Atul Gupta Lecture (2007)

Atul Gupta Chairman & CEO Advanced Technologies Group, Inc.

Having studied economics and physics with a concentration in Computer Science at Grinnell College proves that Atul Gupta was keen on learning from the very beginning. This passion to constantly stretch his intelligence has been with Gupta since the beginning and has continued to be a priority when making career moves as well as decisions for his own company, Advanced Technologies Group, Inc.

Before founding ATG, Atul began his career working for the research department at Principal financial group. While researching technology to make Principal more competitive, Gupta became involved with several other companies. Down the road Principal came to Gupta and offered him the position of CIO. Taking this position would mean that he would receive a 40% salary decrease, but this didn't stop him from capitalizing on this priceless learning opportunity. According to Atul, "Income growth is not equal to career growth." In his mind, just being the CIO of Principal was equal to being paid to learn! From here he launched his own company, ATG.

Advanced Technologies Group Inc. was created to help customers implement new technology into their businesses. In simple terms they installed computers and servers for companies, but in the broad spectrum they did much more. They were focused on becoming strategically important to their customers. The company drastically downsized their customer database and decided to stick with a few of the original companies who were there from the beginning. ATG knew they couldn't be the best in product innovation so they honed in on their strengths, one of which was process innovation.

This company now is an expert at running prisons and halfway houses across the United States. Before they became what they are today, Atul stated a few of ATG's basic guidelines for success. There are four main criteria:

1. Take only smart customers - this means ATG must make sure the risk they're taking to give a company 6 months of setup time is worth it.
2. Executive Leadership must be involved - ATG cannot afford putting their time and money into a company if the head of that department isn't completely committed to staying on board for the long haul.
3. All ATG employees must be entrepreneurs - Atul talked about making sure all of his employees had a strong interest in learning a customer's business. ATG cannot be successful unless everyone in the hierarchy knows what's going on above and below them at all times.
4. They must worry about their customer's success - ATG's success is measured purely on the success of it's customers.

Atul was proud to announce that since 1991, there have been a total of 47 staff employed at Advanced Technologies Inc., and they have only lost 9 employees through the years. Of those 9, only 3 have been let go. This dedication and perseverance has been a big part of what makes ATG the brilliant company it is today. All employees are compensated for being an entrepreneur everyday and for taking the risk to join such a small company. This risk is rewarded by a ranking system. Employees are ranked on several attributes, one being how much they've learned through the years. This again promotes one of Atul's basic life values of constantly learning. After the ranking of salaries, each employee is given a check on Thanksgiving to say exactly that, 'Thank You'.

ATG is recognized locally as one of the most progressive and technically savvy consulting firms. This is reflected in ATG being designated as Iowa's only Microsoft Certified Gold Partner in both Enterprise Systems and E-business. ATG was ranked to be among the 500 fastest growing private companies in US by Inc 500 in 2001, 2002, and 2003. Nationally recognized as one of the leading experts for developing systems for correctional agencies, ATG is the only company to offer the complete portfolio of software needed to support these government agencies. Gupta has served on advisory committees of several major computer technology companies including Intel, Microsoft, AST, Compaq, and Novell, and he was named a finalist for CEO of the Year (small/medium companies) by the Technology Association of Iowa's 2007 Prometheus Awards Committee