Ed Lavin made his mark in the business world quickly. In only a few years peddling business alarm systems for ADT in New York City he was the company’s number one salesman in the world.
“”After that it was hard to underachieve,”” the self-described workaholic recalls somberly in an interview.
“”It was uncomfortable to underachieve.””
The seriousness lasts a minute. “”Then,”” he laughs, “”I went into the phone business and underachieved.””
Maybe initially. However, 34 years later no one can say Lavin’s an also-ran in the industry. He’s bought and sold some of the biggest telecommunications VARs on both sides of the border.
Today he’s in the process of resuscitating his first success here, now called Delphi Solutions Corp. of Markham, Ont, an office phone and network services provider. He talks as if it’s his last hurrah.
The company had once been called Canadian Telecommunications Group Inc., born in 1980 from deregulation of the phone equipment industry. After years of honing his skills selling Ericsson switches in a deregulated America, Lavin moved north and set up CTG with Michael Miville to take advantage of what he knew about selling PBXs on the open market.
The hard-nosed Yankee struck it big. After four years — and a lot of enemies — CTG went public. In 1986 it was bought by British Telecom. Two years after that Lavin went back to the U.S. to become head of the distribution business of TIE Communications, then CEO of Chicago-based Williams Communications and following that owner of Claricom Networks.
In the meantime, CTG went though several mergers and acquisitions before a management buyout set it free again. As Delphi Solutions it was bought in 2000 by Cannect Communications, a competitive local exchange company (CLEC) hoping to ride another degregulation wave. Instead, Cannect went into receivership five months later.
Lavin, who by this time headed a U.S. investment group, had always looked fondly back at the CTG years. He came north again.
This time, however, the blonde hair is receeding and the man who says he was a bit of a cowboy is showing his age (although not enough to prevent the company’s Web page from calling him a “”visionary””).
“”I’m a little bit more suppressed,”” he confesses, “”only because experience has taught us not to be so optimistic.””
Although in good shape when he took over in 2001, Lavin says Delphi had become “”distracted”” and wasn’t very profitable.
One of the first things the new management did was add Nortel Networks gear to its product line to extend offerings to large businesses, and sign partnerships with carriers to offer network services. There was also an internal reorganization with the creation of regional managers so programs can be locally tailored.
Just over a year ago it launched network services bundles including local and long-distance calling and high speed Internet service. In September it added a telecommunications disaster recovery solution in partnership with a U.S. firm.
There’s even been a southern strategy, adding two offices in Vermont through an acquisition to go along with 11 in this country. Lavin hopes to do $35 million in revenues this year, mostly in installing phone exchanges. Five years from now he’d like to be doing $50 million, most in delivering network phone services in partnership with telcos.
And, he says, maybe taking the company public for the second time.
His employees, he admits, wonder how long he’ll stay given his history. But he distinguishes his return to the U.S. as a period when he fixed companies for resale, as opposed to building a legacy.
“”This is more personal,”” he says of coming back to Delphi. “”I would like this to be more of a small cluster of people involved in a business that stays for a long time, not getting sold off to some conglomerate. I don’t choose to do that again. This was a coming home exercise.””