The Birth of an Industry

!!!The Birth of an Industry!!!          

In 1961, my father Frank Mogavero founded Business Machines and Computers.  He is also the founder of the American Minicomputer Dealers Association (AMDA) and has been inducted to the Computer Industry Hall of Fame in 2005 which was a very proud moment for our family:

https://www.crn.com/features/channel-programs/174907207/frank-mogavero-founder-data-systems-worldwide.htm

My father started with nothing, son of poor immigrants and the first in his family to graduate from college, which was no small feat, especially since his graduation was from The University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) and was interrupted by work and war. My father suffered numerous setbacks, including poverty, bankruptcy and major health issues. Nonetheless, he persevered and succeeded.  His theme song is, "I Will Survive" by Gloria Gaynor.  My parents passion is to dance! Unfortunately, time is marching on and they are slowing down. 

As a young man, I remember walking into his office seeing a huge computer covering a complete wall - it was one of the first IBM Mainframes.  My father had the vision to develop one of the first minicomputers in the late 60's to support business applications for smaller organizations.  This was the first of many achievements which he and later us accomplished to become technology innovators.  My father has created so many interesting companies from his first, Business Machines and Computers to Data Systems West/Worldwide, Elections International Incorporated and even a company where he distributed potato powder to allows casinos to add water and quickly make french fries with a much lower storage cost - I look forward to sharing these stories with you! 

I began working for my dad in the summers during high school and during college, also graduating from UCLA in 1986 with a Bachelor of Arts in Economics.  What I learned from economics is that one must always deliver more value than cost. I used my knowledge of economics to help shape our business, growing from a modest $2M/year when I joined to $35M/year with over 100 employees.  We designed and deployed some of the first integrated systems (1986), wide area network solutions (1993), intranet applications (1995), application service provider (2000), lifecycle services (2002) and IoT applications (2007).   I became CEO in 2000 as my father began the journey to retirement.   After many ups and downs, I sold the company to what was PCMall in 2009.  At PCMall, which eventually became PCM and then acquired by Insight in September 2009, I had a tremendous journey, eventually running an $800M business and managing over 100 team members.   

I look forward to telling our family story and sharing our life lessons on our journey though sixty years in the technology industry from near its birth until today. 

Thank you for coming along on the ride!