ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, March 17, 1996 TAG: 9603180008
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-3 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG
SOURCE: ELISSA MILENKY STAFF WRITER
Fiber & Sensor Technologies began in 1990 with a patent for an invention no one else wanted. Today, the Blacksburg fiber-optics company has become one of the state's fastest-growing small businesses with annual revenues in excess of $2 million.
The company specializes in fiber-optic sensors and gauges that measure temperature, strain and pressure on everything from highway support columns to airplane wings.
Electrical sensors already are used to measure many of the same functions, said Bill Tolpegin, the company's marketing director.
But the fiber-based sensors, which are still new to the marketplace, are more durable and can handle higher temperatures and more strain in fatigue testing.
"We've got a really good jump in the fiber-optic sensor business, which is destined to become big business," said Kent Murphy, the company's president and one of its founders. "Hopefully, we'll be part of that."
The company began in 1990 when Murphy, then a Virginia Tech student, and Tech professor Rick Claus developed the fiber-optic sensor and patented the idea. The two had patented other products, which they sold to outside companies, but no one was interested in the sensor.
"It all seemed sort of too out there for people," said Murphy, now a full-time faculty member at Tech.
Instead of relying on a change of heart, the two licensed the product themselves and started F&S Technologies with their innovation. At first, the company was operated out of Murphy's home. Once F&S began winning contracts, it was moved to a barn in Christiansburg behind Wal-Mart in the Marketplace shopping center that had once been used by Virginia Tech.
The barn, which had no air conditioning, was rented for $3 per square foot. But the company grew during its three years in the barn, eventually hiring about 20 people. By 1995, F&S was ready for a new air-conditioned building.
The company relocated in July to an 8,000-square-foot facility in the Blacksburg Industrial Park, hiring more people for a total of 28 employees. As for the barn, it has since been taken over by a college fraternity, Murphy said.
"I think they're having more fun than we did," he joked.
F&S sells its fiber-optic sensors and gauges primarily in three markets: aerospace; research and development - where new materials are tested under certain stresses, for example; and civil structures such as bridges.
One of the company's bigger contracts now is with defense contractor Northrop Grumman. F&S is providing sensors to measure pressure and strain on a new airplane wing, referred to as the "smart" wing, that the defense company is developing.
"Production for smart wings is probably a long way off," Murphy said.
The company also is getting into other markets such as communication and network hardware, medical devices and biosensors, which would measure the presence and concentration of pathogens in blood.
The fast pace at which the company is growing is best represented by its new building. The landscaping around the facility is far from mature, the walls in the conference room are practically bare of decoration, but the company already is talking about an expansion.
"We're putting people in rooms where we have copy machines," Tolpegin said. "We're already too big for this space."
During the next few months, F&S also plans to build a fiber-optic draw tower, which will produce the thin, thread-like fiber needed to make its sensors. Currently, F&S gets all of its fiber from Virginia Tech's draw tower.
All of this activity may explain why F&S recently received two state awards as one of the top 50 private fast-growing companies in Virginia and one of the fastest-growing private high-tech firms in the state. The regional Center for Innovative Technology office nominated F&S for the awards.
"It's a young company and it's doing very well," said Jim Stewart head of the regional CIT office.
LENGTH: Medium: 86 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: ALAN KIM/Staff. 1. With the help of a microscope andby CNBmicrometers for precise positioning, Timothy Bailey, development
technician with Fiber & Sensor Technologies, joins a sensor between
two strands of fiber optic wire. color. 2. Fiber & Sensor
Technologies products, priced between $100 and $450, range from
pressure sensors that will be used in research for active flight
control wings (upper left) to sensors designed to detect minute
changes in expansion, contraction, and temperature, such as the one
in the foreground, which is epoxy-fused to a strand of gold-coated
glass fiber.