CHARLESTON, W.Va. — The owner of Kanawha Valley-based Alpha Technologies was honored Monday in Washington, D.C. at the annual Small Business Person of the Year.
Alpha President and CEO Doug Tate represented West Virginia and Tate learned Monday he was the first runner-up for the national Small Business Person of the Year.
Charlie Denny, director of government relations at Alpha, told MetroNews the recognition came because the company has a good story.
“It started out with a guy back in 2000. Doug was a service disabled veteran and wanted to come home to West Virginia and worked here with Charter Communications and some other folks then decided, like many entrepreneurs, he’d knew a better way to do it,” Denny said.
Alpha has come a long way since its founding, Denny said.
“I think a small company buying an 80,000 square foot data center and making that work, then taking on building a 35 mile fiber ring in a state where broadband access is mediocre to poor, is a pretty good story,” he said.
Earlier this year, Administrator Linda McMahon, the head of the U.S. Small Business Administration, announced this year’s Small Business Person of the Year winners from the 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico.
In honor of National Small Business Week, McMahon will take part in a bus road show starting in Jacksonville, Fla. and then continue on to South Carolina and North Carolina. Each stop she will meet with small business owners, visit small businesses and hold roundtable discussions.