January 2017 | Business View Magazine

184 185 centerline solutions years. It is led by CEO, Ben Little, whose business acumen has contributed to the firm’s stunning 560 percent growth in revenue over the last several years. Little says that he and his fellow inves- tors decided to enter into the wireless ecosystem after examining the marketplace and determining that the wireless industry had three characteristics which made it an extremely good bet. According to Little, the first characteristic was that it was a highly fragmented sector - there were a lot of companies in the industry that did only one thing. “What we found in the wireless marketplace is that you have a lot of very specialized companies,” he explains. “Company A would complete Task A and then hand it off to Company B, who would complete Task B; they in turn would hand it off to Company C to complete the next task, and so forth, down the line.” Centerline’s originators believed there was a better way to do things. The second characteristic was the lack of a business service AT A GLANCE Centerline solutions WHAT: A turnkey provider and servicer for the wireless industry WHERE: Golden, Colorado WEBSITE: www.centerline solutions.com technology within or across the different companies in the sector. “We found that soft- ware technology had skipped the wireless services space,” Little says. “We often find that highly fragmented businesses, where there are lots of small providers, don’t have the luxu- ry, or the need, to invest in this revolutionizing business tech- nology.” However, he and the company’s founders envisioned the great opportunity residing in this technology hole. The third thing that Little says was attractive about the wireless industry was its large market cap– there were many big players and a lot of mon- ey changing hands. “So, we looked at the state of the in- dustry and said, ‘This is a great opportunity; it has a lot of as- sets we really like.’ In addition, we looked at the landscape and saw the ability to vertically integrate. With all three of our core industry characteristics accounted for, plus the added bonus of an opportune land- scape, we said, ‘Let’s take a go at it.’” Centerline’s first acquisition