View from the Top: CalAmp CEO – Michael Burdiek
MMichael Burdiek, CEO of CalAmp, a pioneer in the global mobile connected economy, sits down with Jeanne Yurman to discuss the company’s evolution on this edition of View from the Top.
The video above captures Burdiek’s full conversation, which is detailed below in an abbreviated transcript that was lightly edited for clarity.
Jeanne Yurman: Connectivity, real-time analytics and data in motion, a pioneer in telematics, this is what CalAmp will tell you are the key factors in the new connected economy. The company is based in Irvine, California, and trades here at the Nasdaq under the ticker symbol CAMP. I'm Jeanne Yurman and joining us today for View from The Top is CalAmp CEO, Michael Burdiek. Nice to see you.
Michael Burdiek: Nice to see you also. Thanks for having me.
Jeanne Yurman: Great to have you here. Let’s talk about CalAmp. You guys have been around since the early eighties. You were once known for amplifiers.
Michael Burdiek: Correct.
Jeanne Yurman: But you do so much more now. Give us a sense of what you guys do and a little bit of the company's evolution.
Michael Burdiek: Sure. Well, today, we consider ourselves to be a pioneer in the global mobile connected economy. We provide solutions that help provide visibility and traceability of mobile assets, their passengers and contents anywhere in the world at any moment in time. And we've transformed ourselves pretty dramatically over the years. I've been part of actually two transformations at CalAmp, this being the second and perhaps the most profound. We're really evolving away from being purely an IOT device company and providing solutions across a range of different mobile vertical market applications targeting really interesting new growth opportunities like transportation logistics, as an example.
Jeanne Yurman: When you mapped out this evolution, what were some of the trends that drove your decision making?
Michael Burdiek: Sure. Well, as an arms dealer to the telematics world, we always felt there was an opportunity to do more, move up the stack as they say. And given that we had that very strong position as a telematics device supplier, we saw many opportunities to provide solutions where others weren't providing them adequately or at all. We saw an opening, and we felt that we could leverage our pedigree and our global footprint to really add more value. We really focused on trying to build a range of different software and service solutions, SaaS solutions, targeting some of these interesting growth verticals.
Jeanne Yurman: Software as a service of course. Looking at some of the use cases for your technology, give us a sense of a sampling of where you guys might show up.
Michael Burdiek: Sure. Well, there are a couple, actually, one in the school bus market. If you have children and you dropped them off at the bus stop, you often wonder, "Well is the bus going to be there? Are they on the right bus? Are they going to get taken to school and arrive there on time?" We have a solution that allows us to track the bus. Not only track the bus, but actually report to the parents who are interested in their children, and the time of arrival, and the time of drop-off on the bus route where the bus actually is. It's called Here Comes the Bus, and it's all powered by CalAmp telematics devices and SaaS solution. So that's really an interesting use case.
Jeanne Yurman: A lot of folks will know one of the companies you acquired just a few years ago, LoJack.
Michael Burdiek: Correct.
Jeanne Yurman: How do they factor into your business?
Michael Burdiek: Well, LoJack was a very well-known consumer brand providing stolen vehicle recovery services both in the United States and through a network of licensees outside the US. We saw that brand recognition is a really great opportunity to provide connected car solutions through the LoJack channel and brand them as LoJack. And really help transform what LoJack had formally been, which was really a legacy technology provider who had really not invested to the level that they needed to in order to be contemporary and deliver consumer expectations as relates to what's possible through telematic services. We're in the process of transforming that business, and we're very, very pleased with the progress we've made, especially outside the United States to the licensee network.
Jeanne Yurman: Well, speaking of outside the United States, your customer base really is global. So give us a sense of where we would find CalAmp, some of your biggest markets, where you might be looking to expand?
Michael Burdiek: That's a great question. If I look at my time with CalAmp, when I started as CEO back in in 2011, a long time ago, at that point in time, we were just a little over a hundred million dollars in revenue. Last year, we were almost a hundred million dollars of revenue outside the United States. Back in 2011, we had almost zero dollars of revenue outside the US. We’ve really transformed ourselves radically, really, in terms of being a global player.
We provide telematics devices and telematics solutions to customers in a range of different channels, including transportation logistics. Through our LoJack international licensees, we provide connected car solutions, and we support a whole range of different fleet management applications both directly through end customers or through a set of partners.
Jeanne Yurman: With any business, of course, there are ups and downs and challenges. What have been the biggest challenges of the business that CalAmp is in?
Michael Burdiek: Well, transformation is hard. Going from being a hardware supplier historically to being a software and solutions provider, is very, very difficult. And I would say when you're in transformation, when you're pioneering, no one understands until the pioneering is done. And I think that's the biggest, biggest challenge. That's an external challenge with investors. That's an internal challenge with people who have been with the company a long time, used to doing things a certain way. The evolution and transformation is really an internal and external effort. And it's quite challenging, but it's something that I really enjoy doing. I think it's embraced by a lot of people, and hopefully soon by investors.
Jeanne Yurman: How would you describe the evolution of your leadership as CEO of CalAmp from your first year to where you are now?
Michael Burdiek: I think it's an understanding of how important a team is and having the right people on the team. I talked earlier about how difficult it is to transform a business, especially one that's been in business as long as CalAmp. And if you don't have the people on your team who believe in the vision, who are willing to take on the challenge of executing on a strategy, you're not going to be very, very successful. I think earlier in my career I thought it was more of a singular effort, sort of an individual contributor sort of activity. But it's really not, it's all about the team and relying on the team and trusting the team to really be successful in executing on the strategy.
We strive to build a bridge between today and a future where we provide real-time visibility on the locations and conditions of passengers, vehicles and contents. In the process, we’ll enable more efficient utilization of assets and natural resources, assure the safety of precious cargo, and improve road safety to save lives.Michael Burdiek, President and CEO, CalAmp
Jeanne Yurman: Taking a look at the next one to two years, how do you see CalAmp rewriting tomorrow?
Michael Burdiek: Well, one to two years, and years after that, we see ourselves building a bridge between today and a future where we can provide real-time visibility on the location and conditions of passengers, the vehicles and the contents. And in the process, put in place more efficient asset utilization, more efficient use of natural resources, assure the safety of fragile and precious and perishable cargo. And in the process, improve road safety and help save lives.
About Nasdaq View from the Top
View from the Top documents candid conversations and reflections with Nasdaq-listed company CEOs on business trends and innovations, corporate growth strategies, and matters of the market. These dynamic one-on-one conversations take place from Nasdaq’s global Client Experience Center, located in the heart of New York, in Times Square.
About CalAmp
Based in Irvine, CA - CalAmp is a telematics pioneer leading transformation in the connected vehicle and Industrial Internet of Machines marketplace. Through software applications, scalable cloud services and intelligent devices CalAmp inspires a new world of daring opportunities. Industries like fleet transportation, insurance, consumer goods and construction are discovering new ways to drive productivity with their complete end-to-end telematics solutions. Learn more about CalAmp at https://www.calamp.com/