- Monday December 14th 2020
Inside Business announces GTS as one of the winners of this year’s Roaring 20 awards program
PRESS RELEASE
Inside Business and Cherry Bekaert LLP announce Global Technical Systems
(GTS) as one of the winners of this year’s Roaring 20 awards program,
honoring 20 of Hampton Roads’ most dynamic businesses!
Global Technical Systems | The Roaring 20
By Carrie White
Inside Business
Dec 14, 2020 at 5:40 AM
Founded: 1997
Business type: Military contractor
Based: Virginia Beach
Website: gts.us.com
Employees: about 150
Revenue: $100 million in 2020
Terry Spitzer, CEO of Global Technical Systems, describes his company as being on the “the pointy edge of the sword (providing) bleeding-edge technology —meaning that we’re so leading edge, it’s painful.”
For example, he said, when GTS started production on a kinetic energy storage device, the only researchers were at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California. “So, we went and hired all their scientists.”
GTS doesn’t have employees, Spitzer said. “We are very selective. We have 150 experts. Everyone we hire is a subject-matter expert.”
Spitzer, who served as a Navy electrical technician, began the company to provide engineering services to fix issues on the AEGIS combat system. He quickly learned that “the better way is to work towards production. Ninety percent of our company is production. In the Pentagon, I saw all the holes in the production and technological process. Most companies take 20-30 years to fill those holes. We take 18-24 months.”
Vice-President of Strategic Development Ben Davenport expanded GTS’s research and development focus on four major areas: “Command, Control, Communication, Computers, Cyber, Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (C5ISR); border-security surveillance systems; advanced munitions, including composite missiles, rocket motors and warheads; and kinetic energy storage devices for High Energy Weapons Systems and commercial electrical-grid storage.”
The culture at GTS is based upon Spitzer’s patriotism: “GTS’s mission is directed towards excellence. ... If we are asking these people to die for our country, then it’s our job to provide them with the best equipment possible. ... Also, it’s not practical for our country to rely solely on the Chinese for computer hardware. Not having this capability is a threat to our national security.”
Spitzer is proud that GTS makes every part of its products. “We develop American-made micro-servers that are superior to anything on the market.”
Micro-servers, Davenport said, are “the brains of computers, found in almost every device we use today.” Spitzer continued, “We develop them better and more securely than anyone can in, say, China, which is where the most microelectronics are produced.”
GTS has just moved into its new 630,000-square-foot production facility because of the demand for its products. Spitzer predicts expects GTS to triple its revenue in 2021 to $300 million and grow to 1100 employees — or experts — in the near future.
For more information, please contact Dan Bahen at dan.bahen@gts.us.com or 757-468-8751 x5130