Walsh Group: A Major Construction Group

The 112^th spot on the recent release of Forbes’ list of America’s largest private companies belong to Walsh Group. With a revenue of $3.62 billion, it is no wonder that this company, founded in 1898, will be part of the list.

Walsh Group is a family owned business that is in the construction industry. It is currently being managed by the fourth generation of Walsh. It was Matthew Myles Walsh who started the business of general building construction and it was not until 1949 that the company got incorporated in the State of Illinois. The business provides general contracting, design services and construction management to national clients through their subsidiaries: Archer Western Construction and Walsh Construction. Two of their recent major works include the Women’s College Hospital in Toronto Canada and the redevelopment of the Rainbow Hydro-Electric Station in Montana.

Employing over 5,000 engineers and skilled workers, the company continually invests over $450 million in equipment and other facilities to support their operations. The business is headquartered in Chicago, Illinois.

Schreiber Foods: More Than Just A Cheese Company

It is through their employees that their business succeeded. Through meaningful partnership with the people behind the production, the venture prospered from being a single production facility to a multi-billion industry. It is from this vantage point that Schreiber Foods would like to have everyone look at their business’ history.

Founded in 1945, the company is now the largest customer-brand dairy company in the world. Earning a revenue of $3.8 billion for last year, Schreiber Foods is also one of the largest privately owned companies in the United States. It is an employee owned company and is headquartered in Green Bay, Wisconsin. The business is in the production of cheese, yogurt and other private-label products and distributes their goods to grocery chains, wholesalers and even to fast food chains.

L.D. Schreiber founded the business together with partners Merlin G. Bush and Daniel D. Nusbaum. The company started with the name L.D. Schreiber Cheese Company. It was in 1980 that the name Schreiber Foods Inc. was used after 13 employees purchased the cheese operation from Schreiber in 1962.

During that time, the company was already operating in four plants: their original in Green Bay, their second in Missouri and two additional plants in Logan Utah and Monett, Missouri. It was also during this time that the company already started producing other products other than cheese. It was not until 1999, after Schreiber created an Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP) that the ownership of the company was turned over to its employees and other partners.

By 2000, the company already opened additional operations in Arizona, Missouri and Wisconsin in addition to their plants in California, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Nebraska and in Texas. They also have their international operations in countries like Austria, Brazil, China, India, Germany, Mexico and Uruguay. As of, the company employs a total of 7,000 workers across the globe.

Deltek: Project Management Solutions and Accountability

Anyone who is involved in project management knows that it can be extremely frustrating.  As if putting together a good project team is not difficult enough, creating a project that will encompass the client’s vision can be extremely difficult.  It takes clear objectives, a solid project plan, accountability, and experience.  Deltek is the leading provider of project management solutions for enterprise software and information systems.  The company provides these services for government contractors and professional services firms, including architecture, engineering, and consulting firms.

Deltek was founded in 1983 in Herndon, Virginia to be near federal contractors.  Working with government contracts gave them the experience in detailed project tracking since these contracts must be detailed.  They have helped 12,000 organizations improve business performance, streamline operations, and improve compliance.  Deltek’s Costpoint is a project management software that takes care of all aspects of the project including planning, tracking, and budgeting.  Deltek Services provides training and consulting services to ensure that businesses get the most out of their projects.

Artificial Solutions: Voice Recognition for Any Voice

Getting voice recognition software to work is the stuff that keeps comedians in business.  It can drive someone crazy when they try to get applications or phone systems to understand the human voice.  It involves screaming, repetition, and frustration.  Unfortunately, an entire customer experience can be destroyed by software that was supposed to make life easier.  The solution is to add a feature to computers and mobile devices that has the ability to interact with users in a conversational tone.  For companies that want to develop language tools, Artificial Solutions can make this feature happen.

Artificial Solutions has created a suite of products that addresses the different needs of its clients.  They call their technology Natural Language Interaction (“NLI”) which is an alternative to the stiff language restrictions of the past, where users sounded as if they were screaming at devices that was never going to understand them.  This could be frustrating not only for the user but for everyone listening nearby.

Artificial Solutions products work together with different types of devices.  Their Teneo product works with consumer devices so that users can talk to their devices instead of pushing buttons.  The Teneo Virtual Assistant can help build an interactive assistant for customer or employees interaction that is efficient enough to answer most questions without human interaction.  Normally, a company would have to build customized language recognition tools as an add-on to proprietary software.  Artificial Solutions eliminates that expensive and time-consuming project.  When properly implemented, this product should handle most questions that, in the past, would have required human intervention at a call center.  The product will also ensure that this is done in a consistent manner and can do so in 21 languages.  This will improve the customer experience for these companies and will reduce employee costs in the long run.    

Backflip Studios: Making Game Applications that Everybody Loves

There are a few ways to become a success in the gaming market, but none is more popular right now than to build popular applications for android devices and iOS devices.  Backflip Studios, located in Boulder, Colorado has captured this market and has now taken the attention of Hasbro, which has purchased 75% of the company’s equity.

Backflip likes to focus on games that are not just for the professional gamer who sits in his local game store waiting for the latest release.  They also create games for people who enjoy a game while sitting on a bus or waiting for a class to start and want something to download to their phone.  Backflip has top ranked games including DragonVale, recognized by Apple as its Top Grossing iPad app and Number four iPhone app of 2012.  Their apps have been downloaded over 300 million times.  With a full portfolio of games and the market power of Hasbro, Backflip will be able to continue to create and deliver more products that their clients love.