5G Talent Talk with Carrie Charles (00:01)
Welcome to 5G Talent Talk. I'm Carrie Charles, your host. And I'm really glad that you are here with me today. We have an exciting episode for you. I think every episode is exciting. I'm especially looking forward to this one. I have with me Serghei Busmachiu. He is the CEO of Utilities One. Serghei, thank you for coming on the show today. Hi, thank you. Thanks for having me at the show. I'm very excited to be here. yes.

I can't wait to get into this. I, Serghei, I'm, want to know about your past and how you got into this industry and how you started because I think it's so inspirational. I appreciate that. So I think I'll get going. So I'll start with the real, real beginning with my humbles beginning in the United States of America. Myself, I'm originally from the Republic of Moldova and I immigrated in United States in 2013.

for looking for a better life. And I was going through multiple jobs myself, trying to build a new life here. And I started my first job at the Johnny Rockets as a dishwasher. And after that, I worked for a couple months there. And after that, I was looking for the next job. And actually, I end up in Alaska selling ice, which is funny and crazy at the same time.

So wait, people really do that? There's people who sell ice in Alaska and you were one of them? Yeah, and actually it's pretty hard during the summer in Alaska. It's a pretty lucrative business. At some point I would think I would buy that business when I want to retire and spend the life in Alaska because it's a beautiful place out there. And you know, going through multiple jobs, construction jobs, moving jobs and so on.

It really turned into the different path of my career. In 2014, a friend of mine ended up to go and move in Chicago. He asked me to come and move with him and maybe we start a new future out there and build a new future. I came to his place, but he didn't have internet at that time. I was Googling what's an internet provider.

provider out there and I called Comcast and Comcast sent in our way a technician and that technician fortunately was from next country from Ukraine and we spoke the same language and I asked him the details about the job itself and he explained all those details and I was excited and intrigued about that opportunity and you know next thing you know I came to

I contacted his employer, which was a contractor for Comcast at that time. And I went to their facility for training. And I spoke about the job details and that's how I ended up in 2014 being a cable tech. And from there, it was a great movement because I started learning what's a real customer satisfaction is.

how should customer to be treated and many times I actually did went an extra mile supporting the clients of Comcast and the clients that was in front of me and that's how I learned in all of the cable industry and that's how I really started understanding and seeing a bright future there and working a couple years

in the industry. That's how I kind of found it to do this one. And now you are a successful founder and entrepreneur and I mean your journey is just fantastic. Who is Utilities One? So tell a little bit more about the story of maybe how it was founded or why, what you do, who you serve.

Yeah, so utilities one, like I said, was founded in 2016 through fulfillment business. And as I said, I started myself as a cable technician and this to the industry. And actually, I made a lot of friends and a lot of good connections through the industry. I brought a lot of people and the colleagues that they are working with me and I trained them as a technician and they kind of learned and

learning about the cable industry. And from there, we started the fulfillment business, that means installation and repair that provides the last mile service. And simultaneous two or three years after we started the fulfillment business, we saw a lot of demand on the construction engineering part. And I always was excited about learning new stuff and about...

bringing the new challenges to myself and to the company and so on. And that's how around 2018-2019 we started the construction division for Telecom and we also developed a year or two later the engineering division. And simultaneously we developed our wireless division as well. At that time there was a huge peak of

5G rollout and there was a lot of work and through our community and through our connection we knew a lot of people that are doing tower climbers, small cell installations and we end up doing the wireless world as well. today, know, in the telecom space itself for the company, it's a nationwide company. We're covering about 20 states from 50 states of the United States.

and we provide the turnkey services for turnkey service from the planning, design, engineering, construction and last mile installation. lately we develop ourselves not only into the telecom business and the wireless business, mean the wireless, you know, we develop other industries that

We saw that our upcoming, they're not as big as today as the telecom business, but they also play a big role for our future and the way where we told someone. And those are industries, our power delivery industry, we have the renewable energy industry, and now lately we cut into the water services industry. So what makes Utilities One really stand out in the marketplace?

I'd like for you to discuss what you mentioned to me, that you provide unicorn service. And I'd love to know what does unicorn service look like? So, know, we tell it this one is obviously, you know, I believe, you know, that the volume that and the growth that stays behind, you know, obviously we delivered a much quality and the reliability and going beyond of our client expectation.

You know, the main thing, you you, you get, you know, lot of great companies out there that are really good construction companies, a really good engineering companies, really good fulfillment companies, but you don't really get the company that does a really, really great, that provides that great of a service, utilities on it, provides it every single part of the service. You know, we take each service as a priority and we believe, you know, our customer that

customer expectation is the top number one priority. And by going, you what makes us as a unicorn, believe, you know, putting all these services combined and also, you know, we, believe for the way we position in the market, we, we never, we was under promise and over delivering. So that's what really, I think makes us as a unicorn and into the business today. And plus a lot of great.

other things that we bring to the partners and to our clients. I believe you really see us as differentiated. You have achieved unbelievable growth in such a short period of time. How many employees do you have now? So the organization itself worths over 3,000 employees today. Wow.

So what do you think contributed to such rapid growth? Well, obviously, to hold this growth, played a major role in the industry that I chose. We see a lot of peaking into the fiber telecom, building fiber in all the rural areas. But obviously, we couldn't deny that.

the great people that we brought into business, I was lucky enough to bring a great COO, Joseph DiMelis, that brought a lot of great leaders with himself. And that was helpful in order to bring the company to the next level. Because obviously with all this growth, comes a lot of demand from the clients, comes a lot of responsibility from our side that we have to deliver to our clients.

I believe that the main thing where he helped us and support us to achieve the growth and the short manual time, it was bringing great team together, putting that great team together and bringing great leaders that really understood my vision from day one and are really out there making things happen for us and making sure we provide the best quality service to our clients.

Do you think that it really made a difference, you starting as a cable tech and how you can relate to every single person in your company? Yes, it does really make a difference because, you know, being starting from the bottom and going all the way up, you know, really comes with a lot of knowledge and going through multiple phases of the company. And, you know, I started the company when, you know, that one or three employees in the beginning and that

growing 3000 employees, obviously a lot of things change might as possible to change on day to day basis. And since we're growing and adding more talented people, we're adding more positions in the company, more roles in the company as possible that we didn't have last year. But because of the growth, we have to be proactive and think about all the risk being a bigger company, thinking about

to other challenges that might come along with being a bigger company. So it really does change. But at the same time, I still remember the days when I was in the beginning, the way we used to run business. And at some point, I think we were able to move much faster. But today, because of being a bigger company, we still move very fast, I believe, comparing to other competitors.

You know, it's not moving as fast as I want it, but I believe we're still doing a great job as a business, as overall as a company. And again, you know, it does really help the background that I was a cable tech and I really know what it means to be out there and what it, you know, just put it that way. I know what it means to working in Florida with a hundred degrees and that it's a really tough job. Yes, it sure is. that customer pressure behind.

Yes, yes, working in 100 degrees with the customer pressure. There you go. It's tough too when you're scaling, whether it's scaling fast or just scaling slow, to maintain a culture. Tell me a little bit about the culture at Utilities One. What is it like to work there? Well, each company, I believe,

has their own culture, but our culture, it's all about hard work and dedication. And myself, I'm coming with the background of mixed martial arts. And it's like never give up until you get the job done or until you win. Same type of culture, we have a totality, so on. And like I always tell to my people and my team, and some of them might not like it, but I always saying that the way like, look, we're not the smartest people in the room. We might not be the smartest people, but...

we're gonna work out everyone else that is going against us to work. That is our competition and by working harder than anybody else, you'll achieve great things. It really comes down to the martial arts. You get very talented sportsmen and you get people that...

I'm not so talented, but very willing to put into the work and willing to achieve anything, martial arts, any other sports. It's very similar to the business industry and it has that competitive mindset that you have to work to achieve the great things. Obviously, get the same thing as here. You get very, very...

smart people and that have real high IQ, but you get people that are not the smartest, but they put so much into the hard work and sometimes we beat those smart people. You're right about that. I've seen that many times. Yep. And that's all about our culture. We don't strive to bring in the company, be somebody with

high level degrees or high level background, you what we strive to bring here, we strive to bring in the business and the organization, employees that wants to work hard and wants to achieve it. And that's kind of what stands out about total sound culture. Yeah, and I call that grit, right, where I come from. Grit, you know, like I was in the Marines and that's what we call it. You know, people who have that grit because I don't have a college degree and

but boy, have I worked hard and I've got that intensity and that work ethic that really is unmatched. So that makes perfect sense. You've got people, Serghei, that have been with Utilities One since day one. And your retention rates are exceptional. So I think what would you attribute that to?

Well, you know, I believe that, you know, each company should have their own way doing things, like I said, and should have the core value where the business come. May think of retention, you know, is I believe it's part of the core value, you know, that we have in the business. you know, I really believe those employees that has been there, they won with me.

They really have the same mindset than I do. you know, really with years of working hand in hand with me, I believe that transition to them as well. And sometimes I just feel very more tough than I am, you know, and I see very more tough to their teams than I am. that's what really, I think, it helped us to have that attention into the business because I was lucky enough, you know, to find the right people that...

have the same type of mentality and that's how we form a great group because look, when you get bigger as I said, you run the business way different, you know, you don't really get involved as much as in the financing, you know, you have just one or two people that you're talking from financing, you don't get too much into the supply chain, you know, you have one or two person talking there, you don't get into the procurement department as much, you don't get too much into program management or...

as other parts of the business, you really talk only with those leaders. By having those leaders with the same mentality, I believe we are able to transmit the energy and the core value of the company from the beginning and to other employees that are newer to the business. That's what really helps. I believe we have a

great culture and utility and on. Because everybody sees the growth that we're having, and that inspires even employees who are in the organization. Because we bring the models, for example, I have the fulfillment vice president Ivan Galkin that has been with ourselves since, I believe, since the beginning of 2016.

He started as a tech as myself and he grew in the company from the supervisor to the manager to the director. Now he is the VP running the division and he's a great example. We still have pictures that we show to other employees. Look, Ivan at that time, you know, he worked as a cable tech for couple of years and he proved himself that he's a great tech. He takes care of the customer and that's how we moved role by role.

Examples like Ivan, I have multiple examples on the organization that I can give to you and to 5G talks. I believe it's many of those that, know, the accounting that is run by Mihaela Poyat, she's been the same way she started from day one. And she was the only one who's doing all the whole accounting. Now she has on her team about 40.

professionals that are doing the accounting and financing for us. So it's many examples that I can bring that help to kind of support that retention rate and organization. You also have a really strong training program. And you believe in internal training. And I think that's probably another big reason why you have so much growth in the company. tell me why.

Why do you feel like it's so important? And also what type of training programs do you have in place? Well, we don't have any specific training like looking, know, by, we don't take any advice from other books or leaders or someone. We try to do it the U1 way. And we try to do it our way training. Our main training is

When we bring somebody in the organization, we try to challenge them to the limits. When the limits break, that's when we start to support him. We really want see what that individual is capable of doing. That being said, the way we prioritize and the way we see things on the leadership training is like...

It's like better shoot for the moon and land among the stars. And that's how kind of we do the training, if that makes sense to you. It's really, you know, challenging. It's all about challenges. It's all about, know, every day when I wake up, I challenge myself, you know, and that's what I'm expecting from the other leaders in the organization to challenge themselves and challenge the teams that they're running today.

And we obviously know with all these challenges, I love to see that people failing and I love to support them to be successful because without failures, there's no winners. So again, we're coming back to the culture of mixed martial arts where you lose, you learn, and you win again. So that's how you get to the next level, just to learn from the defeats.

humble and defeats him. inspires you as a leader? Like what drives you? The main thing that drives me as a leader, it's, you know, like I mentioned before, you know, it drives me, day to day the growth of the company and drives me, you know, to see that employees that has been with me for many years from day one and see them, you know, and remember them from day one.

the way we used to do things and the way we're running the business and the way we're doing things for the company. It really drives me to see the growth inside of the business and drives me to the mind that I was able to change so many lives and I was able to change, support so many families and help so many families to put the food on their table. Also, it drives me to provide the...

quality service that helps us to go with a larger scale. It drives me to wake up every morning and think what's the next thing for the utility swan? Where is the utility swan going to move? Are we going to move more into the power services or moving into the water services? Where's the future going to take us? Go and figure out those things. As you said, being without a college degree, it's all about

going out there and kind of start figuring out things like how you can make those things happen because you know it's a little challenging to go out there and you know with no experience to learn you know new industry to learn the new challenges and you know the most important to get a chance you know to prove yourself in that industry and I know it's a different industry but I see a lot of similarity and those

on all the infrastructure industry by end of the day. like I said prior, through hard work and dedication, you can achieve anything. And to answer your question, my drive and my why today is to build a company that will really make an impact in the industry. So let's talk a little bit about the industry and where do you see the opportunities now?

not only in telecom, but also in adjacent verticals. Yeah, so, I mean, industry itself, know, it's got industries itself has kind of moved different direction, I believe. Today, you know, today, you know, our focus as a business is telecom industry.

Just because, you know, after the COVID, everybody, you know, went and worked in rural areas and some of them didn't have the connectivity and didn't have the reliable internet out there. We see today a lot of focus into building the fiber to the rural areas and support, you know, America to build, you know, a great fiber network.

But simultaneously, I see the other demands that are coming out there. We have a huge demand from AI that obviously will drive to increase the build of the power grid, to build more smart, smarter power grid, and just improving the power infrastructure. And that obviously, we have the power delivery infrastructure.

division that you know we're growing that division and I see a lot of potential keep growing that division because you know with this AI and EV charges and many other things coming and infrastructure I see a huge need for our power grid and also let's not forget about

The achievement that is coming from the Biden administration about the carbon pollution free by 2035 and net zero emission by 2050, which that also will drive a lot of growth in our renewable energy division where we have capabilities as an EPC, engineering procurement and construction for the solar farms, for the wind turbines and other...

other aspects of energy, of renewable and sustainable energy. I see a great growth in that division as well. And nonetheless, this thing, we started the water division, where if you take those other parts of the infrastructure, those are more like commodities. This part I see more as a water necessity and we need good

good water to drink and to bring in the people's homes and the customers' businesses and so on. By starting this division this year, we're pretty new to this, but I see a lot of the necessity of great services and that aspect of the water. I see huge potential out there by building the new pipe.

lines, the water sewer and the building, know, installing the water meters to detect, you know, the quality of water and the leakage and so on. So it's, I see a I see a huge demand in other parts of the industry is beside the telecom in the next couple of years as well. But I just believe today our focus and area of expertise will be the telecom for next couple of years, but simultaneously start

that start improving and growing bigger than other industries that I mentioned. Wow. Sergey, I have no doubt that Utilities One is going to be, who knows, mean, maybe a unicorn billion dollar company. What are your goals? What is your vision for the future? What do you see Utilities One becoming in the future? Well, so the future, know, obviously is bright and I believe we're going to

pass overpriced $1 billion pretty soon as a business because we have great things and great industries that we're working on. The vision for Utilities One is to be a partner of choice for critical infrastructure and not only in the United States, but globally. today we're working on the huge project that the Department of Reconstruction of Ukraine that we're going to be a part of on the

restoration of, you know, some portion after the war of Russia. But we're in the discussion today that we're going to go out there and build the residential, 50,000 residential homes across the Ukraine and supporting other initiative in the country of Ukraine. And that will really help us, you know, to put our foot in all more into the global areas. And we also

looking for other opportunities to develop the business and South America and Chile, Peru, Colombia and other areas that I see that there is also an opportunity in the need. you know, the vision for the future of this one is to become a global company, a global company for, like I said, a partner of choice for critical infrastructure. that's where we're moving. And I believe, you know, if we will...

We should do a recap of this interview in two, three years and we'll be way, way ahead of the game that we are today because we're going through a different phase. I have no doubt, Serghei, how can we reach Utilities One and also find out about open jobs that you have?

So yeah, have, know, obviously we have the career and our utilities one website and we also have a contact form that you can reach out to us. Also, you know, I could share my personal information if that's needed. Wonderful. Serghei, this has just been fantastic. Thank you for sharing and it's just, you're such an inspiration. You inspire me.

So I feel like just stopping after this interview and going to work and working harder than I've ever worked in my life. So this has been fantastic. Thank you for coming on. Well, thanks for having me. Have a great day. Thank you.