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Justice Technology Corp.
Business: Telecommunications
Location: Culver City
Revenue Growth: 394%
Cutting deals that’s the heart of Justice Technology Corp.’s business, and the way the company has grown from zero to $100 million (projected 1998 revenues) since starting up in 1993, says founder and President David Glickman.
“In this business, it’s about having the lowest cost, and the lowest cost is about negotiations, and keeping your overhead low,” says Glickman.
The core of Justice Technology’s business is wholesaling international telephone access to the big boys of the phone world, including Sprint Corp., AT & T;, or anybody else willing to fork over a minimum of $50,000 a month.
“We are the carriers’ carrier,” says Glickman. “About 60 percent of our business is selling wholesale to other carriers. You might be using Sprint, but they will route the call through bandwidth we own.”
In a sense, Justice Technology hardly exists: It owns no undersea cables, or satellites, or even underground telephone cables in the United states. Justice Technology only rents access called bandwidth on satellites and international cables, and then resells that bandwidth to others. About 40 percent of the business comes from selling access to retail customers, for as little as $200 a month.
For all of its success, the company is nothing more than a web of contracts in the United States and around the world. Justice is particularly strong in South America and the Middle East.
Getting business is about striking a deal, says Glickman, 33, a Wharton School grad. “Let’s say we want to get into a South American nation. We need lowest cost. So I might say to the South American phone company, ‘We will give you access to Europe at our cost, if you will give us access to your nation for 5 cents a minute.’ Then we get bandwidth on an undersea cable for 2 cents a minute, and sell it all (to a long-distance carrier like AT & T;) for 8 cents a minute,” leaving Glickman a gross margin of 1 cent per minute.
Why would AT & T; buy from Justice? “They might have an old contract, and they might be buying at 10 cents a minute,” he says.
Other Glickman advice: “Surround yourself with people who are smarter than you are, and then listen to them.”
By the way, Glickman anticipates buying bandwidth on undersea cables recently laid by Gary Winnick, the Beverly Hills financier, though his newly public company Global Crossing Ltd.
“If the price is right,” says Glickman.
Benjamin Mark Cole