, the company said.  SMArtX Advisory Solutions is a proprietary managed accounts technology provider and manages SMArtX, an asset management platform which offers traditional, alternative, and passive direct index strategies in a unified managed account structure. The firm also uses its proprietary trading and managed accounts technology to power SS&C Advent’s integrated unified managed account solution.

“Managed accounts are migrating from off the shelf TAMPs to fully customized, bespoke platforms.  SMArtX’s technological flexibility and APIs provide a clear pathway to meeting client demand now and in the future,” said Michael Finnegan, director of Research at ManchesterStory Group.

13
Jan, 2020

By Nancy Dahlberg

Member Spotlight | PATHOS

Read Time 4 Minutes

Business: Marketing firm specializing in “creative intelligence”

Headquarters: West Palm Beach

Leadership: Ann Savage, Founder & CEO; Shane Savage, Chief Strategy Officer

Employees: 20 full-time

Clients: hospitality groups, automotive, retailers, financial firms, hospitals and community organizations.

Website: wearepathos.com

 

Hannah Haywood walks, Fabiana Otero bikes, and Luke Liscom soon plans to One-Wheel to work. And that’s just how their employer, Pathos, likes it.

Pathos is a creative intelligence firm, specializing in full-service enterprise marketing, and is located in downtown West Palm Beach. A big part of its culture since the 29-year-old company rebranded and moved to 319 Clematis Street about a year ago has been to get more involved in the community. For team members Haywood, Otero and Liscom as well as others, that’s easy to do when you work where you want to live – and vice versa.

“We have hosted more than 40 events that have gotten community members from all walks of life into our offices. We also go to other events around the community – it is part of our culture,” said the 24-year-old Otero, who is Brand Coordinator for Pathos. She has been working at Pathos for one year, and before that graduated from UF and did marketing work for the university. “And with our open office, we learn from each other every day. That is ingrained in our culture, too.”

Liscom, 23, is a Motion Designer at Pathos. He interned twice for Pathos while studying at Ringling College of Art & Design. Now he’s fulltime at Pathos working with cutting edge technologies such as 3D mapping and augmented reality, and he’s planning to move downtown soon. One-Wheel, he says, is his primary mode of transportation and you are likely to see him on One-Wheel group rides around town, too.

“We look at the community as part of our effort to create creative capital. To be in a space where we bring people in and work with each other and help grow the creative community has been wonderful,” he said.

Haywood, 23, is Media Coordinator at Pathos, working with clients on their media assets as well as diving into media research for them. But on Saturdays, you’ll always find her at downtown’s Green Market when it’s running. For her, like the others, the live-work-play lifestyle is natural. “We love the city feel, with all the the local vendors and small businesses.”

“Pathos is so unique and special to us because we aren’t scared to search for what makes us happy in our work life and Pathos provides a great balance of play and work and just being happy to go to work every day,” she said.

Achieving that balance and community engagement were the goal a year ago when Pathos moved downtown, said Shane Savage, Pathos’ Chief Strategy Officer, “We want to open our doors into the community, have that neighborhood feel, and start building things with those around us,” he said then.

Mission accomplished. In addition to the 40 events the company has hosted this past year – including for Creative Mornings, Leadership Palm Beach County, Junior Achievement  and various high school groups that get to experience augmented reality, 3D modeling and video production – Pathos’ team gets out in the community too, such as holding open office hours at 1909, helping Wellington High School prepare for its dance marathon, holding branding workshops with Palm Beach Gardens High School, and regularly attending meetups like Blood, Sweat & Beers.

Savage said the move downtown and a focus on getting out into the community has paid off in several ways. Pathos has found it easier to attract like-minded creatives to join the team full-time.  The company is also attracting community-focused clients. Pathos is currently helping Good Samaritan Medical Center with its 100 year anniversary and it started working with the Community Foundation of Palm Beach and Martin Counties, in addition to adding two large statewide organizations to its client roster, Savage said. “We’ve grown our profits as well, just through these initiatives.”

Savage said the stories of Haywood, Otero and Liscom, all native Floridians, show that students and young professionals don’t have to leave the state to find the innovative companies and challenging career paths.

Looking ahead, Savage added: “We want to continue to help build West Palm Beach into a creative capital.”

16
Dec, 2019

By Nancy Dahlberg

Member Spotlight | Dedicated IT

Read Time 4 Minutes

Business: IT services for companies

HQ: Palm Beach Gardens; second office in Melbourne, Fla.

CEO: Adam Steinhoff

COO: Aaron Underhill

Year founded: 2002

Employees: 50

Website: www.dedicatedit.com

 

Just before Thanksgiving, Dedicated IT employees gathered for a holiday luncheon and afterward took a company picture. CEO and founder Adam Steinhoff looks at the photo and gets a little emotional.

“There are a lot of stories in that photo, people getting married, people having kids, getting promoted, buying houses. Our company is making them better tomorrow than today. We are of the size now where we can focus on employee development. It’s neat to see the number of mouths that are fed as a result of this little dream I had almost 20 years ago now.”

There is a lot to celebrate in 2019.

Dedicated IT, a managed service provider or MSP based in Palm Beach Gardens, will close this year with 50 employees, nearly double the number it had in early 2018. GrowFL, a statewide economic development agency that supports the growth of second-stage companies, recently honored Dedicated IT  as one of the 50 Florida Companies to Watch.

“We have been growing revenue about 40 percent, which is a pretty good place to be, We’ve been told recently we are the No. 2 Cisco Meraki dealer in Florida and in the top 1% of the Microsoft partners in the Southeast. We were recently invited to Microsoft headquarters to meet with them,” said Steinhoff, who is an officer on the board of Palm Beach Tech Association.

The company also is acquiring a VOIP telephone company. “The goal is to offer our clients one more piece of the technology puzzle as a one-stop shop… We will be bringing on not only a new technology but a really solid team that thinks like us, and our clients will be very well served because of it.” The acquisition of T5 Telecom, based in Michigan, is expected to be complete by the end of the year.

BREAKING OUT

Dedicated IT would seem to be in a crowded space – providing IT services to companies – but the last couple of years the company focused hard on differentiation. Steinhoff and the team were inspired by the book Blue Ocean Strategy to swim upstream from the pack.

While much of the MSP industry supports companies with 10 to 50 employees, Dedicated IT focuses on companies with 150 to 1,500 employees. These companies have very different needs than smaller companies. They likely have IT departments but need a new set of eyes to assess and resolve complex pain points and implement solutions alongside the departments.

“We are co-managing the IT with them now,” Steinhoff said, adding that the strategy has been a boon for Dedicated IT, especially with healthcare companies. “We are now competing at a national level rather than a regional or local level.”

About three months ago, the company freshened and sharpened its core values. “We use them to make sure the people who want to work for Dedicated IT are going to embody what it is that makes us who we are at the core. It’s the secret sauce of Dedicated IT. It’s the thing that really makes us us.” Steinhoff says. Those values steer all hiring decisions.

The core values are: “We attack challenge with action and innovation. We deliver results and are obsessed with excellence. We value partnership over profit. We encourage people to have fun and let their hair down.”

Even more importantly, DedicatedIT doubled down on its mission statement: “We help people and organizations be better tomorrow than today.”

That mission statement empowers everyone to make the right decision, not a short-term fix but a solution with long-term impact. “It’s a comfortable place to be as a business owner to be able have your entire organization making decisions the same way you would. When you have 10 or 15 employees, you can be involved in everything, but not at 50. By having this really solid foundation, it empowers them to do the right thing and stay on mission.”

FACING CHALLENGES

To be sure, it is challenging to double the company in a short time. It means putting systems and processes in place and adding middle managers that weren’t there before. Scaling the company to this next level took a couple years of laying the groundwork.

As the breakout year comes to a close, Steinhoff, an avid reader, recommends to entrepreneurs three of the books he read in 2019 that helped him with current challenges.

Measure What Matters looks at breaking goals down to milestones and how best to measure those milestones. Necessary Endings talks about why some relationships need to be ended, whether they are partners, clients, employees or whatever, in a way that doesn’t burn bridges.

It’s Your Ship, an older book, is about a commander who had the worst ship in the Navy and ultimately turned it around. He did this by getting everyone on the ship to not only own their particular jobs but to take ownership in the entire ship’s performance by cross-training in various roles and learning to work as a cohesive team. “It helped me to understand how to foster teamwork and to understand how to be a better leader,” Steinhoff said.

02
Dec, 2019

By Nancy Dahlberg

Member Spotlight | Garden of Life

Read Time 4 Minutes

Business: A health and wellness company specializing in science-based, Certified USDA Organic and Non-GMO Project Verified nutrition. The company offers more than 330 branded supplements.

HQ: Palm Beach Gardens

Founded: July 2000

No. of employees: nearing 300 nationwide

President: Brian Ray

Website: gardenoflife.com

 

Garden of Life, a health and wellness company, was founded in 2000 in a garage. Today, the Palm Beach Gardens-based company employs nearly 300 and is the market leader in nutritional supplements.

“We develop, formulate, sell and market nutritional products. We also develop health and wellness content and publish a quarterly magazine for people who are trying to get or stay healthy,” said Matthew Cousins, part of the sales team in the company’s eTail division.

“In the earliest days we sold probiotics to practitioners and we grew from there. We developed into the top brand in every health food store nationally,” explained Cousins, who joined the company in 2002. “And it all started right here in Palm Beach County.”

The health and wellness industry is very fragmented, but Garden of Life is the market leader with nearly 11 percent market share and that’s across a number of popular categories such as probiotics, protein, multivitamins, and most recently CBD, he said. The company is also the leader in certifications, such as Certified Organic, non-GMO Verified and Dual Certified.

Leveraging eCommerce Technology

Christy Poe, Garden of Life’s Senior Director of IT, joined the company in 2014, when the company numbered just over 100 people. At the time, the tech team was just four people.

Now her tech team is 15 strong, yet still lean and mean, and Poe also contracts with local tech companies for projects as needed. “It’s is not a place for a lot of bureaucracy or a lot of formal heavy project management. The company moves very quickly. We bring in two new product lines a year and extensions of product lines so you can imaging the innovation required,” she said.

The tech team, an Oracle shop, support 11 different departments. The challenge is trying to get the right skills sets to keep up with a fast-moving business, said Poe. For example, the team recently opened a warehouse to pack and ship its CBD products, a new line for the company, she said. “We had 12 weeks to do it – we had to put in network wireless, scan guns, scales, etc., and it is usually a 6-month project. Some companies would take that long just to decide what they are going to do.”

Before joining Garden of Life, Poe worked at Office Depot for 15 years in a variety of IT roles. In the last role there, she worked with the PMO doing test management and capital planning in IT. It was a good stepping stone for coming to a smaller company. “I had never done the infrastructure side and it’s been great. The company is very supportive, it is not a company where IT is in the back — we try to stay business relevant.”

And a small team has to be scrappy. “Sometimes it’s kind of sink or swim, we have to figure it out. We are doing a supply chain project now we haven’t done before. You just dig in and learn it,” Poe said.

Building a Team

In hiring, in addition to technical skills, Poe looks for the willingness and ability to learn and interact with people well as well as communication skills. “We like to hire recent college graduates who are hungry and eager to make a difference.“

“We used to say it was hard to source IT talent, but that is changing and Palm Beach Tech has been able to make that more visible,” Poe added. “There are a lot of skilled workers, you just have to look for it – you don’t have to go to Fort Lauderdale or Miami.”

The benefits package is an attractor as well, including gym memberships, an in-house gym and time on the clock to do healthy activities. The company also brings in free, healthy lunches three days a week. And then there is the famous slide …

A good culture starts at the top, said Cousins. “It starts with strong healthy leaders, and it is expected from the top down that we are going to connect with each other and treat one another with respect.”

Garden of Life President Brian Ray recently announced four new holidays, and time off includes school holidays to help working parents. He sends out company-wide emails asking people “what stresses you?” Because many said laptops were not working optimally, that led to a refresh across the board.

“It’s a very flat company, leadership is very involved in all aspects of the company,” she added. “And it’s a very healthy culture – you don’t bring in McDonald’s, you don’t bring in donuts.”

25
Nov, 2019

By Nancy Dahlberg

Member Spotlight | PeakActivity

Read Time 3 Minutes

Business: PeakActivity partners with enterprises to deliver digital marketing and technology tailored to create outcomes that matter the most to growing their businesses.

Headquarters: Boynton Beach

Management team: Manish Hirapara, CEO; Scott Earnest, COO;  Paresh Hirapara, CTO; Daryl Long, Creative and User Experience; Alison Riveira, eCommerce and Optimization; Scott Townsend, Partnerships and  Business Development; Robin Dimond, Social Commerce.

Team members: about 100 (including contractors)

Website: peakactivity.com

 

For the past four years, CEO Manish Hirapara and his team have been building PeakActivity into a technology solutions provider that now employs about 100 people. The Boynton Beach-based company was recently honored  as a top Florida Company to Watch by GrowFL, a statewide economic development initiative to support growing second-stage businesses.

“PeakActivity is a collective of great individuals  – dreamers, thinkers, marketers, designers, technologists – and our goal is we want our customers to take advantage of the digital economy,” Hirapara explains. “We do that by partnering with them and figuring out how to create outcomes that will impact their business in a positive way, oftentimes when it comes to revenue growth.”

How does the company do that? Four ways, said Hirapara.

PeakActivitiy partners with clients to help them acquire top talent. Its digital marketing services enable clients to acquire new customers. The company helps these customers create custom technology solutions, such as for e-commerce, that help them differentiate themselves from the competition. And last but not least, PeakActivity helps them optimize their path to growing revenue. “It’s how we work with the team to uncover the big ideas that are hidden below the surface and figure out how to bring these ideas to bear,” Hirapara said.

Today, PeakActivity is nearing $10 million in revenue, 10X growth from where it was just three years ago. Its client base includes City Furniture, TherapeuticsMD, Tyco, which is part of Johnson Controls, and Total Wine & More, among others.

 “We are over 100 team members now; that is what I am most proud of. It’s a great group of people, and we are really able to create a culture that is embracing and transformative both for our community and our customers,” said Hirapara.

PeakActivity nourishes the culture by giving its team members – Hirapapa calls them Peaksters – high-level challenges, and recognizing them for how they have made a difference for their community or their customers, he said. “’I’m a huge believer that culture is the difference between good companies and great companies.”

PeakActivity hires its Peaksters straight out of the universities and into its internships or as new hires. It also hires veterans who have solid experience in large enterprises and want to apply their skills more broadly, said Hirapapa, who worked in senior roles at Office Depot before founding PeakActivity.

“We are looking for elite talent who are … joining the family and signing up for the mission more so than being here to collect a paycheck.”

In 2020, PeakActivity will create its own set of e-commerce solutions, said Hirapara.

“None of our customers should ever feel like they don’t have the knowledge or the wherewithal to compete with an Amazon or a Netflix or a Facebook. They may not have the financial resources but it shouldn’t be a barrier to entry. We create tech solutions that match what the big guys have and provide them to the masses. We will continue to develop our own software and methodologies and bring them to market and make ourselves as much of a software product company as we are a consulting company.”

To give back to the community, PeakActivity Cares is a way for the team to share their products, services, labor, and donations to multiple philanthropic causes. The American Heart Association, Habitat for Humanity and Kids in Distress are just a few of charities PeakActivity’s team has helped.

Photo at top of post, from left: PeakActivity team members Scott Townsend, Robin Dimond, Alison Riveira, and Manish Hirapara at the GrowFL awards ceremony in 2019. PeakActivity was named to Florida Companies to Watch, a statewide program honoring 50 top companies. 

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18
Nov, 2019

By Nancy Dahlberg

1909 | Partner Spotlight

Read Time 4 MinutesImagine walking into a welcoming workspace where you can talk to a software developer, a graphic designer, a business mentor or a startup founder. On any given day, you can ask anyone for professional or personal advice, whether it’s on how to organize a pitch deck to improving your website to registering a non-profit.

A year ago, this dream became a reality in Palm Beach County as 1909 opened its doors at 313 Datura St. in downtown West Palm Beach, thanks to a group of creators who worked diligently to make it happen.

1909, a non-profit organization, was launched in November 2018 by the Palm Beach Tech Association with support from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, after about six months of strategizing and raising funds. “It’s gone incredibly well, and we certainly learned things along the way,” said Palm Beach Tech’s CEO Joe Russo, who directed 1909 in its inaugural year.

“We are more prepared than ever to support the next generation of creators.”

1909 provides workspace and programming for creators, including entrepreneurs, creatives, developers and designers, all working on bringing their ideas to life. “1909 was built for entrepreneurs by entrepreneurs,” said Shana Ostrovitz, incoming Executive Director of 1909.

In the past year, 1909 has attracted 250 members, opened a second location in Delray Beach (135 E. Atlantic Ave.) and hosted four accelerator programs and multiple events. And it’s just getting started.

 

“In creating this space for people to come together and interact on a daily basis, we are just seeing so many people gravitating toward us and sharing with us that this is what they have been looking for,” explained Ostrovitz. “That’s a testament to what 1909 is — the culture we are creating and the space we provide. It’s about our members, about our members accomplishing their goals and having the impact they want in the world.”

Founding members of the 1909 team included Co-Founders Joe Russo and Danielle Casey, along with Jared Fishman, Aaron Nosbisch, and Ryan Walden, who is 1909’s Entrepreneur Director.

“We’re a startup ourselves and there was a lot of experimentation in the first year,” Ostrovitz said.

“Really, people want to connect to other people and that is biggest value. So Instead of offering so many additional benefits or services or products, the one thing we really learned is to focus on our core – creating an environment where people can connect with other creators, build relationships and thrive. That is the most important thing.  We really don’t have to get so crazy in our offerings — we have something that people are thirsty for and focusing on that is what our members want.”

Workspace

Accessibility is critical to the success of 1909, the name inspired by the year Palm Beach County was founded. That’s why 1909 memberships start at just $50 a month for use of the community spaces. For 24/7 access to the space and all the perks, including wifi, unlimited printing, phone booths for privacy, showers and cold brew on tap, resident memberships cost $100/month and a dedicated desk with a mailbox and business address costs $350 a month.

  • Community Membership | $50 /Month
  • Resident Membership | $100 /Month
  • Dedicated Desk Membership | $350 /Month
  • Office Membership | Starting at $750 /Month

Accelerator

In year one, Ostrovitz directed the accelerator program for 1909 before being named Executive Director. The team put on a music accelerator in Lake Park, a mini-accelerator in Boynton Beach and 6-month general accelerator programs at its Delray Beach and West Palm Beach locations, all of which included a curriculum, expert speakers, mentorship and connections.

At 1909FEST, an event on Nov. 23 celebrating emerging businesses, music and talent, local bands that participated in the music accelerator will be performing and six selected startups from all the accelerators will be pitching for cash prizes. Find out more here.

Ostrovitz said in year two, the primary focus will be on growing membership and building more engagement and value for members in West Palm and Delray Beach. “We want to provide as much value to our members as possible. They are the true heroes of this story and they are one’s who will make long standing impacts in our community.”

If you haven’t checked out 1909 yet, now’s the time.

“If you’re interested in connecting to local visionaries, 1909 is the place to be and the place to see. There are incredible things happening right here in our backyard being led by these incredible founders, I think most people have no idea there is so much innovation and work being done here locally that is going to have an impact on our community and the world,” said Ostrovitz.

Adds Russo: “Everyone here is doing something awesome, and we are really happy that they are doing it with 1909 and with our community of creators.”

04
Nov, 2019

By Nancy Dahlberg

Member Spotlight | TRUE Digital Security

Read Time 4 Minutes

Business: TRUE Digital Security brings together a world-class team of experts, dedicated to the advancement of security, governance and IT management in the connected enterprise.

Offices: West Palm Beach (home of the company’s Network Operations Center), Tulsa, Okla., and Hauppauge, N.Y. 

CEO: Rory Sanchez

No. of employees: More than 80 employees company-wide, with half of them in West Palm Beach

Website: truedigitalsecurity.com

 

When SLPowers, a Palm Beach County-based pioneer in the Managed IT, Cloud and Security Services space, and TRUE Digital Security, a leader in security consulting and security program development, announced they were merging last year, they said their strategy was to form one company that would tightly integrate security and IT operations and bring a new level of efficiency to their clients. A two-in-one solution, if you will, that would take on the TRUE Digital Security name but operate out of three offices, with its largest operation based in West Palm Beach..

 “Our vision is to protect and empower the connected world”, said CEO Rory Sanchez, at the time of the merger announcement. “It may sound like a lofty goal but we’re playing at that level and making it happen one client at a time.”

So how has the strategy been playing out for this IT security business information technology company? “Together, we can identify weaknesses and leverage TRUE’s core services to fill any gaps in an organization’s skillset,” its website states. Services include engineered IT solutions, secure cloud migrations, managed SIEM or MDR solutions, and validation and penetration testing.

We talked to Lisa Remsa, TRUE Digital Security’s Marketing Manager, to learn more.

“We are unique in our space in that usually managed service providers do one or the other and we do both. … The innovation comes from the combination of the two companies,” said Remsa, who grew up in South Florida and worked for SLPowers, a 35-year-old company, for a few years before the merger.

Today, 45 to 50 people work in the West Palm Beach office, including CEO Sanchez, who previously was CEO and president of SLPowers. The entire company, which also has offices in Oklahoma and New York, employs more than 80, said Remsa, who has worked in the tech industry for 17-plus years. The West Palm Beach office houses the company’s Network Operations Center.

“We are changing the way you win the technology race. With the threats businesses face every single day, it’s impossible to keep up. They often have to juggle running their business and protecting it, which can stifle day-to-day operations. TRUE is here to do the protecting,” Remsa said, noting that clients include Goodwill Industries, Dale Carnegie Training and Best Lighting.

A new solution the company provides is a dashboard called TrueSpeed where you can see all of your security and operations information through one single pane of glass customized to the client. “This is unique to our business and works specifically with our solutions,” Remsa said, noting that the company’s security experts worked for agencies such as the NSA and the DOD.

From left, TRUE Digital Security’s Sam Ruggeri, Executive Vice President; Bob Hochmuth, former Executive Vice President; CEO Rory Sanchez; and President Dominic Schulte at the company’s annual charity event, the Margarita Ball.

 

 

Locally, TRUE Digital Security is involved in the Chambers of Commerce, Palm Beach Tech and the South Florida Technology Alliance. As SLPowers and last year as TRUE Digital, it has hosted a Margarita Ball charity event in Palm Beach for more than a decade. Next year it plans to incorporate a philanthropic program that that will include all three of the company’s locations. TRUE also supports other organizations, including Memory for Memory, a local organization that supports Alzheimer’s through the money it raises from electronics recycling, and Stand Up Foundation, which offers community and education events for kids and adults, Remsa explained.

As for hiring, Remsa says: “There is a huge demand for security and IT specialists in general. We work with the local universities to make sure we are involved in continuing to grow our local tech communities and providing opportunities for new talent.”

TRUE Digital Security is looking for people with certifications and expertise in networking, virtualization and security. In South Florida, it is currently seeking seasoned project engineers.

 “We are always looking for every level and focus area to develop a growth environment for the employees,” Remsa said. “Our VP of HR works with employees to put together a career path. We are looking for people who are skilled, team players, that take initiative, and enjoy being part of an innovative team doing new and exciting things in technology.”

01
Nov, 2019

By Nancy Dahlberg

General Assembly launches in South Florida

Read Time 5 MinutesRegister for “Rethinking How Startups Find Talent,” a Palm Beach Tech Meetup being presented by General Assembly and hosted at PATHOS.

The global tech education provider’s newest campus will offer training programs across data science, digital marketing, product management and UX design, in addition to immersive online coding classes.

General Assembly has officially announced its regional expansion into South Florida, armed with its tech training programs aimed at up-skilling employees for the future of
work.

The New York-based skills training company will bring its training in data science, digital marketing and UX/UI design, as well as online immersive courses in coding, to South Florida. It will officially launch its programming on Nov. 1, working with economic development leaders and local employers to strengthen the pipeline of job-ready tech workers. General Assembly, founded in 2011, is also launching in Orlando and seven other cities around the country.

The expansion to South Florida, GA’s 25th metro area, has been heavily rumored for a couple of years, even as the Miami metro area already offers robust coding and design bootcamps and workshops by homegrown player Wyncode Academy, as well as Ironhack and several other companies and nonprofits. But General Assembly’s leadership still saw a gap to close.

“There is a growing need for digital skills in today’s workforce, but the supply and demand we’re seeing in the labor market is simply not matching up,” said Jake Schwartz, GA’s CEO and co founder, in a statement announcing the news on Wednesday. “Accessibility is a key component to this, which is why GA is bringing its award-winning online programs to Miami. In doing so, we’re able to provide students with  the flexibility they need to keep their daytime commitments, all while transforming their careers with evening and weekend training.”

Over the last year, GA built investment cases and saw the growing number of the tech jobs being posted, said GA’s Miami Community Leader Cari Perez in an interview. “Just in South Florida, we saw 47,000 openings around the five disciplines that GA teaches from software engineering to digital marketing, analytics, UX/UI design and product management.”

Indeed, according to trade organization CompTIA, the technology sector contributes over $22 billion to Miami’s economy each year, with local tech workers making a median salary of $67,820 that is 79 percent higher than the statewide average.

The company also announced it will be partnering with Wyncode, co-marketing each other’s offerings. “We’re proud that General Assembly has chosen Wyncode as their preferred education partner in Miami to support their online community of learners. Through this partnership, we will be able to highlight the many ways individuals can launch a new career in the South Florida tech community, either by learning with us in person or online with GA,” said Wyncode co-founder Juha Mikkola.

“Wyncode reached out to us a couple of years ago and we have been in contact and we know the great work that they do here,” Perez explained. “We will refer people who want in-person training to Wyncode and similarly they will be referring to us potential students who want to do online [courses] or analytics or digital marketing, which they do not offer. “It is a strategy to bring more content and more courses to more people and we are working together to do just that.”

General Assembly Miami will be based at CIC Miami, at 1951 NW 7 th Ave., and some of its events will be there but at least for now it will be a “mobile campus,” taking its workshops and events throughout the tri-county area. GA already put on an event and workshop in West Palm Beach, for instance.

On its calendar is a number of free events, such as next week’s healthcare and AI panel put together with CIC and the Miami-Dade Beacon Council and the Palm Beach Tech Meetup with GA at PATHOS. There are also 2-hour workshops such as Intro to Data Analytics, free or costing $25-$30, and 7-hour bootcamps on topics like User Experience Design and Product Design, ranging in price from $100 to $120. “Into 2020 we will be offering a range of possibilities around wellness, health, the environment and how technology impacts them. But we will be heavy focused on analytics,” said Perez, something the companies in the area are requesting.

Every market has different needs and the offerings will be customized, said Tom Ogletree, senior director of Social Impact & External Affairs, adding that GA, acquired last year by HR firm Adecco Group, is more than a code school.

“The reality is all companies are becoming tech companies to one degree or another,” Ogletree said. While GA’s foundation was built on its immersive coding education, now analytics, machine learning, artificial intelligence, the Cloud and product management are increasingly in demand as the workforce needs to reskill and upskill, he said.

“At the end of the day, we are a company that is working with individuals and employers to close skills gaps,” Ogletree said. “While coding and accelerated education
will always be a pillar, we’ve come to a point that we are more than that.” While the senior team isn’t ruling out a brick and mortar campus in Miami in the future, Ogletree and Perez tout the advantages of the mobile campus, a new model for GA, starting with the ability to mobilize quickly and bring access to more people. “It is also a powerful way to understand the community and the market and gives us a framework to build upon,” said Ogletree.

The part-time courses in skills like product management or programming languages such as JavaScript and React cost $3,950. Its full-time immersive classes in software engineering cost more than $14,000, on par with competitors in the area. GA, like its local rivals, offers financing options.

General Assembly will also bring its enterprise programming to the Miami area. For instance, the company could offer intro classes, one-week accelerated courses, part- time courses or full-time transformation courses to employee groups around any of the five disciplines it teaches.

Companies also have access to GA’s career development services and its alumni network of about 70,000. GA has already started working with two enterprise companies in the area. ”It’s about helping the team that is not tech understand tech, helping the analysts become scientists, and giving them access to our talent and alumni networks to recruit,” said Perez.

On GA’s other campuses, this is becoming a larger part of the business, Ogletree said. “For example, we are working with Guardian Insurance that is training all their actuaries to become data scientists. We are working with Adobe that is looking to create pathways for people from underserved communities into tech roles through scholarships and apprenticeships.”

Those are resources the area needs, as finding tech talent is frequently mentioned as a tech challenge for employers.

“Part of what makes Miami’s innovation ecosystem so strong is the foundation of resources available to talent, entrepreneurs, and companies at every stage. Having a global brand like General Assembly establish a campus in Miami serves to further accelerate that growth,” said Michael A. Finney, CEO of the Miami-Dade Beacon Council, in a statement. “With a robust portfolio of classes online and on campus, and 70,000+ alumni worldwide, General Assembly is in a position to prepare our workforce for today’s rapidly evolving, tech-driven landscape.”

This post was originally written for Refresh Miami and is  republished here with permission.

28
Oct, 2019

By Nancy Dahlberg

Member Spotlight | Red Ventures & Bankrate.com

Read Time 4 Minutes

Business: Bankrate.com is a leading online publisher, aggregator and distributor of personal finance content.  It helps consumers find and compare rates on financial products like mortgages, credit cards, car loans, savings accounts, certificates of deposit, checking and ATM fees, home equity loans and banking fees.

Parent Company: Red Ventures (acquired Bankrate in 2017)

South Florida office: Palm Beach Gardens

No. of South Florida-based employees: about 50

No. on mortgage tech team: about 15

 

When engineers are willing to commute from Miami and Fort Lauderdale to Palm Beach Gardens to work at Bankrate.com, that’s a sign of a special culture.

April Gibson-Fulton, Software Engineering Director in Bankrate.com’s Palm Beach Gardens office, is proud of that. While she has worked to nourish a strong engineering culture, the tech industry veteran embraced the collaborative spirit as soon as she arrived about three years ago to lead the mortgage tech team.

“I really liked the fact that the business team and the tech team worked really well together. It wasn’t like we were the IT shop and it was a necessary evil. We were treated as equal partners and we worked really collaboratively. That was a big draw,” said Gibson-Fulton, who previously was a software development manager for Dycom.

In her role at Bankrate, Gibson-Fulton is responsible for working with product management and data teams to deliver solution to Bankrate.com  that will help its advertisers – banks and lending institutions – generate more volume.

BANKRATE’S OWNERSHIP

Bankrate.com was acquired in 2017 by Charlotte-based Red Ventures, the largest technology-enabled platform for launching and growing sales & marketing businesses in the U.S.  The Bankrate brand is a leading online publisher, aggregator and distributor of personal finance content that helps consumers find and compare rates on financial products like mortgages, credit cards, car loans and savings accounts. Bankrate also owns CreditCards.com, which was part of the acquisition.

Gibson-Fulton oversees a mortgage experience team, which focuses on the main rate tables on Bankrate.com and an integration team that sends leads to advertisers. In all, about 14 engineers report to her, she said.

“We run a scrum process, collaborating not only with engineers but we also work closely with our design team, product managers and data team. Data is something really big and I consider it to be a key differentiator from some of the other engineering organizations I have worked for. We are an outcome-driven organization as opposed to an output-driven organization. We look at a problem and figure out our hypothesis — what data do we need to collect to see if we are achieving that outcome — and then based on the data do we pivot or move forward on certain initiatives?”

Bankrate has moved from a click-based business to a leads-based business and is actually collecting more information about the consumer and that helps the advertiser, Gibson-Fulton said. It is also working on customized user journeys, which involve meeting consumers where they are at in the home-buying journey and providing the education, tools and workflows to support them.

THE ROLE OF CULTURE

Hiring has been a challenge at times, but culture is a huge draw and retainer, she says.

“I truly believe engineering is a team sport,” said Gibson-Fulton, who played basketball at alma mater Florida Atlantic University. “For me, everything is about teamwork. Our office manager every month recognizes birthdays and seasonal events and we have a very competitive ping pong table. It’s a thing. People will come from the New York or Charlotte office and there are full-blown competitions.”

How can companies nourish the company culture? Let’s talk to Gibson-Fulton about some of the things Bankrate as part of Red Ventures does:

  • Bankrate created a culture where people feel safe. People have to feel comfortable bringing good news as well as bad news, she said.
  • A collaborative spirit is also key. “It is about making sure everybody’s voice is heard, everybody has input and it’s valued. Everybody says that but it really happens here. “
  • Continuous learning is key. Everyone has opportunities to grow and learn, from the most junior to the most senior person. “We have a strong mentoring culture, we do a lot of pair programing.” Bankrate also holds hackathons and tech summits during the year.
  • Gibson-Fulton does one-on-ones weekly with her team, but she knows some people are uncomfortable voicing concerns there so she also sends out an anonymous happiness survey quarterly to see how people are feeling and what motivates them to keeps them coming to work. “Hands down it is our culture — we are a tight knit group of people,” said Gibson-Fulton, adding that the team socializes after work, attending each other’s hockey games and heading to dinner afterward.

In hiring, Gibson-Fulton looks for attitude and aptitude. Being a continuous learner is critically important with technology changing all the time, so she looks for candidates that would value participating in lunch and learns, fireside chats and lightning talks that Bankrate offers, as well as  events and educational opportunities in the community.

“What we look for in candidates and in performance reviews stem from Red Ventures’ RAPID formula: result driver – accountable team player – passion – influential communicator – development driver.”

The company’s values are exemplified on the walls at the Palm Beach Gardens offices, with messages like “Everything’s in pencil,” “Running up escalators,” and “We believe in leaving the wood pile higher.”

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18
Oct, 2019

By Nancy Dahlberg

SBA National SBIR Road Tour coming to South Florida

Read Time 2 MinutesWant to connect with the government’s largest source of grant funding for innovative early-stage small businesses in technology or the sciences? Here’s your chance.

The Small Business Administration’s National SBIR Road Tour is coming to Miami, and you’re invited to attend. Representatives of 12 federal agencies that award SBIR/STTR grants will be on hand.

The tour is being hosted by U Innovation at the University of Miami on Wednesday, Nov. 13, 2019. It will connect entrepreneurs working on advanced technology to the country’s largest source of early-stage funding — the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) programs. The SBIR and STTR programs, which focus on next-generation research and development, provide more than $3 billion in early-stage funding to small businesses each year and execute more than 5,000 new awards annually.

If you’re an entrepreneur, researcher or a small business in fields such as advanced technology, life sciences, energy or aerospace, don’t miss this opportunity.

CLICK HERE TO REGISTER

Program managers from 12 participating federal agencies will conduct one-on-one meetings, take part in targeted panels, discuss technology areas, and share insights into how the agencies make funding decisions. After registering, attendees will be contacted via email about scheduling one-on-one meetings with agency representatives.

THE AGENDA

  • 7:00 a.m. – Registration, networking, continental breakfast
  • 8:00 – Introductions
  • 8:15 – SBIR/STTR overview
  • 8:45 – Five-minute reverse pitches from agencies
  • 9:45 – SBA and federal agency talks and panels
  • 12:30 – Lunch (provided with registration)
  • 1:30 – Opportunity zones and your company: How and why to take advantage of opportunity zones to spur investment into your company

Simultaneous one-on-one meetings will occur from 8:00 to 12:30 with agency representatives.

Federal agencies confirmed to attend: Department of Health and Human Services – National Institutes of Health (NIH);  National Science Foundation (NSF); National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA); Department of Energy (DOE); Department of Homeland Security (DHS); Department of Transportation (DOT); Department of Defense – Air Force (USAF); Department of Defense – Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA); Department of Defense – Missile Defense Agency (MDA); Department of Defense – Navy (DON); Department of Defense – Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA); Department of Defense – Special Operations Command (SOCOM).

For more information, visit www.sbirroadtour.com.

14
Oct, 2019

By Nancy Dahlberg

Almost 200 join Smart Cities & Hurricane Relief Hackathon

Read Time 3 Minutes20 Teams, 100 hackers, 20 coaches, 5 judges, and countless volunteers. 

It was a record turnout for Palm Beach Tech’s 4th hackathon, and a great opportunity for the local tech community to come together to solve community problems while flexing their creative muscles. The hackathon was hosted by Office Depot, and sponsored by FPL, the City of Boca Raton and two-dozen other South Florida companies and education partners. 

“All teams created truly innovate solutions. I was truly inspired by the way these teams, whose members did not know each other, came together, committed on a problem to help the community and collectively worked through 24 hours to build and demonstrate a fully working solution,” said Andrew Parry, VP of IT for Office Depot.

After a Friday night kickoff party that included some inspiring tech pep talks and an intense game of Rock Paper Scissors, teams formed they begin serious ideation around the white boards Saturday morning. During the 24-hour development period, the 20 teams ditched sleep in favor of Candid Coffee, pizza, endless M&Ms and the well-stocked snack table in order to build and code something great for the community. On Sunday the teams presented solutions to top judges from Levatas, PGA, Microsoft, Modernizing Medicine and Office Depot.

This year the theme was particularly timely, as the hackathon was held during Hurricane Season and came on the heels of the devastating impact of Hurricane Dorian in the Bahamas.

“All of the team projects related to either smart cities or hurricane relief, with the winning projects actually supporting the latter,” said Joe Russo, President and CEO of Palm Beach Tech. 

Several teams focused their efforts on ideas benefitting the City of Boca Raton and surrounding communities.

“It was so inspiring to see our diverse tech community come together and use their talents to build awesome solutions that will improve our community,” added Pedro Moras, Innovation Strategist for the City of Boca Raton.

And the winners are – drum roll please …

 

First place, $2.500 prize:  Hurricane Helper

Hurricane Helper’s progressive AWS based web application is called EDNA – Emergency Disaster Network Application. EDNA is an online platform that streamlines disaster management by using a national volunteer network in a cloud call center. See Presentation

Team Members: Derek Donev, Erik White, Mike Tobin, Michael Roth, Ivan Bliskavka, Holden Gibler, Taylor Gagne, Alex Ciccolella.

 

Second Place, $1,000 Prize: Hurricane Hackers

This team’s app was part-registry, part-donation center known as ReAll – standing for Resource Allocation. As a storm is approaching, people can see and compile a list of what they need. After a storm, people can use the app as a donation center, as they can donate items or money for hurricane relief. See Presentation

Team Members: Shawn Genoway, Charles Richardson, Tim Richardson, Jahnoah Simpson, Joel Ryan Martin

 

Third Place, $500 Prize: Self Healing

Self Healing solution uses Mesh Technology to improve post hurricane communication when cell phone communications are often unavailable. See Presentation

Team Member: Talal Gedeon

 

The full and final scoring can be found for a short time by using this link: Click Here

30
Sep, 2019

By Nancy Dahlberg

Code Palm Beach growing to inspire more kids in tech

Read Time 3 MinutesYou’d be hard-pressed to find many tech initiatives that are more inspired and community-driven than Code Palm Beach.

“Our main goal is to give every student in Palm Beach County the opportunity to experience technology and see if it is something they are interested in. We would like every student to have a basic knowledge of code because in our time it is important to understand the way computers speak and how to talk to them. We are trying our hardest to get to every kid in the county,” explained Madison Cuellar, Administrator of Code Palm Beach.

To accomplish this, the non-profit Code Palm Beach runs free coding events monthly for kids in grades K-12. It partners with the South Florida Science Center, Palm Beach County School District and local libraries, as well as the Palm Beach Tech Association.

It’s powered by more than 50 volunteers.

To introduce the kids to coding, Code Palm Beach brings in tech professionals – from entry level developers to CTOs – to teach and mentor. They come from companies such as NextEra Energy/FPL, Arrow Digital, Dycom, Hello Labs, PGA and others. Through these events, Code Palm Beach creates a positive environment that promotes tech, coding, engineering, and robotics education and leverages readily available curriculum from Code.org and freeCodeCamp.

“All of our volunteers are industry professionals and Palm Beach Tech gives us a good pool to pull from,” Cuellar said.

BRANCHING OUT

Code Palm Beach is expanding to reach more kids.

“We started with two locations and now we have six and we are adding an intermediate class and an advanced class,” said Cuellar, who coordinates with the libraries, volunteers and parents to ensure everything is running smoothly. Current locations include the South Florida Science Center, libraries in Royal Palm Beach, Delray Beach, Boca Raton and in West Palm Beach and the STEM Studio in Jupiter.  Each location aims to hold at least one class a month, sometimes more, depending on the volunteer pool.

The volunteer spirit was baked in from Code Palm Beach’s beginnings. In 2016,  George Whitaker and Sean Biganski saw a need and founded CoderDojo Palm Beach, a kids coding club, with a handful of parents in the tech industry. “They said there isn’t enough STEM education and we’re just going to do it,” Cuellar said. Then with the help of the community, it evolved into Code Palm Beach. Biganski and Whitaker have remained active in Code Palm Beach, and are Chair and Treasurer respectively.

Palm Beach Tech came aboard and partnered with the organization in 2018 to bring classes to more even kids.

“Watching Sean & George lead CoderDojo was inspiring,” said Joe Russo, CEO of Palm Beach Tech. “It’s exciting to share the joy of coding with our next generation, and the Palm Beach Tech community has stepped up make this a reality for 100’s of local students.”

 

ADDING INTERMEDIATE & ADVANCED CLASSES

Most of the kids Code Palm Beach has helped so far have been in the 6-14 age group. Now the organization is offering more classes and events for intermediate and advanced students.

“Our courses aren’t large classes where everyone follows the same tasks. It is dependent on where you are as a student,” Cuellar explained. “We have students who come in with no experience and more advanced ones. We have different platforms that allow more advanced students to work on what they are comfortable with and volunteers to help move them along.”

Code Palm Beach plans to add a game development course, Cuellar said. “We always have kids who come in and say I want to hack the coolest game. We just want to have whatever kids are interested in and sneak in some education.”

It’s working. More than 650 students have been helped.

“The kids come back. You see them progress, we get a lot of regulars and they are growing a lot. That they are moving through the courses shows that it is working.”

To find out more about Code Palm Beach’s free activities or to volunteer: Visit codepalmbeach.org  or call (561)-425-8918.

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16
Sep, 2019

By Nancy Dahlberg

Member Spotlight | FPL

Read Time 5 Minutes

Business: Florida Power & Light Company is the largest energy company in the U.S., serving 10 million+ people across Florida. FPL is one of the state’s largest employers.

Parent company:  NextEra Energy, a clean energy company and the world’s largest utility firm. 

Headquarters: Juno Beach, FL

No. on FPL tech team: 1,000 (approx. including contractors)

Speaking with: Michael Fowler, VP of IT at FPL

Fowler’s advice: “You have to be constantly refreshing your skills. If you graduate today, you will have to keep learning at an intense pace for the rest of your career… Otherwise you will be left behind.”

 

Michael Fowler is the Vice President of IT for FPL, leading one of the state’s largest tech teams. That includes all the IT professionals who support customer service, all who help get your power back on after an outage, and those who develop and maintain FPL’s mobile app and website. Under Fowler, about a thousand people work on FPL’s tech.

If you don’t know Fowler yet, you will. In addition to his executive role at FPL, he is the chair of Palm Beach Tech. He is also a leader on the Technical Advisory Committee for Palm Beach County Schools, passionate about nurturing the next generation of tech talent.

Let’s hear his thoughts about hiring tech talent and growing a tech community.

 

‘I DIDN’T KNOW THIS IS FLORIDA’

Before accepting a position at NextEra Energy, FPL’s parent company, about 9 years ago, Fowler spent 23 years in utilities in the Washington DC/ Baltimore area.

“Who can say no to West Palm? Part of it was the job opening was similar to what I was doing in Baltimore. And the other draw was NextEra, with their focus on renewables – it is just a great story. Why would you not want to work for a company that is driving toward the next era of renewable energy at scale? How many times do you get the opportunity to jump onto that train?”

And he adds: “On my first visit, I said wow, I didn’t know this is Florida.”

Still, Fowler quickly learned that hiring in South Florida was not nearly as easy as in the Washington DC area. “When I stumbled upon Palm Beach Tech and their vision to make this a tech hub, selfishly I became very interested. I always have needs for IT people,” said Fowler. “It’s connectors like Palm Beach Tech that have brought the community closer together.”

 

MAKING IMPACT AT SCALE 

Should you think working in tech at a utility isn’t sexy, think again.

“When you peel back the covers, we do some really interesting work. And I think that we do interesting work because we have a lot of smart, creative people,” Fowler said.

In the old days, FPL field work would always take a human and ladder. Now drones do some of that work.

“What you will see in the future is not only is the drone taking pictures of the work or the inspection, but when you add in AI it will get you to better, faster answers as well. It is a really exciting to be here at a utility with utility scale problems and being in IT to help them figure out how to do that better, faster, cheaper and by the way there is the safety component. If you don’t have someone crawl up on a ladder, you have just made the world a safer place.”

There’s more, said Fowler. “We have done smart outage – how do you give customers the best, most reliable answer on when their service will be restored? Customers want better, faster, more accurate data. My team has tackled some of those challenges, as well as getting the technology into the hands of the people who work in the field.”

 

IT’S ALL ABOUT THE NETWORKING

Fowler meets job candidates through networking at Palm Beach Tech’s meetups and hackathons and through PBT’s career boards.

“They just don’t stumble onto Juno and walk in the front door and say I want a job… They don’t sit at home with a bookmark on Careers at FPL and look at it every day. It takes proactiveness on our part to get out there and find the people.”

In his role on the Palm Beach County Schools Technical Advisory Council, which also includes local universities, Fowler tries to figure out how to build stronger partnerships not only for better curriculum but also to better connect students with the jobs they are looking for, he said.

A Palm Beach Tech project Fowler is focused on is bringing on an apprenticeship program that will build even more technical skills in the region. Palm Beach Tech is in discussions about collaborating with Miami Dade College, which received grant funding to build such a program.

“If we want to be a regional player, we need to figure out how to make these programs scale regionally. We’re stronger as a region if we can develop these programs that allows you to live, work and learn near where you want to do that,” Fowler said. “But we need a lot of participation from businesses up and down the region.”

 

PREACHING CONTINUOUS LEARNING

The apprenticeship program will help people to skill up, whether they have been in the workforce and want or need to learn tech, or they received an IT degree but need to polish up with some certifications, said Fowler.

Tech professionals need to be constantly updating their skills. Fowler uses Cloud skills as an example. Two years ago, just 2 of the 30 FPL IT interns used Cloud in their projects. Last year about half did, and this year all 33 interns used some form of Cloud in their projects. “In the space of two years, we have gone from the Cloud is sort of interesting to it is ubiquitous – you have to be there.”

Fowler also believes everyone should look for ways to invest in the next generation. “If you are in a leadership position, figure out how to make that next opportunity for that intern or that new college hire,” he said.

 “We are only going to win in this world economy by focusing on education. We will win in the global economy if our people are the best prepared to do their jobs.”

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09
Sep, 2019

By Nancy Dahlberg

Member Spotlight | ShipMonk

Read Time 3 Minutes

Business: ShipMonk provides stress-free packing and shipping services for small and mid-sized e-commerce companies.

HQ: Fort Lauderdale. Fulfillment facilities in California and Pennsylvania.

Founder and CEO: Jan Bednar

Year founded: 2014 at FAU Tech Runway

No. of employees: More than 400; about 250 in South Florida

Website: www.shipmonk.com

 

“It’s been a little crazy but good — we’re moving in the right direction,” said Jan Bednar, in describing his startup’s busy summer.

His logistics-tech company, ShipMonk, provides “stress-free” packing and shipping for small and mid-sized e-commerce companies. Its multichannel order fulfillment services enable startups and SMBs to focus on building their brand and achieving next-level growth.  In July, ShipMonk moved into a 220,000-square-foot headquarters and logistics facility in Fort Lauderdale, three times the size of its former Deerfield Beach facility.

ShipMonk plans to open a new facility in California early next year, having already outgrown its 95,000-square foot facility. “We are out of space there, too,” Bednar said in a recent interview with Refresh Miami.

In addition, ShipMonk opened a fulfillment facility in Pennsylvania in June, it’s third in the U.S.A. “We might open one in the Midwest but for right now we’re good,” Bednar said.

More than 400 people now work at ShipMonk, Bednar said, including about 250 in South Florida.

Expect many more jobs: Bednar has committed to add another 400 jobs in South Florida over the next five years.

Revenues have followed a similar projectory. The company once again landed on the INC 5000 this year, at No. 154, with 2,470% three-year growth and $28.4 million in 2018 revenues. That was up from about $10.6 million in revenues in 2017 and $3.9 million in 2016.

This year ShipMonk is on track to more than double its revenues again.

To fully appreciate this growth, remember ShipMonk’s first office was a corner of FAU TechRunway’s accelerator space in Boca Raton, stacked high with boxes, just five years ago when he was basically a company of one. Bednar, an FAU student from the Czech Republic in his early 20s, started the first iteration of the company, then called BedaBox, in 2014 while part of TechRunway’s first accelerator class. His concept won first place in FAU’s business plan contest and tops in the Florida Venture Forum’s Collegiate Competition at the time. Fast forward to 2018, and Bednar was named to the national Forbes 30 Under 30.  

ShipMonk was a bootstrapped company for the first four years and always profitable. Last November, ShipMonk raised $10 million in a Series A round led by SJF Ventures in North Carolina, with participation from Virginia-based Grotech Ventures, Maine-based Supply Chain Ventures, and a group of angel investors who specialize in supply chain investments. Bednar gave up just 15% of the company, the Sun Sentinel reported at the time, and he planned to use the funding for hiring and automation.

Bednar wasted no time putting the venture money to work.

In addition to all the facility growth and hiring – the employee count has nearly doubled since last fall – ShipMonk has been heavily investing in automation.

ShipMonk team in Fort Lauderdale.

“We have a lot of exciting things going on. We have a $2 million automation project we will be implementing in our Florida facility early next year. We’re trying to increase our through put capacity and automate a lot more things as well to be more competitive in the market,” Bednar said.

Robots? Check. “In October, we will be deploying the robots.”

Global expansion is in the works, too. Next year, ShipMonk hopes to open its first Europe locations. “We are still researching locations but looking at Western Europe, Netherlands, Germany, Belgium, one of those three most likely,” he said.

ShipMonk’s tech team of about 30 people is currently based in the Czech Republic. The company has some tech positions at each of its locations, but in South Florida a lot of ShipMonk’s jobs are in operations, supply chain management, industrial engineering, account management and sales, and customer support (ShipMonk calls its customer support managers Happiness Engineers). “HR, finance and marketing grows as the business grows,” Bednar said. Find the current job openings here.

 

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