ELECTRO STANDARDS does business with major corporations and the military, and it employs 90 people, but it's still run by its founder, Raymond Sepe Sr., and his wife and sons. From left: Michael, Raymond Sr., Brenda, Raymond Jr. and Kenneth Sepe.
Company Profile
Electro Standards Laboratories
Owner: Raymond B. Sepe Sr.,
president and CEO
Type of business: Telecommunications engineering
Location: 36 Western Industrial Drive, Cranston
Employees: 90
Year founded: 1976
Annual Revenue: WND
Growing company helps clients turn research into telecom technology
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There’s a lot going on at Electro Standards Laboratories, a Cranston company that can design, manufacture and install almost any type of cable or switch for telecommunications networks.
Raymond Sepe Sr. founded the business 30 years ago – after having led engineering efforts at other companies, including Raytheon. The CEO, trained in electrical engineering at the University of Rhode Island, now oversees market growth and technology, while his wife, Brenda Sepe, serves as chief financial officer and each of their three sons manages a separate aspect of the business.
The company is broken into three primary departments: research and development, design and assembly, and network installation.
Raymond B. Sepe Jr., who holds a doctorate in electronics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, runs the R&D department, which is filled with prototypes of electronic motors, some housed in clear plastic cases, making visible their colorful circuits and metal parts.
“We tell our customers and clients to treat us like an extension of [their] laboratory,” Raymond Jr. said. The R&D department helps clients including the U.S. government to turn research – often from MIT – into usable technology.
For certain jobs, Uncle Sam also enlists the help of another Sepe brother: Kenneth E. Sepe, an electrical engineer who graduated from Cornell University.
In an interview, Kenneth Sepe recalled a request from a government agency that asked him to build a customized fiber-optic switch – for delivery in just two weeks. He and his staff worked long hours to get the job done, but they were able to deliver.
“They ended up buying a 1,000 of these switches, that we developed three weeks before,” Kenneth recalled.
Perhaps the most outgoing of the three brothers, Michael J. Sepe operates the network services division, whose crews install telecommunications networks in commercial and residential structures across the country and in Europe.
Michael Sepe launched the installation business in the late 1980s, after he graduated from Worcester Polytechnic Institute with a degree in industrial engineering. His first big client was a division of Nynex, which fueled the growth of his department and put it on the map.
The network services department gives Electro Standards an outlet for its products, and also serves as the company’s “eyes and ears” in the field, where employees can observe the latest technology trends, Michael said.
Though Electro Standards is a family-owned and operated business, the Sepes don’t take their personal relationships to the office.
“Even though Ray is my husband, when we are at work we are not husband and wife,” Brenda Sepe said. “We keep things separate.”
That much is clear from the manner in which the family members address each other. At work, instead of saying “Mom” and “Dad,” the sons call their mother “Brenda” and their father “Ray Sr.”
Michael Sepe noted that keeping family and business separate prevents their company from appearing like just a “mom-and-pop” operation – which it most certainly is not – and helps it appeal to its high-profile clients.
In fact, he said, Electro Standards provided many of the cables and switches used to rebuild the data infrastructure on Wall Street in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. It also has installed networks for GTECH, both here and abroad, and has expanded to the residential market, providing network services for the luxury condos at the Carnegie Abbey Club in Portsmouth, for example.
On the R&D side of the business, Electro Standards is has been contracted by the U.S. Navy to develop an electromagnetic motor for launching jets from aircraft carriers, to eventually replace the steam-piston engines the Navy uses today.
The new “linear” motors also could be used in hybrid autos, mining equipment, and propulsion systems for aircraft, boats and other vehicles, according to the company.
Raymond Jr., who is heading up the effort, says the contract has put Electro Standards in a race to hire more engineers to get the job done. “We’re actively looking for people,” he said, but it’s been difficult to draw qualified employees from the Boston area.
Indeed, Raymond Sr. believes recruiting is the key to growing the company. “I can double the size of this company in one year,” he said, “as long as I have the people to do it.”
