Taking Government Know-How to the Private Sector

For three years, George C. Newstrom kept his finger on the pulse of Virginia's technological needs as secretary of technology under former governor Mark R. Warner. Now he's leveraging his government experience to help a Fairfax company expand its services to federal and state agencies.

This is Newstrom's first week on the job as president and chief operating officer of Lee Technologies , which provides back-end mechanical and electrical support equipment that keeps information technology systems up and running. Lee Technologies gets about 80 percent of its business from commercial companies such as IBM , Microsoft Corp. and Verizon Wireless . Newstrom plans to increase the company's government offerings to "make the customer mix a bit more robust."

"We want to change the business model from incremental growth to exponential growth," said Newstrom, who led the Herndon-based operations of EDS , an IT company, for 28 years. "Moving to more government business lends itself very heartily to that goal."

Newstrom also plans to take advantage of the growing number of research labs and educational facilities going up in the area, all of which will need a strong computer infrastructure.

"This company has not looked at that potential," he said. "Universities have a much higher need for lab space these days, and there's a lot of building going on."

Fairfax Firms Dominate State List

Fairfax County seems to have the technology market cornered.

Of the 50 fastest-growing technology companies in Virginia, 36 -- or 72 percent -- are in the county, according to an annual list compiled by accounting and consulting giant Deloitte & Touche LLP and the Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr law firm.

Induslogic Inc. of Vienna topped the list with 19,210 percent revenue growth since 2001. The company, which provides outsourced development of software, last week announced a merger with Bonus Technology , a New Jersey company that has 250 engineers in Ukraine. The company's new name is GlobalLogic .

Abraxas Corp. of McLean, which provides global risk mitigation services, came in second, with 12,798 percent growth over the past five years. Two Loudoun County companies were the only non-Fairfax businesses in the top 10.

G&B Solutions Inc. of McLean, LanceSoft Inc. of Chantilly, eStara Inc. of Reston, Rivermine Software and Argon ST Inc. , both of Fairfax, and Exostar Inc. of Herndon topped the list. They all achieved more than 1,000 percent revenue growth since 2001.

Kim Hart can be reached athartk@washpost.com.