Winner
Information Technology
Matthias Horch came to America on the opportunity of a lifetime in 2000 and very nearly went home less than a year later with nothing.
Horch was asked to come to America to help build a U.S. subsidiary of Germany-based IT company TDS, but the dot-com bust at the turn of the century left him and his eventual Secure-24 Inc. partner, Volker Straub, without work and contemplating a return home.
Instead, with little more than an idea, they decided to found a new company that would help businesses secure information, comply with federal regulations, boost productivity, reduce costs and improve ROI. With a simple PowerPoint presentation, they set a goal to get three customers in three months. If they could do that, they thought that they could stay in America.
It didn’t take long for customers to see that Matthias had a vision for how evolving organizations and middle-market companies would need reliable, advanced managed hosting and disaster recovery services for their critical IT systems. Very quickly, attaining three customers seemed too easy of a goal, and Secure-24 began to grow organically. Today, the company has four U.S. data centers and has expanded its abilities to quickly address large, complex client business needs.
But while the company has grown, Horch has maintained the entrepreneurial spirit that originally sparked the company — and he wants to bring that out in his future leaders. He has a personal stake in developing the next generation of talent at Secure-24. The company has a three-year mentoring and training program designed to bring out the best in young talent, and as part of that, junior staff members are exposed to leading-edge technology.
The result is a second generation of employees who will secure many happy returns for Secure-24.
How to reach: Secure-24 Inc., (248) 784-1021 or www.secure-24.com
