When Dave Baughn, Lee Behar, Mike Wade and Tyler York launched WYRE Technology in 2021, they found a way to turn the challenges of the pandemic into an opportunity.
“Our biggest challenge was, and is, acquiring new customers,” says York, the IT company’s CEO. “There was a lot of opportunity because people weren’t out there. Nobody was getting hit on to go out for coffee and talk.
“We reached out to people who hadn’t been reached out to in a year, and we found a lot of them were done with (staying in) and open to seeing what was out there.”
WYRE found enough of those people to rack up $750,000 in sales in 2022, its first full year of operation. York estimates that the company will more than triple that, to $2.5 million, in 2024.
Heady stuff, made even more so by the fact that WYRE was named Tech Company of the Year in September, at the Chattanooga Technology Council’s fifth annual TechX awards.
“WYRE Technology is a fast-growing managed services provider, who has increased revenue, expanded its team, and secured major partnerships,” ChaTech says of WYRE on its website. “Their people-centered service model and cutting-edge solutions stand out.”
York says WYRE’s early success is rooted in its approach.
“IT is largely a commodity,” he says. “A business leader looks for a partner he can trust. In (Chattanooga), that means a lot.
“The impact we’ve had on the people we’ve worked with kind of came around.”
The WYRE founders say they were working together at another Chattanooga-based managed service provider (MSP) when they decided to break away and try something on their own. Baughn, the company’s COO, says they had in mind from the beginning to do IT differently.
“We exist to break a stereotype,” he says. “We saw a lot of local MSPs adopting a mindset of ‘These are our tools, so these are all we’re going to use. We wanted to offer the best (cyber) security offerings that didn’t tie them or us down.
“Our purpose is to help customers advance their businesses — focus on what they do, and not worry about the IT. We want to come alongside (client) leadership and help them improve their process,” Baughn adds.
The personal approach WYRE’s founders took during the pandemic resulted in the startup winning what’s now its biggest customer — Chattanooga State Community College. York explains that in May 2023, 18 months after he met an IT consultant for coffee at Niedlov’s, that consultant got a call from Chattanooga State, which had just been hit with a ransomware attack.
“Chattanooga State called him, and he recommended us,” York says. “The school was shut down. We helped them out over a period of months, then eventually won a request for proposal (RFP).
“Chattanooga State’s not a whale; it’s not all our business, but it’s that cornerstone client that young companies need,” he says, adding that WYRE’s client stable includes TAG Manufacturing, Lee Smith Co., the Maclellan Foundation and the U.S. Department of Defense contractors, among others.
“We have a lot of nonprofits, too,” York adds. “We run the gamut, from nonprofits to the DOD, because we were built to be flexible.”
WYRE’s founders say the company is on the brink of major growth. Originally launched in St. Elmo, the company recently relocated to the top floor of the Lupton Building on Georgia Avenue in downtown Chattanooga.
In 2025, Wade says, WYRE plans to introduce its own software product for network monitoring and cyber security. York adds that while the company’s headquarters will stay in Chattanooga, the company is looking to grow through acquisitions of smaller companies.
“Companies in Atlanta, Knoxville and Nashville,” he says. “Kind of a natural progression, but we don’t want to get too far out over our skis.”
NOTE: This story was corrected on Dec. 3 to say that WYRE Technology has had U.S. Department of Defense contractors as clients.