Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, September 19, 1993 TAG: 9309150354
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: PAT BROWN STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
Richardson and Kirmse Engineering Inc., a quietly growing Roanoke company, is quick to point out it is not making the decisions about the fate of defense operations. Rather, the company's engineers have created eight software systems to be used by all four branches of the military as they consider bases' futures.
The software systems make it possible to log and store detailed inventories of the military's real estate. And they pack the power to project the cost of closing an installation or of changing its mission.
For example, explained R&K president E. James Kirmse, a military planner could figure ahead of time the price of closing a base in Panama and the cost of disbursing its troops and equipment to other locations in the United States and overseas. A graphics package can show the floor plan of a single room or map an entire installation. Another system can tell where an enlisted man sleeps, eats and works.
R&K is integrating its system with that of another company so decisions about closing a base also will include the economic impact such a move would have on the surrounding community.
"We play `what if' scenarios," Kirmse said. "A military planner can ask himself, `What will it cost if we moved these units from this base to that base? Do I close Base A or Base B, and where should I move the troops?' "
Despite dealing in high-stakes topics, R&K Engineering itself keeps a low profile. Many in Roanoke probably don't know about the 51-employee company on the third floor of Campbell Court, the office space above the Valley Metro and Greyhound bus terminals in downtown Roanoke.
Also not widely known is that this 9-year-old company has attracted a number of engineers and computer analysts to Roanoke and brings approximately 100 people a year to the city for training.
Kirmse and Bill Richardson, who is now vice president, started the company in 1984. They credit their growth to a combination of talents: their training as engineers and their understanding of the military environment.
"We know how the military operates," Kirmse said. "We understand their needs."
"If you are talking about moving an 18,000-man division, you are actually talking about moving 30,000 to 60,000 people, including wives and children. You have to take into account marriage rates, family housing, child-care needs, how big the commissaries should be. Then you need to consider barracks, artillery ranges, warehouses, runways, hangars. It's very complicated."
For the other half of the company's formula, Kirmse and Richardson credit Gail Bolt, R&K's vice president and computer analyst. She joined the two engineers shortly after they started the company and began to build its computer programming staff.
At first she had trouble finding people she wanted to hire. In 1984, she said, colleges were preparing students to use computer programs, but she was looking for employees who could create systems.
So, she spent a great deal of time training employees.
"The key is to find people who are versatile," she said, adding that now computer science graduates of Virginia Tech are "both well-trained and well-rounded," with knowledge of a number of computer skills and languages.
About half the company's staff are systems analysts; the others are engineers and planners.
"Many are retired military officers," said Kirmse, explaining that their military management skills bolster the company's "functional expertise."
Kirmse served in the Army and later worked as a civilian for the Navy. Richardson, who graduated from Roanoke's Patrick Henry High School and Virginia Military Institute, served two years of active duty with the Army Corps of Engineers.
"We always have war stories floating around the office," Bolt said. One employee's West Point blanket competes for wall space with banners from Virginia Tech and the University of Virginia.
Kirmse, Richardson and Bolt met when they all worked for Hayes Seay Mattern and Mattern, an architectural and engineering firm based in Roanoke.
Kirmse moved to Roanoke in 1974 because he was tired of traveling for engineering firms and weary of big city bustle.
"For the first time in my life, I looked for a location first and then found a job," he said.
He describes his company's success as "beyond my wildest dreams" and himself as "doing exactly what I want to do."
Bolt left Washington for Western Virginia because her husband wanted a slower pace. "But I need a city," she told her spouse. They settled on Roanoke.
These days, R&K is again hiring engineers and computer analysts. "People are always surprised," Bolt said, when they learn that a company involved in sophisticated computer systems is located in Southwest Virginia.
"They say, `Oh, my gosh! That's going on in Roanoke?' "
Kirmse uses military jargon to describe what he calls his staff's dedication. "There are a lot of heroes in this firm," he said. "They make sure we meet our deadlines, and they make sure it [a new program] will work."
Bolt's best example was of an Army contract. The firm was asked to develop software for a computer system that allowed individual unit commanders to calculate their own military readiness. With only three months to accomplish the mission, it was a scramble, she said.
"If the general wants something, you have to get it," Richardson said.
The company's sights are set on a December 1994 deadline for a system that will include a report to Congress. The contract for the $3 million deal was signed earlier this month, and it combines R&K's data and systems with another firm's cost-estimating programs.
The end result is software enabling the military to use information on the physical condition of structures to project maintenance costs.
"The military always had a database," explained Kirmse, "but it wasn't accurate. It was hard to use, so nobody kept it up."
With military cutbacks and base closures imminent, inventories of space, personnel and capabilities suddenly have become important.
When R&K gets such data updated, "people are paying closer attention. It's an important area, so it's getting a new look," the company president said. Kirmse explained that facility surveys used to take months to collect and were out of date before they could be published.
Now, explained Bolt, they are in place, updated every three months and available in two hours or less.
To win such contracts, Richardson scrutinizes the Business Daily, a Department of Commerce publication that's a shopping list of items and services government agencies want to buy. He oversees proposal writing, compiling thick, spiral-bound books that detail the company's capabilities for prospective customers.
R&K has 40 contracts in place, half of them with the Army Corps of Engineers.
They are the result of competition that often pits R&K against much larger companies. The Roanoke outfit goes up against McDonnell Douglas Corp. or Electronic Data Systems Corp., the company Ross Perot sold to General Motors Corp.
Kirmse admits that the competition is tough, but he sees his company's size as an advantage.
"The decision makers are very close to and part of every project," he said. "For us to compete in this arena with these bigger firms, we must be tremendously motivated, and we must produce quality."
Being small, he said "has allowed us to take some paths that were perhaps a little risky."
"We don't see other companies doing what we are doing," Kirmse said. "Architectural and engineering firms are software users. Computer companies build software programs. We integrate functional knowledge and custom-design systems."
Kirmse said his company is sometimes hired to redesign systems larger companies have designed, so they will do what their military customers want them to do.
"One reason is that you can't get people to tell you what they want," he explained.
Once R&K begins showing a client the kinds of problems they can solve, clients catch on, Richardson said. "They say, `I sure wish it could do this [other task], too!' " So R&K modifies the program to perform an additional job.
"We design for what the user needs," said Kirmse.
For the past nine years, R&K has enjoyed its local anonymity. Success is changing all that.
There are now two other offices. One in San Antonio, Texas, keeps five staff members close to a special four-year project that will inventory and graphically describe every inch of Fort Sam Houston, the Army's health-services center. Another office, in Alexandria, has 12 staffers who manage projects and acts as liaison with the company's Washington-based military clients.
On Oct. 1, R&K will move to new headquarters at 707 Fifth St. N.E. across from Roanoke's main post office on Rutherford Avenue
But with so much of their success tied to the military, R&K principals may be asking themselves if they have hitched themselves to a falling star.
"Our systems have a tremendous potential in commercial applications and for state universities," Richardson said.
"Yes, it would be affordable to a state university," Kirmse added. "No matter how big or small the military is, it will still be necessary to plan.
"We started designing these systems to evaluate change under the buildup during the term of Ronald Reagan. These same systems can be used to analyze the draw-down under Bill Clinton.
"We think we have saved the taxpayers a great deal of money."
by CNB