EDC helping to keep local company alive

Citrus County Chronicle, September 7, 2001
By CHERI HARRIS

Champs Software Inc. gets state grant to get vital training for employees

A small Citrus County software company facing extinction unless employees learned new skills found helping hands at Citrus County’s Economic Development Council and CLM Works.

Brett Wattles, interim executive director of the EDC, said Thursday at an EDC executive board meeting that Champs Software Inc. had been awarded a state grant to retrain employees.

Mike Melfi, director of business development at Champs Software, said it is difficult to find qualified technical employees in the region. He noted that the software development company’s major competitors are in big cities, where the pool of skilled labor is much larger.

“We really don’t have that luxury. We have to train from within, and technology changes so quickly, it’s a big challenge, and it’s very costly to do that,” Melfi said. “So we went to the EDC and met with Brett Wattles and asked if there were any programs available that could help us to preserve the employees that worked for us by giving them the training they need in order for us to remain competitive.” Melfi said if Champs had been unable to obtain the grant, the company, which has been in Citrus County for about 25 years, could have been forced out of business.

With the grant for training, Melfi said about 15 full-time jobs were saved.

Wattles said the jobs are high paying for Citrus County. When Champs contacted the EDC, Wattles said he referred the company to Rusty Skinner, the executive vice president at CLM Works in Ocala.

“It’s a perfect example of teamwork,” Wattles said. Skinner said the state grant will pay about $44,000 for training for Champs Software employees.

Melfi said Champs Software develops computerized maintenance management software and services.

“Our software helps to track the maintenance performance of sophisticated equipment,” Melfi said.

He said Champs Software clients include Quaker Oats, Disneyland Paris, Hershey Foods, Georgia-Pacific and 26 nuclear plants worldwide.

Melfi said Champs Software is owned privately by Chandra Patel, but most of its competitors are large, publicly held companies.

“There’s a lot of challenges that go with that,” Melfi said, “and that’s why we appreciate the state for giving us some funds to allow us to improve our employees’ portfolio of knowledge.”

In other EDC business, executive board members reviewed findings from an annual financial audit conducted by Williams, McCranie & Sutton, P.A. The audit showed that the EDC’s bookkeeping practices conformed with generally accepted accounting principles, but noted that cash received from the EDC barbecue didn’t correspond directly with ticket sales.

In 2000, profits from the EDC barbecue represented 5 percent of the EDC’s annual revenue.

See September 7, 2001 issue of Citrus County Chronicle for original article.