Keystone Computers fight odds against giant tech companies and survives.

BY ADAM WAUD

As owners of Keystone Computer Solutions, Joe and Dorothy Richburg are all too familiar with the competitive IT consulting market in the Twin Cities. With more than 250 companies -- large and small, local and international -- vying for a piece of the action, the Richburgs said they are convinced it takes more than the right technology and smarter-than-average personnel.

"Dorothy and I are hands-on folks," Joe Richburg said. "A lot of people we work with, we have a personal relationship with."

Because of preconceived notions about who works in IT, African Americans must outshine their competition in order to succeed in this business, he said.

"We have to get through the biases and service [clients] effectively,"
Joe Richburg said. "We have to be better because we have to overcome perceptions."

The Richburgs founded the company in 1987 as a means to independently market themselves and their technical skills. Dorothy was a mainframe programmer and Joe -- who had been recently laid off from Control Data
-- was looking for engineering-technologies work; specifically CAD/CAM, or computer-aided design and manufacturing.

He said consulting opportunities didn't materialize for him, at first, and that Dorothy carried the company for 10 years, while he took a job with 3M.

Keystone now has about 30 employees and is comprised of two main divisions. The first division provides staff augmentation for large, Fortune 500 companies.

"We fulfill staffing needs for large corporations and place our employees on their sites to work on projects," Joe Richburg said said.

The other division aims to provide computer- and network-infrastructure support for small to midsize companies. Keystone puts the small businesses on a maintenance schedule and provides technical emergency support. Joe Richburg said Keystone services keep computers running at peak performance at all times and eliminates the need for on-site administrators.

"We fulfill a need," he said. "These companies do not always need to have someone there full-time -- information technology can be very complicated and it is of benefit to small and medium sized companies to have things handled professionally."

He said the key to Keystone's success is expert service and the ability to deliver the right technology to clients. He added that effective communication is also important.

"We try to be attentive to customers needs," he said. "We try to understand the technological as well as non-quantifiable needs."

Its strategy seems to work. Keystone's client base includes organizations such as General Mills, Fortis, Pillsbury, Imation, Honeywell, IDS/American Express, Target Corporation, United Healthcare, Northwest Airlines, ECOLABS, the University of Minnesota and Metropolitan Economic Development Association, or MEDA.

Gary Hobart, director of business systems and technology at MEDA, said it's Keystone's industriousness and ability to see the big picture that sets it apart.

"They don't just fix a problem," he said. "They have the ability to understand our environment and are willing to go the extra mile."

After enduring the market downturn in past years, Joe Richburg said his company was able to hold on and eliminate very few employees.

"We just hunkered down and cut the expenses, the fluff -- not that there was much fluff," he said. "We had a prioritization of expense reduction
-- employee salaries are the last to go, although we were very fortunate."

He said he is now seeing an upturn in the economy; an increase in demand for business has been a strong indicator of that upturn, Joe Richburg said. He cited Keystone's recently won contract with the U.S. Corp of Army Engineers to outsource some of their computer help desk.

"I am positive about the prognosis for the industry and Keystone in particular," he said. "Those companies that have survived will be successful because we have weathered a big storm."

And, with Keystone's penchant for personal relationships, they should do more than withstand the ups and downs -- even with all the competition.