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Above: Bob Brooks and his company, Gabriel Communications, are the messengers of good news to small- and medium-size busineses, as illustrated in this article that appeared in the September issue of Red Herring.
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St. Louis success stories regularly make national news. This column highlights some of the most recent headline grabbers.
National Publication Picks St. Louis Entrepreneur in its “Top Ten” List
Robert Brooks co-founder and CEO of Gabriel Communications has once again been singled out for his entrepreneurial prowess. In May, he was featured in Upstart, a supplement of Telephony magazine. And, most recently, he was selected as a 1999 Top Ten Entrepreneur by Red Herring, a magazine that focuses on “The Business of Technology.”
The article begins by explaining the eagerness of others to buy into Brooks’ idea, “Last year Bob Brooks ended a self-imposed retirement to raise $80 million for Gabriel Communications, a next-generation competitive local-exchange carrier (CLEC) based in St. Louis. It took Goldman Sachs, Centennial Funds, and a small list of former investors all of three days to come up with the money.”
This reflects on Brooks’ successful track record, his portfolio of previous startups include: Brooks Fiber Properties, Inc., a data CLEC, serving more than 36 U.S. cities at the time of its sale to WorldCom in 1997 for more than $3 billion; Cencom Cable Associates, a cable TV company in which he pioneered the deployment of fiber-optic technology, selling it to Hallmark Industries in 1991 for $1 billion; and OneComm, where he was a founding director and which later became Nextel Communications.
Gabriel Communications is an Integrated Communications Provider (ICP) offering a full suite of telecommunications products designed to help businesses more effectively communicate and compete in tomorrow’s business environment. The company offers services such as local voice, data and video, a full range of domestic and international long distance and a variety of Internet services including dedicated access, Web hosting and e-commerce.
The article points out Brooks’ success not only as an entrepreneur, but as a mentor, too. Two Gabriel executives, Jerry Howe, president, and Tom Erickson, chief financial officer, who were former Brooks Fiber employees, approached Brooks to start a company using a next-generation telephone system. Also, three of his former vice presidents at Brooks Fiber have started new CLECs. “That’s my claim to fame—my feeling for people,” Brooks is quoted as saying in the article.
Brooks doesn’t have to toot his own horn, the Red Herring does it for him, naming him the “Telco Angel.”
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Above: James F. Orr, president & CEO of Convergys
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Convergys Wins CIO-100 Award for Operational and Strategic Excellence
IO magazine has named Convergys Corporation as a recipient of the 1999 CIO-100 award, which recognizes worldwide organizations for their highest level of operational and strategic excellence. This year’s award focuses on the top 100 companies that have prepared for the new economy and are strategically leading the business community into the next millennium.
“The transition into the new economy will be a painful one for many organizations,” says Abbie Lundberg, editor-in-chief of CIO magazine. “Those that make it must know their customers, leverage the Internet, invest in people, innovate like crazy and completely reinvent themselves if necessary.”
In 1983, Convergys produced the first cellular telephone bill ever generated in the United States. Today, Convergys is a leading provider of customer care and billing solutions for communications companies. The company’s software produces more than one million bills every 24 hours. In addition, Call Center Solutions Magazine recognized Convergys as the number one agency for two consecutive years in their annual “Top 50 Inbound Service Agency Ranking,” handling more than one million customer contacts daily through its call centers.
“Convergys has long-term outsourcing programs with leading companies such as AT&T, Compaq, 3Com, Sprint PCS and American Express. Since our 1998 initial public offering on the New York Stock Exchange, Convergys has shown double digit rises in revenues, solid earnings and signed new or extended contracts in excess of $2 billion,” says Jim Orr, president and chief executive officer of Convergys.
Convergys has acquired Exit Marketing, a leading teleservices company in Europe; Technology Applications, Inc., a leading Internet software developer; and Wiztec Solutions, Ltd., a leading provider of subscriber management and billing solutions for subscription television operators. Plus, Convergys has entered into a global alliance with IBM to market and deliver comprehensive billing and customer management solutions to the wireless industry. Convergys’ information management solutions recently set an all-time volume record by supporting the acquisition of two million new wireless subscribers nationwide during the past year’s holiday season. Convergys continues to expand its share in fast-growing market sectors. Under the terms of contracts already signed, Convergys will serve more than 20 million cable customers, which represents more than one-third of the U.S. cable billing market.
“The importance of us meeting our clients’ needs during a period of such enormous growth has meant constant reliance on having state-of-the-art technology,” says Bob Marino, president of Convergys Information Management Group. “Convergys blends this leading edge technology with our experience and expertise to enable our clients to enhance their customer relationships when they need high-tech, high-touch, personal interaction to grow their businesses.”
Convergys has three call centers and approximately 1,500 employees in the St. Louis metropolitan area with locations in Arnold, St. Charles and Hazelwood. The company recently announced an expansion in St. Louis with a new facility in North County and the addition of 1,000 new jobs. Convergys was featured in the Midwest Real Estate News as a major contributor to the growth upswing in the area.
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