At The Top - February 2003

Unique Firms Expand in Nothern Nevada

by Linda Fine

Gary Baker, senior vice-president and shareholder at Lee & Associates and managing partner of the firm’s Reno office, recently negotiated leases with two young and aggressive Truckee Meadows firms: NRG Tech and OEM Support.com. Baker specializes in sales and leasing of industrial properties, as well as land sales for industrial and commercial development. Lee & Associates is a 22-year-old commercial real estate brokerage with offices in 20 cities throughout the United States, including Reno and Las Vegas.

Both of the companies that recently leased from his firm have taken important steps they feel necessary to grow their businesses. According to Baker, each moved into buildings containing more than 20,000 square feet, representing a four-fold increase in production space. Some might call this a leap of faith, but both companies are headed by leaders confident of the niches they’ve carved within their marketplaces, and both have eyes firmly fixed on the future.

Patrick Calkins, 25, president and founder of OEM Support.com, saw a need within the computer industry. After three years of intensive research, he found a way to fill it. "There’s too much e-waste ending up in the landfills, and we’re the life preserver," he said of his company, established to recycle electronic components. "I don’t know of anyone else doing this."

Said Patrick Phillips, director of marketing and sales, "We basically de-manufacture computers, as well as electronic components. The plastic and metal casings go to a recycler and the circuit boards are ground up and recycled. Nothing ever ends up in a landfill." While de-manufacturing is a coined word not yet found in the dictionary, the process provides an important service.

Containing three to seven pounds of lead, CRTs (cathode ray tubes) used in computer monitors are considered hazardous waste by the Environmental Protection Agency. Consequently, because these CRTs require special handling, OEM charges $15 to collect and recycle them – the $15 fee is a main source of income for the firm. However, both men stressed there is never a charge to pick up any of the articles they collect for recycling.

With an equally intriguing story to tell, NRG Tech’s history began at the University of Central Florida, where company co-founders Neal Mulligan and Kirk Collier developed a process Mulligan describes as the blending of fuels using a mixture of hydrogen and natural gas. The initial project was funded by the state of Florida to develop low-emission engines, Mulligan said. After three years and three patents, the duo went into private business, receiving cooperative research agreements in 1996 from the Department of Energy.

The two have parlayed their research into a viable commercial entity, contracting with the city of Las Vegas and the University of California at Davis, among others, to supply alternative fuels for transit buses and light-duty vehicles. They have branched out to produce pure-hydrogen internal combustion engines for mobile and stationary power generators, while developing multiple patents to reform natural gas into a cleaner-burning fuel. With their forward momentum burning as brightly as their fuels, the company is gearing up to begin actual production on-site in Reno, a shift from their primarily research mode. "We’re doing a pure-hydrogen engine development program with one of the three big Detroit auto makers," Mulligan said.

Besides working with Detroit auto makers to develop a pure-hydrogen engine, Mulligan said his firm is also involved with Arizona Public Service, BC Hydro Corporation – both utility companies – and ENRG to develop the same technology.